You Fat Cows (Amos 4)

Warning! The following language is exclusively reserved for use by prophets of old; don't try this at home. Chapter 4 of Amos begins thus:

   "Hear this word, you cows of Bashan . . ."

The grazing land at Bashan was as good as it got. The cattle found there were the fattest and sleekest in the land. Every Israelite understood what Amos was saying; they heard it like this, "Here this word, you fat cows . . . ." He had this to say specifically to the women of the elite families.


God hated Israel's consumerism and their methods for sustaining it. As Amos describes it, the women of the elite in Israel prodded their husbands to bring more and more home for their consumption. They lived an opulent lifestyle with beds of ivory, couches, a diet of red meat, entertainment, wine aplenty, the finest oils (6:4-6), and multiple houses (3:1). This indulgence in itself was bad enough, but how they acquired it made it all the worse.


Specifically, the Israeli elite acquired their disproportionate amount of consumer goods through these methods:

1. fines and debts (2:8).
2. taxation (5:11).
3. cheating the poor (8:4-6).

With this going on, any tithe, offering, thanksgiving, or worship of any kind was rejected and despised by God (4:4-5; 5:21-23).

I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies" (5:21).

We must check ourselves as a nation. Do we have consumption habits that affects the rest of the world? Check ourselves as individuals. Do we have consumption habits that make us unable to respond appropriately to the poor and the afflicted near us? We do not want to be included among . . .

". . . those who trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth and turn aside the way of the afflicted . . ." (2:7).

Hang in there, the blog on chapter 5 will be more positive. Until then, here's a thought provoking accounting of consumption in our country, The Story of Stuff:

Violence and Robbery (Amos 3)

 “They do not know how to do right,” declares the Lord,
“those who store up violence and robbery in their strongholds” (Amos 3:10).

     Violence, robbery, quarrels, murder, war . . . these stem from wanting what we do not have (James 4:1, 2). Of course, there are appropriate ways to acquire what we do not have, but, unfortunately, Israel gave us the example of acquiring inappropriately. Israel resorted to violence and robbery. They had their winter houses and summer houses made of ivory that had to be maintained. It took massive resources to maintain lavish accommodations and those resources had to come from somewhere. The folks who could afford to have these types of homes were taxing, fining, oppressing and neglecting the poor to get what they needed to sustain their lifestyle. 
     So bad were conditions in Israel that the Lord called upon ungodly neighbors and the Mosaic Law to bear witness to judgment. He called upon Ashdod and Egypt to gather around and look at the confusion and the oppression (vs. 9). He also called attention to the Law to show that he was not responsible for the downfall; Israel herself was responsible. The Law stated that if livestock was put in the care of a neighbor that, in the case of losing the animal, the caretaker was responsible for the loss (supposing they may have eaten it themselves or sold it) unless he could produce a torn piece of the animal to prove that wild animals attacked it (Exodus 22:13).  Enough evidence would remain to prove that it was not God's neglect or injustice that led to Israel's downfall, but rather her violence and robbery.
     We've been laying alongside Israel some of our own country's involvement in parallel behaviors. We've actually seen that a few evil people with a lot of power, money and legal protection can cause a lot of violence and robbery. Here's another clip from John Perkins that shows how things escalate to violence and robbery.

You're the WORST!

Amos begins his message to Israel ensnaring them into understanding the same truth that the Lord had shown him against a plumb line. He leads up to Israel's sin with a 3-4 beat. Take a few moments to read Amos 1:3-2:5 noting both the redundancy of the 3-and-4  statements and the individual sins of the nations that surrounded Israel.

At each beat, Amos announces the sins of Israel's neighbors, some of which were transgressions against Israel herself. They would have remembered these transgressions and would have been in full agreement with God's pronouncements. Let's take a quick look at these sins:

1. Damascus: "threshed Gilead" . . . they cruelly crushed the Israelites.
2. Gaza (i.e., Philistia): "exiled a whole people" . . . they sold them into slavery.
3. Tyre (i.e., Phoenicia): "delivered a whole people to Edom" . . . they sold them into slavery.
4. Edom: "pursued his brother with a sword" . . . these descendants of Esau, Israel's brother, fought against their own relatives.
5. Ammon: "ripped open pregnant women in Gilead" . . . these, more relatives of Israel, in war, greedy for territory, did heinous things to Israel.
6. Moab: "burned to lime the bones of the king of Edom" . . . these, again relatives of Israel, apparently desecrated the dead.
7. Judah: "rejected the law of the Lord."

Realize this, as Israel read or heard this prophecy, they would have been expecting the culmination of the 3-and-4 pattern to bring them to the point. They probably started off by agreeing with Amos . . . saying something like "yeah Lord, do what you gotta do to them." They might have become confused though, when he went beyond Edom, the 4th country listed. The prophecy didn't culminate with the 4 sins of one country of these neighbors. . . each of these countries had only one sin listed. It wasn't 4 countries . . . there were 7 listed before themselves. 


The Lord compared Israel to the nations around her essentially pointed out that she was worse than the rest. Israel had these four sins listed:

1. "trample the head of the poor" . . . exploit and abuse the poor.
2. "turn aside the way of the afflicted" . . . neglect the downtrodden and helpless.
3. "go into the same girl" . . . exploit women via prostitution. Poor women were likely forced to enter into prostitution at the temples for financial subsistence.
4. "lay themselves down beside every alter on garments taken in pledge" (see Ex 22:26) and "in the house of their God they drink the wine of those who have been fined" . . . both of these statements indicated the use ill-gotten gain in worship and self indulgence.

We know that the Lord hates these things, so we check ourself at how we treat the poor . . . at home and in neighboring nations.

Hear what this guy has to say about how Western corporations treat the poor:

A Plumb Line In Our Midst

Thursday night we began a series in Amos. We began in chapter seven. In chapter seven, God reveals his message for Israel to Amos.

And the Lord said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said,

“Behold, I am setting a plumb line
in the midst of my people Israel . . . (v.8)

God shows Amos Israel's faults against a true standard . . . God's own truth about social justice and righteousness. God's message is not to an individual, but to a nation. It's difficult for Westerners to view things apart from individuality. We are radically individualistic. In this study, we are going to compare ourselves as a nation to the nation of Israel. In Amos we can see what God loves and hates about national behaviors when it comes to social justice and righteousness. 


Israel, the northern ten tribes, at this time had several stark similarities to our present-day USA. She was just over 200 years old as a nation. She was at the height of her prosperity. And, surrounding countries had reasons to be displeased with her. 


In the coming weeks, we will look at the specific sins of Israel that brought the judgment of exile on her, and compare them to ourselves . . . Israel's experience with God will be our plumb line.
Christians often recognize national sin in abortion, pornography and homosexuality. We are going to take a look at two specific sins that we will recognize in Israel: 1) social injustice and 2) the idolatry of consumerism.


Here a few links to resources that we'll use to assess the condition of our nation:

• Story of Stuff
• Economic Hitman Video
• Confessions of an Economic Hitman