Amos 1:1-15

God knows the future.  He knows what He is doing and is in full control over the events of this world.  People often live as if God were unaware or powerless to do anything about the sins of men.  All men and all nations will be held accountable before God.  He takes into account the sins of a people and He will bring judgment down upon them in His time.  Amos uses his first two chapters to announce God’s judgments on the nations.  He explains why they will be judged and how they will be judged.  Though there were many sins, Amos foretells a very similar judgment of all of them with only small variations.  God may stand by patiently allowing sinfulness in a people but the day will come when His patience will end and He will have accumulated multiple reasons to justify His judgment of the nations.

DAMASCUS: Amos starts out with a warning to Damascus of their coming judgment due to the way that they waged war with Gilead.  This is a condemnation of Syria because of their brutality and mercilessness.  Their judgment would be seeing their walls and palaces burned down with fire and their rulers as well as the citizens of the nation would be taken into captivity.  There is a price to pay for cruelty.  God will not forget our cruelty to others.

GAZA: This is the nation of the Philistines and a condemnation of their slave trade.  They conquered nations and then carried away the people from those nations as slaves to be sold to other nations.  It is one thing to take a people you have defeated as captives, but is a more serious offense to traffic the lives of people as property.  God values our lives as we bear His image.  This nation would also see fire destroy them and they would experience what it was like to be taken as captives.

TYRUS: These are the people know as the Phoenicians and their sin was exactly the same as that of Gaza, the only difference in the text being that they had forgotten the covenant that they had made with David and Solomon.  God takes exception when we do not keep our promises and He will judge all who are merciless.  They too would see their walls and palaces burned.

EDOM: These are the descendants of Esau who was the brother of Jacob the father of the nation of Israel.  Esau hated his brother for purchasing his birthright and stealing his blessing with trickery.  His descendants continued his hatred of Jacob’s family and were constantly pursuing them.  God is not pleased with bitterness and will burn the palaces of Edom for their violence against their brother.  It is important to protect our hearts from bitterness and leave the business of judgment with the Lord.

AMMON: The Ammonites were condemned by God for their violent and merciless war against Gilead.  These were the descendants of Lot, Abraham’s nephew.  They became a very cruel people and were destructive in their wars.   Violence has a price that God will charge it to our account.  The walls and palaces of Ammon would be burned with fire.  God’s wrath is a consuming flame and we would all do well to strive to avoid it at all costs.