Monday, July 2

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Monday

This week we’ll continue our series on the Minor Prophets of the Old Testament, “Who Were Those Guys?” by exploring the book of Amos. Before we can dive into the message and content of Amos though we’ve got to figure out who he was, and what he was writing about.  In short we’ve got to start our exploration of Amos by asking, “Who was this guy?” That’s what we’ll explore in today’s post.

The book of Amos is different than many of the Minor Prophets where we’re given little information about the prophets other than a name (Joel, Obadiah, and Jonah for example). The book of Amos is different though. In Amos we’re presented with a detailed superscription that gives us lots of identifying information about who he was. Amos 1:1 opens the book by stating that the book contains,

“The words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa —what he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake, when Uzziah was king of Judah and Jeroboam son of Jehoash was king of Israel.”

There are a few pieces of information there that will prove to be important in our study of Amos. First note the profession of Amos, Amos was “one of the shepherds of Tekoa.” Amos was not a priest, nor was he wasn’t raised by his parents to be a prophet. Rather Amos was what many of you reading this right now are, he was a businessman. Amos background makes his message throughout the book all the more remarkable. As we’ll discover Amos was not given an easy message to bring to the nation of Israel.

Although his message was not easy to bring, Amos brought it courageously. I love how Amos responds to the false prophet Amaziah who calls on Amos to end his ministry. Bear in mind as you read Amos’ response that Amaziah was a powerful guy. Amaziah was employed by the King of Israel and could have easily had Amos killed. So in Amos 7:14 when told to back down from his prophecies against the nation of Israel Amos courageously proclaims, “I was neither a prophet nor a prophet’s son, but I was a shepherd, and I also took care of sycamore-fig trees. But the Lord took me from tending the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’”

I love how Amos leans on his story to give his message its power. Amos makes it clear that he’s not saying what he’s saying because he wants to say it, he’s saying it because God has told him to say it! Pastor Mark Driscoll likes to describe himself as a “Nobody trying to tell everybody about somebody.” That description fits Amos quite well. Amos was a nobody called to tell everybody about somebody. He was a meager shepherd called out of a life of business into a life of prophesy. Amos was called to prophesy to everybody in the nation of Israel to warn them of the impending judgment of the Lord.

I want to close out today’s post by encouraging those of you who are not involved in ministry vocationally. For all of you that are faithfully serving the Lord while still holding down a day job , you’re in good company, Amos was one of you! Amos was a man just like you, an ordinary man called to tell of an extraordinary God. You don’t have to be a Pastor to make an eternal difference in people’s lives. You don’t have to be a “…prophet or the son of a prophet,” to speak for the Lord. You just have to be a nobody willing to tell everybody about somebody.  

Grant Diamond