Verse 1 I saw the Lord standing upon the altar: and he said, Smite the lintel of the door, that the posts may shake: and cut them in the head, all of them; and I will slay the last of them with the sword: he that fleeth of them shall not flee away, and he that escapeth of them shall not be delivered.
The prophet Amos sees another vision of the LORD standing upon the altar presumably of the Temple. When the LORD stands it means He is doing a work. Here is pictured the destruction of the religious system which would be accomplished by war and invasion by another nation. The Temple and all its religious aspects had become idolatrous and needed to be destroyed by a righteous God. Notice He is upon the altar, not next to it or behind it. This is significant and points to the LORD Jesus Christ in the future being offered up as a sacrificial lamb.
Verses 2-4 Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down: 3 And though they hide themselves in the top of Carmel, I will search and take them out thence; and though they be hid from my sight in the bottom of the sea, thence will I command the serpent, and he shall bite them: 4 And though they go into captivity before their enemies, thence will I command the sword, and it shall slay them: and I will set mine eyes upon them for evil, and not for good.
The Hebrew word translated as “hell” is “shaowl” also spelled shehole or shaol. It means grave, hell, pit, underworld, or sheol. In the Old Testament it is the abode of the dead and a place where wicked people are sent for punishment. Mount Carmel was the place the prophet Elijah had a showdown with 850 pagan priests and won as recorded in 1 Kings 17 and 18. In ancient times this location was considered to be a holy place and the name means “garden-land” as the rainfall produces a lush and fertile environment. The highest part of the mountain ridge is approximately 1700 feet above sea level. The word picture here is that no matter where the Israelites try to hide from God, His judgement will reach them and this judgement and the resulting punishment is unavoidable.
Application: Notice that in verse three above God says, “I will command the serpent, and he shall bite them”. Satan is “the serpent” and the one the Israelites of Amos’ day and the Jews of today worship. They call him Leviathan and believe he is holy, and they believe the serpent was good to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden because he showed them that they did not have to listen to God Almighty but that they could ascend to godhood themselves. So it appears that God who is in control of everything will use Satan to harm and punish the rebellious Israelites. This is an interesting concept where the very spiritual entity the people reverence and worship will be that which harms them. Look at the nations today and notice that the governments of these nations are wicked and serving Satan and that the people who, for the most part, have rejected the LORD Jesus Christ are being victimized by their own wicked governments. Could it be that God is allowing Satan a free hand for the very purpose of bring judgement upon a wicked and perverse generation of people?
Verses 5-6 And the Lord GOD of hosts is he that toucheth the land, and it shall melt, and all that dwell therein shall mourn: and it shall rise up wholly like a flood; and shall be drowned, as by the flood of Egypt. 6 It is he that buildeth his stories in the heaven, and hath founded his troop in the earth; he that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The LORD is his name.
The prophet Amos speaks of the sovereignty or supreme power, and the authority, omnipresence, and omnipotence of God Almighty. The Hebrew word translated as “LORD” is “Yahovah” and it appears 6519 times in Scripture. It is translated 6510 times as “LORD”, 4 times as “GOD”, and 4 times as “JEHOVAH”. The land that had been promised to the Hebrew people since the days of Abraham would be taken from them. The land always belonged to the LORD. They had polluted it with sin and the word picture presented in the verses above is that of a cleansing of the land like that which would occur with a flood of water. The prophet Amos’ words should have reminded the Israelites of Who was in charge. But like all the prophets’ words that God sent to Israel and Judah, the messages were ignored.
Verse 7 Are ye not as children of the Ethiopians unto me, O children of Israel? saith the LORD. Have not I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt? and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir?
God is stating that the Israelites are no better than other pagan nations for which He also did good works. Their rejection of Him and their slide into idolatry and pagan religious practices put them on the same level as those nations around them. They were no longer children of God, but were children of the Devil. “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.” John 8:44
Application: “Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you.” 2 Corinthians 6:17 This command and promise to the Church was true in ancient days. Because the nations of Israel and Judah failed to remain separate from the unclean things, they were destroyed by the very God who chose them to be His special people in the first place. The Israel of today is the Church. It is a spiritual Israel based on faith in Jesus Christ and not a physical Israel. As the Church becomes more and more secular and as it embraces the doctrines of men instead of the pure words of Scripture and compromises to become more and more like the unrighteous in the world around it, will God pronounce judgement upon it? “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God?” 1 Peter 4:17
Verse 8 Behold, the eyes of the Lord GOD are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth; saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, saith the LORD.
Why did God not destroy Judah (the combined tribes of Judah and Benjamin) at the same time He destroyed Israel (the 10 northern tribes)? After all, He called it “the sinful kingdom”. Most likely it was that the tribe of Judah was the line through which the Messiah would come. So Judah along with the city of Jerusalem was kept in store until the LORD Jesus Christ came and ministered on Earth. It was then annihilated by the Romans with Jerusalem falling in 70 AD.
Verse 9 For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth.
This verse is interpreted by most Bible scholars and commentators to mean that the righteous Israelites would be spared. This writer disagrees. God declared the entire kingdom to be sinful and therefore there would be no righteous to spare. When physical grain is sifted to separate it from chaff or from dirt and debris, the corn/grain is then saved and, if not eaten, it is planted the next year for a new crop to grow. The corn/grain must be put back into the soil to grow. So this writer believes that this analogy means that the house of Israel was dispersed amongst pagan nations (eaten) never to be planted in a land where they could grow into a nation again. As long as the people (corn) were sifted all over the Earth (nations), they could not unite (fall upon the earth) and form a nation. The physical nation Israel of today was invented by the power elites (Rothschild and friends) and the people calling themselves “Jews” living there have been proven to not be genetically related to the ancient Hebrews to whom God gave the land. So this verse is true and the prophecy came to pass when looked at from this perspective.
Verse 10 All the sinners of my people shall die by the sword, which say, The evil shall not overtake nor prevent us.
All means all. So the Israelite nation was going to be destroyed by war and the people ignored the warning of Amos and the other prophets God sent to let them know their future if they failed to repent. They persecuted the prophets and never believed their nation could fall. Jesus said,“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!” Matthew 23:37
Verses 11-12 In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old: 12 That they may possess the remnant of Edom, and of all the heathen, which are called by my name, saith the LORD that doeth this.
Most pastors, Bible teachers, and prophecy scholars will say that the above verses are about the physical nation Israel, but they cannot be. Why? Because God refers to the remnant of Edom and all the heathen which are called by His name. These people would be Gentiles.
Verses 13-15 Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed; and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. 14 And I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. 15 And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the LORD thy God. (Amos 9)
For a plowman to overtake the reaper it would mean that the farmer was having a bumper crop and was still harvesting when it was time to turn the soil over and replant. The same situation would exist for the vineyards and for all the vegetation in the land. Before geoengineering and weather manipulation, farmers had specific times of the year, depending on their geographical location, when they would plow, plant, tend and harvest food crops. With the governments of the world and their military along with various corporations “seeding” the sky with chemicals and heavy metals to produce artificial weather, the tasks of the farmers world wide has become more difficult if not impossible. For more information on geoengineering visit https://www.geoengineeringwatch.org and https://www.themontanaassemblytownsquare.info.
Verses 11 and 12 and 14-15 have repeatedly been interpreted by those who have adopted the Scofield doctrine fable as a physical restoration of the two nations, Israel and Judah. Modern day Christian believers are waiting for present day Israel to be completely restored and then for Jesus Christ to return and establish an Earthly kingdom for a thousand years and to have King David reappear and rule over Israel from Jerusalem and so forth. This fable or doctrine of man makes Jesus Christ, LORD, Savior and Almighty God, a liar. “Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews (yes, He said the Jews): but now is my kingdom not from hence.” John 18:36 So for Jesus to allow an Earthly kingdom to be established would make His words untrue. Jesus is not a liar. He is God, very God. “In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began;” Titus 1:2 These verses are metaphor referring to the Israel of God which is made up of all believers from all nations, tongues and tribes, who believe in and follow the LORD Jesus Christ through faith, and who are therefore spiritual descendants of Abraham, and who are under the New Covenant established by Jesus Christ when He came to this Earth and ministered, died, and rose again for the remittance of the sins of living men and women. The Church today is the Israel of God, not the physical UN and Rothschild created nation on the Mediterranean Sea who is responsible for wars, death and destruction. Jesus pronounced that land to be desolate, and it is desolate today spiritually. It is the habitation of Satan’s servants, New World Order elite, and Illuminati deceivers and murderers. There is nothing holy about that land. But all of God’s people are under the leadership of the LORD Jesus Christ, Son of David, and therefore the rightful Heir to the throne of David spiritually. Therefore when Jesus came and established His spiritual kingdom, He took and raised up the tabernacle of David that had fallen physically. There was no rightful king in Judah during the Roman occupation, but the Herods who were kings working for Caesar were descendants from the Edomites. Therefore, the Christian believers who established the Church and who were called by His name defied the “remnant of Edom” and “all the heathen” where ever they went as they proclaimed the Gospel of Jesus and brought down the doctrines of men and of Satan. And the picture of prosperity and restoration in the verses above points to both the blessed physical lives of the Christian believers and to the Heavenly life they will inherit when they leave this world for eternity. For further study, see Jeremiah chapter 33.