Daily Devotional for Sunday, June 14

Amos’ Second Sermon

“I have overthrown some of you, as God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah, and ye were as a firebrand plucked out of the burning: yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord,” Amos 4:11.

One of my siblings went through a period of time of consistently getting into trouble. With every occasion, he would be punished for his actions, but this punishment did not seem to be a deterrent. With every infraction, the punishment grew more severe, but he did not seem to see that his actions were the problem. Eventually things escalated to such a point that he was able to see the inevitable path that he was on and that his actions were why he was on that path.
Israel would not return unto the Lord because they had transgressed the commands of the Lord and profaned the sacrifices to the Lord (Amos 4:4, 5). In order to get their attention, the Lord had withheld their rain for their crops and water for drinking which caused blight, mildew, and palmerworms to devour their plants. God also sent plagues like He had in Egypt and took away their horses, and overthrew some of them like Sodom and Gomorrah had been, yet he pulled them out of the fire time and again, but they would not learn the lesson or return to the Lord (Amos 4:6-11). The Lord had tried everything to get them to see their need to return unto Him, but they did not see their actions as the problem and did not see the need to change their ways. The apostle Paul did not see his need to change his mind towards the Lord until he was knocked down on the road to Damascus. He realized who Jesus was that day and that, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:31).

REFLECTION
What does the Lord have to do to get your attention? Are there things happening in your life that are showing you that you need to repent and return to the Lord?

Tim Chambers