Evangelical Lutheran Diocese of North America

Monday after Rogate

Posted on May 2, 2016 by Pastor Dulas under Devotions
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Scripture: Amos 9:8-15 (NKJV)

8 “Behold, the eyes of the Lord God are on the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from the face of the earth; Yet I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob,” says the Lord.

9 “For surely I will command, and will sift the house of Israel among all nations, as grain is sifted in a sieve; Yet not the smallest grain shall fall to the ground.

10 All the sinners of My people shall die by the sword, who say, ‘The calamity shall not overtake nor confront us.’ Israel Will Be Restored

11 “On that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David, which has fallen down, and repair its damages; I will raise up its ruins, and rebuild it as in the days of old;

12 That they may possess the remnant of Edom, and all the Gentiles who are called by My name,” says the Lord who does this thing.

13 “Behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord, “When the plowman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him who sows seed; The mountains shall drip with sweet wine, and all the hills shall flow with it.

14 I will bring back the captives of My people Israel; They shall build the waste cities and inhabit them; They shall plant vineyards and drink wine from them; They shall also make gardens and eat fruit from them.

15 I will plant them in their land, and no longer shall they be pulled up from the land I have given them,” says the Lord your God.

Devotion

Israel and Judah, indeed, all whom the Lord had led from bondage in Egypt, had grown corrupted. They no longer heeded the Word of God and they trampled on the poor of the land while living in libertine extravagance. Because of this, God proclaimed through Amos, a humble shepherd and a dresser of sycamore figs, that they faced a destruction similar to that which had befallen Sodom and Gomorrah. His message was not well received. Even Amaziah, the priest in Bethel, opposed him, speaking against him to King Jeroboam and forbidding Amos to prophesy in Israel.

We live in a society which, among other things, twists God’s gift of sexuality and slays countless unborn infants in legalized abortion, in the face of the undeniable evidence that we live in the end times. Jesus will return like a thief in the night and destruction surely will fall on the world. Pastors today are also confronted with resistance when they speak and act according to God’s revealed Word—often with thinly veiled threats based on a “hire-and-fire” mentality. But just as God promised through Amos that a faithful remnant would be spared, so also, because Jesus Christ has overcome the world, the faithful will be spared when He returns in judgment. Yahweh raised up the fallen tabernacle of David in remembrance of His covenant with him whose human descendant, Jesus, would prepare a place for us so that we may eternally be where He is.

We pray: Thank You, heavenly Father, for sending the Holy Spirit, Who keeps me in the true Church with Christ and Who, on the Last Day, will raise me and all the dead, and give eternal life to me and all believers in Christ. Amen.

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