Plan and Purpose Bible Lesson #III-45 Tension in Creation, Amos 4-9 For our last couple of lessons, we have been reading a chapter from the book Creation s Jubilee by Dr. Stephen Jones for the purpose of understanding how God creates evil and uses evil in His plan for mankind, yet does not sin in doing so. I would like to finish that chapter in this lesson and then we will continue in the book of Amos. 3. David Numbers Israel When Israel fell into sin during the last part of David's rule, we read the following in 2 Samuel 24. 1 Now again the anger of the LORD burned against Israel, and it incited David against them to say, "Go, number Israel and Judah." The same story is told in 1 Chronicles 21:1, but here we find an interesting difference in the story: "Then SATAN stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel." We might ask, who caused David to sin? Was it God or Satan? Or perhaps it was David himself, since we see later that David took full credit for his sin (2 Sam. 24:10). The fact is, all three were involved, but on different levels. David took the proper attitude in taking responsibility for his sin. On the level of God's thelema will, David had violated the Law by not collecting the soldier's ransom (a half-shekel each, Exodus 30:12-16) to atone for their souls, that they not die in battle. In exposing them to mortal danger, he sinned and therefore needed to repent. But yet 1 Chronicles 21:1 claims it was Satan who tempted David to sin. On the highest level of God's boulema plan, God takes full credit for doing it (2 Samuel 24:1). This is not a contradiction, any more than where one report says, "The President won the battle;" another says, "General Quadsteller won the battle;" and a third report says, "Our brave soldiers won the battle." All three are correct, but on differing levels of truth. In this case, God wanted the job done, and so He did it through Satan, who tempted David to do the actual sin. And once again, God's plan was carried out perfectly. David sinned, because he failed to observe divine law; God did NOT sin, because He succeeded in His plan. What was that plan? It was first to judge Israel for sin. Secondly, the plan was to expose David's lack of the knowledge of sin, so that he could correct it. Thirdly, it was to provide opportunity for David to purchase the threshingfloor of Ornan, which was to become the future site of the temple of Solomon. Once again, God had a plan, an overall goal. He could have gotten there without the problem and conflict with evil, but he did not. Turning evil into good was also part of the plan. 4. The Lesson of Job The book of Job is the treatise that God inspired in order to teach us the subservience of Satan. While some may believe that "Satan" here is only a human being, it matters little for our purposes. Either way, the principle is maintained. Satan needed permission from God to do anything to Job. God gave him such permission in 2:6 and 7. 6 So the LORD said to Satan, "Behold, he is in your power, only spare his life." 7 Then Satan went out from the presence of the LORD, and smote Job with sore boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head. What follows is a commentary on the reason and purpose of suffering in the earth. Job had three friends who each argued from a different point of view, but none of them understood the mind of God.
Eliphaz argued from human experience: you reap what you sow in life, so Job's troubles are because he must have sinned. Bildad said his problem was bad karma: Job's troubles are because he sinned in a past life and is now paying for it in this present life. Zophar argued from human merit: all are born rebellious and are responsible to purify their own hearts to avoid these judgments of God. Wisdom and purity will merit God's favor. Almost all men would answer in one of these three ways. The religions of the East argue like Bildad. The Greek philosophers and many Christians would argue like Zophar. Phariseeism and much of modern Christianity would argue like Eliphaz. Yet they all fell short of understanding the mind of God, because they did not comprehend the plan and purpose of God. Only Elihu had the answer, which we will summarize: "You think that you are more just than God. You have said there is no gain in trusting in His righteousness. You have questioned if perhaps there is more profit in NOT following Him. When men are oppressed by a tyrant, they cry out for help, but no one ever seems to ask God for answers. When they do, He does not answer because of their pride in thinking that God is unjust and unfairly treating them. If the righteous are bound in the stocks with trials, it is that he may show them their deeds and their sins which have sprung from pride. In this way he opens their ears and instructs them to turn from their iniquity. If they hear His voice, they will prosper in peace and righteousness; if not, they will perish by the sword and die not knowing why. So take heed. Do not tell God, 'You have done wrong.' Remember to extol His work, rather than tell Him how to run the universe." As it turns out, Job's troubles came only because God wanted him to understand that we must not be bitter against God for allowing us to have adversity. We must not accuse God of being unfair or unjust toward us. When evil comes upon us, our pride immediately begins to surface. We treat God as though he were unjust. Such an attitude presupposes that we know better than God what justice really is. And so God sends adversity upon us, even to our breaking point, in order that we may obtain a deeper understanding of the justice of God. We learn that His "injustices" are only temporary, and that He knows how to turn these "evils" into good. Once we really begin to believe this, we enter upon the true life of faith, where we view all our adversaries ultimately as tools of God to train us as His sons and daughters. That is the place of rest, which God invites us to enter today. 5. The Death of Jesus It could be said that the death of Jesus was the worst evil ever done in the world. Yet what Christian could doubt that it was also the greatest good? Can there be any doubt that God turned the greatest evil into the greatest good? The crucifixion became the instrument of the salvation of the world. Once again, God's thelema will was thwarted in order to accomplish the hidden boulema plan of God. God's will was that all men everywhere accept Him as the Messiah. God's plan was that he would be "despised and rejected" (Isaiah 53:3). His death was an integral part of the plan. Without His death on the cross, the whole plan would have failed, and God would have become a sinner. Caiaphas could no more have refused to crucify Jesus than Pharaoh could have let Israel go. It was all part of the plan. Caiaphas was held liable, of course, even as Pharaoh, Esau, and even David were held
liable. Yet the liability is limited to the level of the thelema will. God alone takes responsibility for the boulema plan. Did Caiaphas sin in doing this? Yes, of course he did. Did God sin? Absolutely NOT. God did not fail in the goal that was set before Him by the counsel of His own will. In the divine plan Jesus was crucified from the foundation of the world. When men do evil (as defined by the divine law), it is sin to them, because they violate the standard that God has given to men. When God does evil, it is always in accordance with His plan, which is His own standard of measure. If this sounds unfair or unjust, we simply refer the reader to the book of Job for a lesson in pride. We are not God; we are not always capable of bringing good out of evil, as He is. Our concept of justice and righteousness is warped by the death that resides in our souls. We need, above all, to have faith in Him that He knows what He is doing, and He does all things well. The Tension Resolved Universal reconciliation is God's final solution to the tension in creation brought about by the "temporary injustices" which He Himself instituted. The divine law defines the judicial question by insisting that God take responsibility for all "injustices" that He does or allows to be done. The Biblical account leaves us no alternative but to justify God by universal reconciliation. No other solution is adequate to ease the tension that He imposed upon creation by subjecting all to futility. Only when we recognize this can we resolve the greatest philosophical question ever conceived by man-the origin, purpose, and end of all evil. This completes the study from the book Creation s Jubilee. Continuing now with the book of Amos. We were reading from the 3 rd chapter of Amos in which Amos assures us that nothing happens that God does not bring about. However, God promises that before He does anything to Israel or Judah, He will reveal it to them through the prophets. We ll find that this is true, though seldom do the people listen or respond to them. God then deals with Israel only in what He has to say through Amos. (Read Amos 3:9-15) God makes it clear to Israel and to Syria that He is bringing an adversary against them. Ferrar Fenton renders verse 12 as, Thus says the LORD,--As after a lion a shepherd picks up two feet, or the part of an ear,--so shall the children of Israel be at Shomeron hid in a nook, or laid in a bed in Damask. In other words, after God brings their adversary against them, there won t be much left of Israel who are living in luxury. He is speaking here of the coming Assyrian captivity. It won t make any difference whether one is rich or poor, high status or low, all will be affected the same way. Bethel was Israel s equivalent to Judah s Jerusalem in the sense that this was where the priests were and where the king went to worship when he worshipped God. (Read Amos 4) The first part of chapter 4 is addressed to the women who were at ease in Israel, though in what some might think as unkind terms. God is calling these women, who apparently were of the upper class, and who oppressed the needy, cows or heifers. To indicate that they are going into captivity, He says that He will take them away with hooks and their remnant with fish hooks. In some of the Assyrian monuments, their captives are portrayed with hooks in their noses. The word palace in verse 3 appears to refer to a place, but no place is known by the name given in the Hebrew. It apparently meant they would be placed in exile.
Since their sacrifices had become repugnant to God because of their worship of the altar and the sacrifice itself, verses 4 and 5 tells them to come to Bethel and Gilgal and multiply their transgressions. God is being a little ironic here with them. God then lists several things like famine, drought, and pestilence, etc. that He has brought on Israel, yet they have not returned to Him. (Re-read verse 12-13) (Read Amos 5) I think we need to take warning in our time as our sins are not that different from those of Israel in Amos time. God condemns their false religion. They have gone to great pains to preserve their false gods, which are no gods at all, but have strayed from justice and righteousness. There is still time for Israel to turn to the true God. He gives some of His credentials in verse 8 He created the constellations, created light and darkness and causes the waters of the seas to be spread out over the earth as rain and snow. He strengthens the weak against the strong. How could the people possibly worship idols whether they be literal idols or idols of the heart in the face of such a God? The people obviously think they are safe in their stone houses and with their pleasant vineyards, but God says they will not live in their stone houses or drink the wine from their vineyards. He says they afflict the just and take bribes and render unjust judgments against the poor. They over tax the poor. He describes the coming day of the LORD as a day of darkness. He says He hates their feast days and solemn assemblies and their burnt offerings. While these are things they had been commanded to do by God, they had perverted them so that they were worshipping the feast days and the burnt offerings and the altars instead of the God that had instructed them to do them. They had become an abomination to Him. He ends the chapter telling them that they are going into captivity beyond Damascus. (Read Amos 6) I take this as a warning to Judah. The people of Judah, particularly the leadership, are guilty of the same things as the people of Israel were, they just weren t as bad yet, but God is telling them that the same things that are going to happen to Israel could and would happen to Judah. He tells them that if they think that the things that are going to happen to Israel can t happen to Judah, then they need to go look at some of the other nations that God has brought to destruction. He asks if Judah is any better or any stronger than these nations were. The affliction of Joseph in verse 6 is a reference to breach between the two kingdoms that divided the two. The leadership of Judah is not grieved over this breach, but are secure in their own minds thinking they cannot be harmed. But the men of Israel are going into captivity. If there are any left following the siege that God is bringing upon them, they will die from other causes such as pestilence. Here and in I Sam. 31:12 are the only places in the Bible where it discusses the burning of corpses. I m not sure of the significance, but both cases are exceptional cases. Here, it appears to me to be because of the large number that will be killed. Verse 12 needs a little explanation. God infers that it would be crazy to run horses on solid rock or to try to plow with an ox either on rock or as suggested by Dr. Bullinger, the sea. It is with this same madness that Israel has turned judgment into gall and the fruit of righteousness into hemlock, or wormwood. Israel basically says that it is by their own strength that they have achieved what they have and it will be their own strength that they will turn back the enemy that God is bringing against them.
However, God says that the enemy that He is bringing against them will afflict them throughout the length and breadth of the land. Chapter 7 begins by symbolically representing to Amos the army discussed in the previous verse as grasshoppers that will utterly destroy the land. This disturbs Amos greatly and he asks God to forgive as he sees no way for Israel (Jacob) to recover. He says that God repented and said It shall not be. God then symbolically showed Amos the great destruction by using fire. Again, this disturbed Amos so that he asked God to forgive and asked who would raise Israel (Jacob) up. Again the same thing happened. (Read Amos 7:7-9) God then uses a plumbline to tell Amos that He would measure what Israel was doing by the plummet of righteousness and judgment and says that He will not pass by them (forgive) any more. As a result, the high places of Israel (Isaac) would be desolate and the sanctuaries would be laid waste. Also God said He would rise against the house of Jeroboam, who was king of Israel at the time, with the sword. This didn t set well with Amaziah who was the priest at Bethel and he wrote a letter to Jeroboam telling him that Amos conspired against Jeroboam to kill him. He then tried to get Amos to go to Judah and prophesy there instead of in Israel and to not prophesy any more in Bethel. (Read Amos 7:14-17) This was Amos answer. (Read Amos 8) The summer fruit means ripe fruit. This indicates that as the fruit was ripe, the time for the destruction of Israel was also ripe, or had come. The people were polluting God s commandments and appeared to be thinking only on how they could make more money. God says He is not going to forget what Israel had been doing and wasn t going to forgive them anymore. He is going to turn the land into a land of mourning. He is going to bring about a famine of hearing the words of the LORD. The people who were worshipping the golden calves that Jeroboam the Ist had set up in Dan and Beersheba were going to fall and not be raised up He says. (Read Amos 9) There will be no escaping the judgment of God when He brings the Assyrians on Israel. The people will realize that He only is God, the creator. He then assures Israel that He is not going to completely destroy them, but rather He is going to sift them among all nations. (Read Isa. 43:10-12) Though God is punishing Israel for their sins by putting them in captivity, it is by this captivity that Israel will ultimately be this witness to all the world. Though the terminology changes some in both the Old and New Testaments, we are kept aware that these are the people that are those witnesses, if we but study His Word. Amos then looks ahead to the last days in which God establishes His kingdom here on the earth. The planting of Israel after their escaping the land of their captivity and migrating westward to the various lands to which they ultimately came, western Europe, the British Isles, north America, Australia, South Africa, etc. are all partial fulfillments of verses 14 and 15. It is to these lands that we have seen immigrants from all over the world come to in the last 200 years as God gathers them from where He sowed them following this captivity that we are talking about here in Amos. What we see happening now in our nation and other Israel nations is an attempt by man to thwart the purpose of God, but it will not work ultimately. We need to catch up on our history some and go back to the book of Isaiah in our next lesson. JRL