Amos "Famine in the Land" This Bible Study is written by Roger Christopherson, and made available with written permission by http://www.theseason.org This book is a record of God's corrective plan for His children. It is symbolic, with a prophetic message for our generation, in the end times. Amos 8:1 "Thus hath the Lord God shewed unto me: and behold a basket of summer fruit." Summer fruit means it's ripe; it's plump. This fruit is in reference to figs: Over-ripe figs. Ready to plop and spatter on the ground when they fall. Amos 8:2 "And he said, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A basket of summer fruit. Then said the Lord unto me, The end is come upon my people of Israel; I will not again pass by them any more." God tells Amos that His people are ripe for chastisement; He is going to correct them. Amos 8:3 "And the songs of the temple shall be howlings in that day, saith the Lord God: there shall be many dead bodies in every place; they shall cast them forth with silence." God is telling His People of Israel that when you sing your church hymns in these latter days, He will look at them as howling rather than worship and praise. That's because those hymns are not based upon His oracles, but your vain traditions, and pagan worship. Songs like "I'll Fly Away", when it's not written in God's Word, except in Ezekiel 13:17-23, where God tells us He's against them that teach souls to fly. Ezekiel 13:20 "Wherefore thus saith the Lord God; Behold, I am against your pillows, wherewith ye there hunt the souls to make them fly, and I will tear them from your arms, and will let the souls go, even the souls that ye hunt to make them fly," If you think you're going to fly to save your soul, it's time to wake up to what the Word of God actually says. God is unhappy with those who teach you to fly to 'save' your soul. Amos 8:4 "Hear this, O yet that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail," God is speaking here. He is addressing those money grabbers that use the law, business, even the health profession, to prey on the poor and misfortunate. God says He's got His eye on you, and the time will come for your just rewards. Amos 8:5 "Saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn? and the sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, making the e'-phah small, and the shek'-el great, and falsifying the balances by deceit?" God is addressing you that think you can cheat on weights and measurements, steal through usury, falsify balance sheets, over-charge by other means of deceit. Do you really think you are going to get away with any it? Considering God's Word and the prophecies of these end times, your day of reckoning is very close. Your judgment will be just and true, and very near. (This is aimed also at Kenites, and not just the Israelite people.) Amos 8:6 "That we may buy the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes; yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat?" God is setting the record straight as to the way people think; what is good for the Kenite, but bad for the poor. God's saying that those people that think they can buy the poor through usury, and when the poor buy a pair of shoes, we'll enslave them through credit and usury. God says also, I see that bad wheat you are selling, disguising the moldy wheat for the good wheat. You are cheating and robbing in doing your business practices. You may say, how can they cheat me through wheat sales? Do you eat white bread, made with bleached white flour? Well, why do you suppose that flour is bleached? Have you seen white flour that sits too long? It's full of bug larva and maggots. Do you think you're getting the best of the wheat from these millers? No. The cattle get the best grains to feed on: Think on it for a moment. Use dark bread with wheat in it. Even the bran is better when the kidney of the wheat is gone. Though it's a common practice used through advertising, it's still wrong, and God is addressing the mislabeling practice here. Amos 8:7 "The Lord hath sworn by the excellency of Jacob, Surely I will never forget any of their works." God is warning you here that He has His books, and every word and penny is recorded therein. You will be held accountable in the courts of heaven, where there are no cover-ups. Amos 8:8 "Shall not the land tremble for this, and every one mourn that dwelleth therein? and it shall rise up wholly as a flood; and it shall be cast out and drowned, as by the flood of Egypt." God said the wealthy will have no chance of ever getting to heaven, unless they unload their pack, repent, and come to Him. He compares your acts, words and deeds like the dike is going to break loose under pressure, and like a flood covering the land, your deeds are going to overtake you. We are approaching flood time now and within God's Word is the only way of immunity, a way of escape. Amos 8:9 "And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord God, that I will cause the sun to go down at noon, and I will darken the earth in the clear day:" This darkened sky happened once before, when Christ was crucified (Matthew 27:45). "Now from the sixth hour (12 noon by Jewish time) there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour." It happened then and it will happen again at the seventh trump. Amos 8:10 "And I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; and I will bring up sackcloth upon all loins, and baldness upon every head; and I will make it as the mourning of an only son, and the end thereof as a bitter day." On that day of Jesus' return, He is saying, your feast and celebrations will turn to sorrow (remember the 3-1/2 day celebration from the killing of the two witnesses); the sackcloth on their loins is to remind them of great shame coming upon them. The baldness on the head is a time of shameful prayer. Your mourning for the only son is for the commitment to the wrong son; for Satan, whom you worshipped. The time spoken of here is the sounding of the last trump, the seventh trumpet; spoken of in I Corinthians 15:50-54. Amos 8:11 "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord:" This is the famine Jesus spoke about in Mark 13:8. and in Matthew 24:7. It is not for food or drink, but for the "hearing of the word of the Lord". My friend, this famine is here and on us now. There is a famine now, for traditions and church social systems are what is taught and held in high esteem. A preacher committed to a denomination is allowed to teach only what is set under the banner of that denomination, and in most cases that teaching is far from the truths within the Word of God. There is a spiritual war going on now in the world. Can you imagine going into a battle with only infants and babies still on the milk bottle? Sadly, most churchmen are as prepared to meet Antichrist as a one-year old would be to face a charging enemy. What are you taught in your church that would prepare you for that battle? You will face Satan and all his forces in this generation, and that is why you must have your spiritual armor on and in place, ready to do spiritual battle with the enemy. Do you even know what the enemy looks like, or what his weapons of spiritual destruction will be? This is why the famine coming on our land and throughout the entire world is so serious, for people will not be ready for the battle Satan will bring upon the earth. Amos 8:12 "And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north even to the east, they shall run to and from to seek the word of the Lord, and shall not find it." Church systems will not let a God led, Spirit filled person open up and let the Word pour forth as the Holy Spirit leads, without wounding preacher with limits. Shortly, all but the "elect of God" will chase and run to and fro for understanding of God's Word, but it just will not be found. Once God's elect are sealed with the truth in their minds, God will turn the others over to Satan and his locust army of fallen angels and followers. Revelation 9:4 "And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of God in their foreheads." God's seal is His Word, and your mind is in your forehead. When God's Word is sealed in your mind, you will know the truth, know Satan as the fake and liar that he is, and not be tempted by him. Revelation 9:5 "And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man." This is the five months that Jesus spoke, of that the time of Daniel's prophecy would be shortened. When a scorpion strikes a man, the man is left completely defenseless, for his mind is unable to think to defend itself. Spiritually speaking, God is going to turn over those not sealed with the truth at the coming of Satan, the Kenites, and his locust army of angels, and the people will be completely taken by them. Zechariah 8:23 tells how they will even grab hold of the Kenites (Jews) skirt to find the true word, but it just will not be found. This wave of a one worldism religious form has already begun. Amos 8:13 "In that day shall the fair virgins and young men faint for thirst." What is that thirst? For hearing God's Word. Amos 8:14 "They that swear by the sin of Samaria, and say, Thy god, O Dan, liveth; and, The manner of Be'-er-she'-ba liveth; even they shall fall, and never rise up again." They swore by the "sin of Samaria", or "the following of a false god". Remember Bal, the cow worship. "O Dan liveth" is their cry, for it was the tribe of Dan that led them into calf worship, Bal worship. The "manner" is their mode of worship. Remember in Amos 7:13 when the high priest said that "Beth'-el", God's house, is the house of the king (government). For it is the government that will decide what will be worshipped there. This regulation of churches started many years ago, and is so common today that it upsets no one. Just start a church and see how the rules regulate and scrutinize just how it is to be run, the form, the leadership, and on and on. It's no different now than what it was then. The king's court (tax system) controls the very life of the church. If you want to be subsidized by the government through tax deductions, you dance to their tune. If you want to be underwritten by a denomination, than you teach what they tell you to teach; for wages, pensions and even a medical plan from them forces you to. At Christ's return, all earthly systems and forms will fall and only Christ's kingdom will stand and reign. If you have relied on anything, form, system, preacher, or church for your salvation, you have problems. For only Christ, and His word, can provide you the nourishment spiritually to go through the spiritual famine of these end times.
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