A Divine Commissioning
3/27/26 Bible Thought (Amos 7)
Main Idea: Obedience to the divine commission must overtake obedience to people.
A Look at the Text:
In chapter after chapter, the prophet Amos presents hard truth and coming judgment to the people of Israel. In chapter 7, the pattern remains, although there is a twist at the end.
God revealed a series of visions to Amos. He was going to bring locusts and fire upon the land, but at Amos’ intercession, God spared the people. Then, a vision of a plumb line—an ancient instrument to ensure that a wall was level vertically—was given to Amos. At this point, sparing was no longer an option.
Israel, against the perfect plumb line of God’s Word, fell pathetically short. They were crooked and sinful. While God spared the locusts and fire, He wouldn’t spare His standard.
It is then that the scene suddenly shifts.
Up to this point, we have been hearing God’s Word through Amos, but now we get to see the setting. Amos was prophesying publicly in Bethel, one of the northern kingdom’s centers for idolatry.
After judgment oracle heaped upon judgment oracle, the priest there had had enough. Amos is told to go prophesy in Judah instead, for “The land is not able to bear all his words” (Amos 7:10).
To this, the prophet responded that in fact he wasn’t really a prophet—he was a farmer. But he was nonetheless a farmer that God called (see Amos 7:14-15).
God appointed this farmer to be a prophet. As such, he wasn’t going to just go prophesy somewhere else. Prophecy really wasn’t his gig. He was merely being obedient to what God had commanded him to do.
Then, to remove all doubt, Amos responded with a final judgment oracle upon the priest himself and upon the nation.
Bringing it Home:
The prophet Amos is one of the best examples in Scripture of being obedient to divine commissioning. With this, let us not forget that he wasn’t called to proclaim a message of prosperity, but of doom.
Yet being a prophet didn’t have to be the family trade for him to obey. He knew what God had appointed him to do, and he did it, even though it wasn’t popular and his message was rejected.
To some degree, God has appointed a task for all of us.
While certainly none of us are called to prophesy during the divided kingdom, God has nevertheless commissioned us with something that we are here to do. In the words of the apostle Paul, while we aren’t saved by good works, we are saved for good works (see Eph. 2:8-10).
“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10).
These are things that God has put before us.
This in mind, we must remember that if they are divinely given, they ar for His approval and pleasure. People-pleasing is the antithesis of Christ-pleasing (see Gal. 1:10). If God has called us, we don’t need the approval of man. We merely need to be obedient to what He has tasked us with.
Challenge:
Do I see the reality that God has appointed a task for me?