Amos 3:2 - Homiletics

The inevitable punishment of Christian sin.

"You only have I known of all the families of the earth, therefore I will punish you for all your iniquities." These words are at once an accusation, a condemnation, and a sentence. What God had done for Israel in vain was a ground and the measure of what he now must do against them. Blessing abused is but the faggot feeding the fire of merited curse. They had given themselves up to wickedness, and the fire tongue of a lofty privilege sits above every sin, revealing its demon face.

I. THERE IS A GRACIOUS SENSE IN WHICH GOD KNOWS MEN . "I know my sheep;" "I never knew you." These sentences mean salvation and condemnation respectively. For God to know men is with them a question of life and death. This knowledge may be:

1 . National. It was so with Israel. "You only have I known." This meant that God loved them ( Deuteronomy 10:15 ), chose them ( Deuteronomy 7:6 ), formally acknowledged them as his people ( Deuteronomy 14:2 ), and gave them privileges—not necessarily saving in every Case of light ( Psalms 147:19 ; Romans 3:2 ), and help ( Psalms 136:10-24 ), and fellowship ( Exodus 20:24 ; Numbers 14:14 ; Deuteronomy 4:7 ), and promise ( Romans 9:4 , Romans 9:5 ), answering to this visible relation. This knowledge may also be:

2 . Personal. Then it means, in addition to what has been mentioned, the forth-putting of Divine energy in them, making them new creatures m Christ, and so "partakers of the Divine nature" ( Galatians 6:15 ; 2 Peter 1:4 ). God brings them into his family ( Galatians 3:26 ) by this spiritual birth ( John 1:13 ), calls them sons ( 1 John 3:1 ), makes them coheirs with Christ ( Romans 8:17 ), and gives them all family privileges and graces, chiefest of these the spirit of adoption, by which we cry, "Abba, Father" ( Galatians 4:6 ). Man, in fact, is by nature an alien and a stranger, and for God to know him is to substitute a gracious for his natural relation.

II. THIS KNOWLEDGE IS A SPECIAL , NOT A GENERAL , AFFECTION . "You only." There are gifts of God that are indiscriminate ( Job 25:3 ; Matthew 5:45 ). Man gets them as man, and irrespective of personal character. But spiritual gifts are necessarily confined to the spiritual circle. It is evident as regards God's gracious knowledge of men.

1 . That it rests on a minority of the race. Israel at best was little among the nations of the earth. In comparison with the Chaldeae, Medo-Persian, Greek, or Roman empires, it was scarcely worthy of being named; and a dozen peoples bordered Palestine from time to time, any one of which, in the natural course, would have wiped it off the earth. Yet, passing by the many and the mighty, God says to single, feeble Israel, "You only have I known of all the families of the earth" ( Deuteronomy 4:32-38 ). And this action is of a piece with other Divine action for similar purposes. The saints are now, and have always been, a "little flock." It is the few who go in at the "strait gate" of the kingdom. Even the nominally Christian peoples are less than a third of the population of the earth. If out of the number of these were taken the actual Christians, the true believers in Christ, the saintly company would assume smaller dimensions still. This state of matters will no doubt be reversed before the dispensation ends. Christ "in all things shall have the pre-eminence," and the minority which his followers compose will, during the millennial era, be converted into a vast majority ( Isaiah 11:9 ). Meantime God looks on a small circle of transfigured souls, and says, "You only have I known."

2 . It does not follow human probabilities. If any single nation was to be made the repository of revealed truth, and the teacher of the other nations, we should have expected one or other of the four universal empires to be chosen for the purpose, rather than a second or third rate power, located in a circumscribed and excentric spot. Then the typical Jew was, like his ancestor Jacob, a sordid fellow, deficient in the more heroic qualities, and, from the standpoint of the natural, decidedly inferior to his brother the Edomite, or almost any neighbour you would select. The greater readiness with which the Gentiles received the gospel, when it came to them, would seem, moreover, to indicate that they would have responded more worthily to the Divine Old Testament culture than Israel did, if it had pleased God to bring it to bear. It is the same with individuals. Not only does God pass by the rich and great for the humble poor ( James 2:5 ; 1 Corinthians 1:26-28 ), but he passes by the wise and prudent, and gives the light of his salvation to babes ( Matthew 11:25 ). It is not the great geniuses of society, but the commonplace average men, who form the circle of the saints. The reasons for this are adequate, but God keeps them to himself. Obvious to reason in many cases, they are not revealed, because in many others they would be above it, and God acts without reasons given, that "no flesh may glory in his presence."

III. IT DOES NOT INEVITABLY PREVENT SIN IN THE OBJECT OF IT . The life of the Hebrews was as a whole above the moral level of the heathen life around them. But still it was far from pure. If we subtracted from Jewish history all that arises out of sin, and the punishment of it, comparatively little would remain. So little congenial to human nature is God's service, and so congenial the service of sin, that Israel was perpetually turning aside after the idols of the heathen, whilst in no instance did the heathen ever turn from their idols to God ( Jeremiah 2:11 ). And not only does outward religious privilege fail to put an end to the sinful life, it is to some extent the same with inward religious principle. The saint remains a sinner all his days. Grace, like the house of David, is getting stronger with him, and corruption, like the house of Saul, is getting weaker through life. But it is still with him as with the apostle, striving after perfection, yet burdened with a feeling of the surviving power of sin ( Philippians 3:12 ; Romans 7:24 ).

IV. IT DOES MAKE THE PUNISHMENT OF SIN ON EARTH CERTAIN . "Therefore will I punish you." Sin inside the kingdom necessitates punishment, and will be visited with it promptly.

1 . Because it is guiltiest as against God. More has been done to prevent it than in other cases. It is sin against light ( James 4:17 ; Luke 12:47 , Luke 12:48 ), against love ( 2 Corinthians 5:14 ), against favours ( Psalms 103:2 ), against restraining grace ( 1 John 3:9 ). In proportion to the strength and number of deterrent influences against which sin is committed must be the strength of our sinful bent, and so the guilt of our wrong doing.

2 . Because it is most hurtful as against his cause. The sin of the wicked is natural. It is to be expected from one who consults lust and serves the devil. It is done, moreover, from the standpoint of opposition to God, and responsibility for it is thus kept outside the spiritual circle. God and his cause are not dishonoured in the eyes of men by what is formally done against them. It is sin by the professedly righteous that brings righteousness into disrepute. Religion is charged with all the evil that is done in its name. The more closely identified wrong doing is with the Christian name, the more hurtful is it to the Christian cause. Therefore Christian sin, in addition to the general reasons, involves punishment for reasons peculiar to itself. If God would have his Church a tree for the healing of the nations, he must lop off every unsound and rotten branch.

3 . Because it is most incompatible with the destiny of the person sinning. The sin of the wicked need not necessarily be punished here. It will be amply visited on him throughout eternity. It is quite in the line of the man's life course that he should suffer the vengeance of eternal fire. But the sin of the righteous presents a different aspect. Its commission is the contradiction of his gracious nature, and its future punishment would be the contradiction of his exalted destiny. It is vital to his well being that the judgment, inevitable somewhere, should fall here ( Psalms 89:30-33 ). Only thus can his happy immortality be safeguarded. The present destruction of his flesh conditions the saving of his spirit in the day of the Lord Jesus ( 1 Corinthians 5:5 ).