Visions from the Lord

1
Visions from the Lord

• Amos 7.1 8.3

2
Averted Vision 1

• Locust Plague
• The threat looms when the last growth of the
  pastures and field before the summers dry season
  is beginning if it were lost the people would
  have nothing to carry them over until the next
  harvest (Mays 1969 127-128).

3
Averted Vision 1

• Crops
• Curse Deut 28.38, 42
• You will sow much seed in the field but you will
  harvest little, because locusts will devour it.
  Swarms of locusts will take over all your trees
  and the crops of your land.
• Blessing Deut 30.9
• Then the LORD your God will make you most
  prosperous in all the work of your hands and in
  the fruit of your womb, the young of your
  livestock and the crops of your land. The LORD
  will again delight in you and make you
  prosperous, just as he delighted in your fathers.

4
Averted Vision 2

• Fire
• Curse Deut 32.22
• For a fire has been kindled by my wrath, one
  that burns to the realm of death below. It will
  devour the earth and its harvests and set afire
  the foundations of the mountains.
• Blessing Deut 8.7
• a good landa land with streams and pools of
  water, with springs flowing in the valleys and
  hills.

5
For Visions 3 4

• Amos is shown a symbol which he must translate
  into word before he knows its meaning. He is
  displaced as intercessor and allowed only to name
  the symbolic object whose significance lies
  wholly in Yahwehs intention (Mays 1969 132).

6
Enacted Vision 1

• Plumb Line
• The Lord was standing by a wall that had been
  built true to plumb, with a plumb line in his
  hand (7.7)
• Then the Lord said, Look, I am setting a plumb
  line among my people Israel (7.8c).

7
Enacted Vision 1

• Plumb Line
• The high places of Isaac will be destroyed and
  the sanctuaries of Israel will be ruined with my
  sword I will rise against the house of Jeroboam
  (7.9).

8
Enacted Vision 2

• Basket of Ripe Fruit
• Because there is a basket of ripe fruit, Israel
  is ripe for destruction
• the songs in the temple will turn or spoil to
  wailing (8.3a).

9
The Confrontation

• By the vision Amos has been selected as the one
  person on earth to whom the heavenly king
  discloses his counsel. He is the intermediary
  between the divine sovereign and his subjects,
  the figure by whom the decree of the heavenly
  court is to be proclaimed (Mays 1969 128).

10

• Projecting
• into
• the New Testament

11
Intercessory Prayer

• In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our
  weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray
  for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us
  with groans that words cannot express. And he
  who searches our hearts knows the mind of the
  Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the
  saints in accordance with Gods will (Rom
  8.26-27).
• Jesus is able to save completely those who
  come to God through him, because Jesus always
  lives to intercede for them (Heb 7.25).