Here is the hunger that the Lord sends: a hunger for the word of God. A moment comes in every person's life when His word becomes vitally necessary...
Here is the hunger that the Lord sends: a hunger for the word of God. A moment comes in every person's life when His word becomes vitally necessary. Of course, one cannot say that there is ever a time when someone does not need it, but what matters here is that there are special moments when He sends an intense hunger.
But He says that people will seek the word and not find it. Why? Does an unkind God send hunger and refuse to satisfy it? No. This concerns a people who have once again forgotten God. And this is often exactly what happens to people: yes, the Lord gives them a hunger to hear His word, but a person has moved so far away from Him and turns away so persistently that he simply does not understand where to seek that for which his soul hungers. Often this hunger remains unsatisfied, while the person convinces himself that he has already satisfied it with something very, very useful and proper...
Yes, the Lord can send hunger, but He respects our freedom and does not impose on us the way to satisfy it. In fact, there is no need to wander throughout the world, because we already have His word, just as the people of Israel had it in the days of Amos.
8 The vision of a basket of summer fruit, Amo 8:1-3.
The destruction of the oppressors foretold, Amo 8:4-10.
And a famine of the word of God, Amo 8:11-14.
8:2 The end - Of God's patience towards Israel, the end of their ripening, they are now fully ripe, fit to be gathered.Pass by them - God had with admirable patience spared, but now he will no more pardon or spare.
8:3 With silence - So great will be the cruelty of the enemy, that they dare not bury them, or if they do, it must be undiscerned.
8:4 To fail - Either to root them out, or to enslave them.
8:5 When - Ye that could wish there were nothing to interrupt your marketing, that look on solemn times of worship as burdensome, such was the first day of every month, and the weekly sabbath.Small - So the ephah being too little, the poor buyer had not his due.The shekel great - They weighed the money which they received, and had no more justice, than to make their shekel weight greater than the standard; so the poor were twice oppressed, had less than was their right, and paid more than they ought to pay.
8:6 That we may buy - They would have new moons and sabbaths over, that they might go to market to buy the poor. And when these poor owed but for a very little commodity, as suppose a pair of shoes, these merciless men would take the advantage against them, and make them sell themselves to pay the debt. The refuse - This was another kind of oppression, corrupted wares, sold to those that were necessitous.
8:7 Hath sworn - By himself. Forget - Suffer to pass unpunished.
8:8 The land - The people of it. For this - This that you have done, and this that God will do. And it - The judgment, the displeasure of God, shall rise and grow like a mighty wasting flood. It - The land.Drowned - As Egypt by the overflowing of the Nile.
8:9 At noon - So Israel's sun did as at noon set under the dark cloud of conspiracies and civil wars by Shallum, Menahem, Pekah, and Hosea, 'till the midnight darkness drew on by Pul, Tiglath - Pilneser, and Salmaneser. Darken - Bring a thick cloud of troubles and afflictions. In the clear day - When they think all is safe, sure, and well settled.
8:10 Upon all loins - All sorts of persons shall put on mourning.Baldness - Shaving the head and beard was a sign of the greatest sadness.A bitter day - A bitter day, which you shall wish you had never seen, shall succeed your dark night.
8:12 Shall wander - Search all places for a prophet or preacher, from the Mid - land sea to the dead sea, they shall search all corners for a prophet.
8:14 They - Who sacrifice to and swear by the calves at Dan and Beth-el. By the sin - Who say the idol at Dan is the true and living God. The manner - The idol which is worshipped at Beersheba.