GOD DID IT! – (Read Amos 4:6-11)

We will allow God to be anywhere but upon His Throne.

So we fashion for ourselves a “god” of our own Imagination and liking, creating in our thoughts, molding Him the way we believe He should behave, limiting Him from being who He is and lessening His authority…limiting Him to what He can and cannot do or be like. We strip away His right to rule completely. We sit in judgment of God as though we are on the Eternal Sovereign Throne. We will let Him co-reign with us even but as long as He knows we get the deciding vote! He is a sort of a junior partner, knowing He exists to serve us … such is who we “serve” and desire, “a god” of our own imagination. But Not so Amos. He reports who God is, what He is like… how He behaves when He chooses, where He chooses and how He chooses and no one will thwart Him… and shows in the calamities that befell the people – GOD DID IT!

Amos 4:6-11. God caused the calamities!…

GOD DID IT!

FOOD SHORTAGE- GOD DID IT!

I gave you empty stomachs in every city and lack of bread in every town, YET you have not returned to Me,” declares the LORD”– (v 6}

DROUGHT- GOD DID IT!

I also withheld rain from you when the harvest was still three months away. I sent rain on one town, but withheld it from another. One field had rain; another had none and dried up. People staggered from town to town for water but did not get enough to drink, YET you have not returned to Me, declares the LORD. “-{v7- 8}

CROPS DESTROYED- GOD DID IT!

“ Many times I struck your gardens and vineyards, destroying them with blight and mildew. Locusts devoured your fig and olive trees, YET you have not returned to Me,” declares the LORD” -{v9|

PLAGUES- GOD DID IT!

I sent plagues among you as I did to Egypt. I killed your young men with the sword, along with your captured horses. I filled your nostrils with the stench of your camps, YET you have not returned to Me,” declares the LORD.”-{v10]

OVERTHROWN- GOD DID IT!

I overthrew some of you as I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah. You were like a burning stick snatched from the fire, YET you have not returned to Me,” declares the LORD. ”-{v11}

GOD DID IT FOR A PURPOSE That they would turn to Him but He testified against them…“YET you have not returned to Me,” declares the LORD”

“Therefore this is what I will do to you, Israel, and because I will do this to you, Israel, prepare to meet your God.“-{v12}

He calls them to personal responsibility and accountability – To GOD! Everyone eventually faces God. Those who would not turn, The time, In His time will meet Him whom they refused to turn to!

WHO IS HE?

“He who forms the mountains, who creates the wind, and who reveals His thoughts to mankind, who turns dawn to darkness, and treads on the heights of the earth- the LORD God Almighty is His name.” -{v13}

Don’t try to make excuses for God or make Him somehow look ”better,” “water” Him down, “tame” Him and make Him more appetizing, and harmless, nor give Him a “PR Makeover” to be “politically correct,” an ecumenical “god of all the peoples” who will not rattle society but fit in and maybe even be like a mascot, a cheerleader, someone who can be wheeled out for those feel-good moments. Indeed, a figurehead having position but no real power apart from granting the “three wishes” to come true when Demanded and expected of Him!

But He is not like that for He is God. In the days of Amos, and He acted not out of vindictiveness to those whom He created but out of mercy, grace, compassion. He loved them and knew they were going the wrong way in their choices in living and desired what was right and best for them and that is ALWAYS God’s Way! For He Created them for His own glory, and they were not fulfilling the purpose for which they were Created for! -{Read Isaiah 43:7}

THE REASON HE DID IT?

So that they would turn to Him who loved them, forsake their sin and to Him who had cared for them and they were His by right, as He has created them for His own glory !-( Read Isaiah 43:7) and yet we sadly read of their rejection of their Maker and His love, – “ yet you have not returned to Me.” H

He brought calamities and yet the hardness of their hearts, their ungratefulness towards Him would not be moved… But they chose not to repent toward Him! They refused to turn their back on self-will, and sin to Him!

GOD DID IT! He did it so they would Repent. Turn from self, sin to GOD!

God is on His Throne. Sovereign King needing no one’s Permission to affirm if He can or cannot act. The Psalmist wrote,

“I know that the Lord is great,
that our Lord is greater than all gods.
The Lord does whatever pleases Him,
in the heavens and on the earth,
in the seas and all their depths
.” – (Psalm 135;6)

And in Amos Day God did what pleases Him, He acted –

WHO DID IT? WHO CAUSED THE CALAMITIES?

GOD DID IT!

And God is Still On His Throne today! And He Still Acts!