Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Amos 4:12

Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: [and] because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.

12. The sentence. All warnings have passed unheeded: no amendment is visible in the people; Jehovah must therefore proceed now to still more extreme measures. What these measures are, however, is not explicitly stated, in order, doubtless, that Israel, roused to alarm by the prospect of unnamed but not therefore unimaginable evils, may be moved the more effectually to penitence.

Therefore thus will I do unto thee ] By thus the prophet points his hearers forwards to the threatened, but unnamed, judgments still impending.

prepare to meet thy God ] as He approaches, viz. in judgement. The implication is, prepare thyself to meet Him, so that thou mayest be acquitted; a last chance of amendment is offered to the heedless nation, or at least to those members of it whom the five-fold chastisement has spared; if they will but avail themselves of it, the Judge may be moved to mercy, and the sentence be mitigated.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Therefore thus will I do unto thee – God says more by His silence. He had enumerated successive scourges. Now, with His hand uplifted to strike, He mentions none, but says, thus. Rib.: So men too, loth to name evils, which they fear and detest, say, God do so to me, and more also. God using the language of people Jerome, having said, thus will I do unto thee, is silent as to what He will do; that so, Israel hanging in suspense, as having before him each sort of punishment (which are the more terrible, because he imagines them one by one), may indeed repent, that God inflict not what He threatens.

Prepare to meet thy God – In judgment, face to face, final to them. All the judgments which had been sent hitherto were but heralds, forerunners of the judgment to come. He Himself was not in them. In them, He passed no sentence upon Israel. They were medicinal, corrective; they were not His final sentence. Now, having tried all ways of recovering them in vain, God summons them before His tribunal. But although the judgment of the ten tribes, as a whole, was final, to individuals there was place for repentance. God never, in this life, bids people or individuals prepare to meet Him, without a purpose of good to those who do prepare to receive His sentence aright. He saith not then, come and hear your doom, but prepare to meet thy God. It has hope in it, to be bidden to prepare; yet more, that He whom they were to prepare to meet, was their God. It must have recurred full often to the mind of the ten tribes during their unrestored captivity of above seven centuries before the Coming of our Lord; a period as long as the whole existence of Rome from its foundation to its decay; as long as our history from our king Stephen until now.

Full oft must they have thought, we have not met Him yet, and the thought must have dawned upon them; It is because He willed to do thus with us, that He bid us prepare to meet Him. He met us not, when He did it. It was then something further on; it is in the Messiah that we arc to meet and to see Him. Jerome: Prepare to meet thy God, receiving with all eagerness the Lord coming unto thee. So then, is this further sense which lay in a the words , he (as did Hosea at the end) exhorts the ten tribes, after they had been led captive by the Assyrians, not to despond, but to prepare to meet their God, that is, to acknowledge and receive Christ their God, when the Gospel should be preached to them by the Apostles. Rib.: God punisheth, not in cruelty, but in love. He warns then those whom He strikes, to understand what He means by these punishments, not thinking themselves abandoned by God, but, even when they seem most cast away and reprobate, rousing themselves, in the hope of Gods mercy through Christ, to call upon God, and prepare to meet their God. For no ones salvation is so desperate, no one is so stained with every kind of sin, but that God cometh to him by holy inspirations, to bring back the wanderer to Himself. Thou therefore, O Israel, whoever thou art, who didst once serve God, and now servest vilest pleasures, when thou feelest God coming to thee, prepare to meet Him. Open the door of thy heart to that most kind and benevolent Guest, and, when thou hearest His Voice, deafen not thyself: flee not, like Adam. For He seeketh thee, not to judge, but to save thee.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Amo 4:12

Prepare to meet thy God.

Preparation for judgment

We will endeavour to enforce the exhortation of the text in a series of arguments, illustrating the reasons why due obedience and attention should be given to this command of the great Omnipotent.

1. Because we shall most certainly be summoned to His tribunal, a We must all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ. Do you believe this awful fact? You shall meet God, to give an account of every thought, word, and deed. Are you seeking a preparation for this dreadful period? The very idea of standing before the judgment-seat of Christ should so overpower the mind with its awfulness that every moment should be busily employed in preparing for that hour.

2. Because we shall then receive our everlasting destiny. Then we shall know our irreversible fate. The condition after judgment is unchangeable.

3. Because our time on earth is short and uncertain.

4. On account of the promised blessedness and happiness of heaven. The reward of glory, honour, and eternal life awaits those who have made due preparation to dwell in the celestial kingdom. (J. M. Burton.)

A call to remember God

To prepare to meet Him implies a firm belief of His approach, and careful consideration in what way best to receive it. This precept is often applied to the idea of meeting God in another world. But we may, apply the lessons of this teaching to what goes on in this world. How may we prepare to meet our God as He comes near to us?

I. During our probation on earth.

1. In the way of repentance. God reveals Himself to us as willing and waiting to be gracious; He calls on the careless and impenitent to meet Him in mercy, and tells them to do so–

(1) Quickly.

(2) Carefully.

(3) Decidedly.

2. In the way of temporal blessings. Then we should meet Him in a spirit of gratitude and praise.

3. In the way of temporal sorrow. Sorrow is often represented in Scripture under the idea of the clouds, the whirlwind, and the storm.

(1) Endeavour to turn judgment aside by humble prayer.

(2) Bear it as coming from God.

4. In the use of the means of grace, Men often lose much from not preparing to meet God in His own ordinances. Prepare to meet Him–

(1) With reverence and godly fear.

(2) With earnest expectation.

5. In the works of righteousness.

II. After the time of our probation is over.

1. Very solemn and awakening is the thought of meeting God at that moment, when every earthly prop will have been taken away from the soul, and the veil of flesh removed, and every delusion will have vanished for ever. Remember this in the midst of the engrossing concerns of this uncertain life. Realise that you are only,, strangers and pilgrims here.

2. After death comes judgment, when we must be made manifest before the tribunal of Christ. Prepare for that day. Judge yourselves now. (Vincent W. Ryan, M. A.)

The great meeting

I. God meets us now, and we meet him at sundry times and in divers manners. If in His own appointed ordinances we draw nigh to Him, it is our privilege to feel assured that He will most certainly draw nigh to us. But there must be antecedent preparation. God meets us in the time of trial, and we should prepare to meet Him. We should carefully and honestly examine ourselves–search, as before Him, our thoughts, feelings, opinions, and habits. There are temporal blessings in which God meets us, and in which we should prepare ourselves to meet Him, by habitually cherishing a contented and thankful spirit.

II. God meets us hereafter. That meeting is certain. The doctrine of a future judgment is, no doubt, peculiar to Divine revelation, but it receives the strongest confirmation from the natural conscience. It well-nigh overwhelms the mind to think of the disclosures of the great day. The final inquisition shall be spiritual. We all admit that the character of an act is determined by the motive in which it originates. God will then make manifest the counsels of our hearts. There is in this much call for alarm, but there is also abundant consolation. To the ungodly there cannot but be something terrible in these words, Prepare to meet thy God. How unbearable is the thought when it flashes even for a moment on the guilty conscience, Thou God seest me! We must remember that our Probation is limited to this present life. We must prepare to meet our God now or never. (R. W. Forrest, M. A.)

Prepare

How often have these words been turned into words of terror; how many noble discourses have been preached from this text which had no relation whatever to its meaning! This is the voice of love. All punishment, has failed–what now is to be done? Something larger, nobler. Prepare to meet thy God. Prepare: there is forewarning. When God forewarns He means to give us every opportunity of repentance; if He were not determined upon giving us every opportunity He would plunge upon us without warning, and carry us away as a flood in the night-time, The very word prepare, so used in,, this relation is itself a Gospel term. Prepare to meet thy God. Still it is thy God. Men give up God, but does God give up them? They forget that there is a double relation. Imagine not that God is moved by your fickle changefulness. You may have renounced God, but God has not renounced you. (Joseph Parker, D. D.)

Reverence and preparation

The words of Amos, as they are understood by Christendom, bidding us prepare for a final and extraordinary meeting with God, appeal to our sense of prudence and to our sense of justice. The words rouse these original instincts of the human soul to a new activity. Behind the sense of justice and of prudence there is in the soul of man another feeling, more indefinite, yet not less real than these–the sense of awe or reverence. Fear, love, and admiration enter into reverence in different proportions, but it cannot be identified with any one of them. It is the virtuous emotion whereby the soul of man sincerely acknowledges the presence of greatness. Reverence is not in any sense a fictitious sort of virtue. Some think reverence is the upshot of artificial circumstances, of artificial and stinted convictions, a fruit of narrow associations, of subjection to characters and to traditions of a particular type. But, reverence, like all virtue that deserves the name, is based on truth. And it is not exclusively, or even chiefly, ecclesiastical excellence. It is true that the Church of Christ is the great school of reverence, because, within it, the highest and most commanding greatness is continually presented to the soul of man. But reverence, as a human excellence, is older than the Church, older than Christianity, older than revelation; it is as old as the idea that there is anything in existence that is greater than man. The first school of reverence which has been provided for us is the natural world around us. I an feels, behind nature, a higher power of some kind, which appeals to his sense of greatness. In the absence of revelation, the mystery of the natural world has led to abundant error and degradation. Nature is, in a way, Gods first revelation to man. It is our first teacher of that practical sense of a higher greatness which we call reverence. The lesson is learned more effectively from man himself. Man becomes an object of reverence whenever a higher greatness than his own rests upon him; and it may do this in one of two ways, as the greatness of office, or the greatness of character. High office, always and everywhere, is a shadow of the majesty of God. But character commands reverence more than orifice. Office is in a sense outside a man, character is himself. Conspicuous goodness, in every age, compels reverence. Aristides, by his justice; Scipio, by his chastity; Cato, by his inflexibility. Nor is reverence less due to great names because it has been exaggerated. Exaggeration becomes impossible when we remember that the true object to which reverence is due is nothing in the man himself, as it is not anything in nature herself. It is that higher greatness which in both may be discovered beyond. Reverence is no mere inoperative sentiment when it is sincere. It carries with it practical consequences. Hence the extreme importance that the objects of reverence should be, as far as may be worthy of it. That one human form, one human character might command a boundless reverence, the Infinite Being submitted Himself to bonds, and appeared among us m a created form, that in Him all Christian reverence might centre. Below the throne of Jesus Christ reverence is always paid to a greatness distinct from and beyond the object which immediately provokes it; it is paid to God. Behind nature we find the omnipotence of God; behind human office the authority of God; behind human character, in its highest forms, the holiness of God. We do not vet see God, we feel God. Amos knows the difference between that sort of apprehension of God which is common among men; between talking about Him as men do, and meeting Him. Israel was irreverent, and Amos bids Israel prepare to meet its God in quite a different sense to that in which He had been met either at Bethel or Samaria in the prosperous days which were drawing to their close. Israel was to meet Him in suffering. Suffering strips off from the eye the conventional films which hide out God; it brings us face to face with Him. So, too, with us Christians as to death and judgment. How are we to be educated for the sight of God after death? Chiefly by worship. Religion is neither morality nor worship. It is the relation which binds the soul to God, of which religion morality is a necessary symptom, and worship a necessary exercise. But who ever heard of anything that could be called religion which was without a worship? Worship is the highest expression of reverence. Worship is an education for the inevitable future, a training of the souls eye to bear the brightness of the everlasting sun. (Canon Liddon.)

Prepare to meet God

Mere belief in the existence of the Deity may be the belief of the basest sinner. If my faith in God is not influencing my heart and my conduct Godward, so far as my spiritual condition is concerned, I might just as well have been born a heathen. Why should you prepare to meet God?

1. Because you must meet Him. There are a thousand things we can refrain from doing. Men can refuse to pray; refuse to repent and reform their ways; refuse to make confession of Christ: but there is one thing they cannot refuse to do,–they cannot refuse to meet God. The call of death all must hear and obey.

2. Because you may have to meet Him soon. The time is uncertain. Delay in other matters is sometimes prudence; but in all that relates to the safety of the soul, delay is dangerous, and indifference is inimical to the highest well-being of man.

3. Because you will have to meet Him alone. We meet in crowds now; but as individuals then. We must all die alone; we must all meet God alone. 4 Because to meet Him unprepared will be the greatest calamity, of your being. How will you meet your Maker if you neglect the preparation. What shall be the end of them that obey not the Gospel? (Enoch D. Solomon.)

The solemn warning

I. An interview between god and man is inevitable,

II. preparation is necessary to make these meetings salve and happy

1. A preparation of sincere repentance.

2. A preparation of faith in the Lord Jesus.

3. A preparation of regeneration.

4. The preparation of good works.

Not works of merit; but works of goodness, produced in us by His Holy Spirit. Works of devotion to God, and beneficence and compassion to men.

III. Urge the admonition of the text.

1. Prepare scripturally.

2. Prepare earnestly.

3. Prepare immediately.

4. Let all prepare. (J. Burns, D. D.)

Preparation for meeting God in the afflictions and judgme

nts of His hand:–

I. Prepare to meet thy God, o Israel, acknowledge who it is that is come out against thee. Stop not at second causes–dwell not and trifle not about petty and subordinate excuses. Acknowledge God to be the author of the calamity. It is His providence–His hand–His voice.

II. Acknowledge thy inability to meet him. How can man meet and bear and endure and sustain the judgments of his Creator? Our weakness being too great–our guilt too apparent–our folly too monstrous.

III. the abasing of ourselves before god in true penitence. Abase thyself before Him–return from all thy transgressions–cast away your idols–return unto God, and seek His face.

IV. We must cast ourselves upon his grace and mercy in jesus christ. Prepare to meet thy God by throwing thyself at the foot of the Cross–and by relying on justification and acceptance in the atoning blood and meritorious propitiation and sacrifice of the eternal Son of God. (D. Wilson.)

Gods message to Israel

Our consideration is called to the coming of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ, as God manifest in the flesh. In the language of Scripture, the design of Almighty God in any way to bless or to punish mankind is often represented by the declaration of His coming among them for that purpose. In His own existence God necessarily fills all space, and is at all times equally present in every portion of the universe which He hath formed. Yet He speaks of Himself as dwelling among His people, departing from them, etc. All these forms of expression arise from the peculiar government which He exercised over the Israelites, often called a theocracy. Because every instrument, either of good or evil, was powerful and effectual only as employed by Him. God is also said to have personally done that which was done by His permission. While God warns His people of His approach, either for purposes of mercy or judgment, He commands them also to prepare for His reception; to be ready to meet Him with that reverence and gratitude and submission which comported with His high authority, and with their dependence upon His power. It seems that the afflictions of Israel had not been allowed by them to produce their proper effect, in bringing them to repentance. God threatens them therefore with further execution of His determinations for punishment, and solemnly admonishes them to be prepared for His coming.

I. The events which may be referred to as the coming of God. Two great events referred to under this peculiar designation. The advent of God in His Incarnation, for the redemption of His people. And the second personal advent to judge the world in righteousness.

1. The first advent of God, to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself, in some of its aspects, may be considered as a past event. But, in regard to its final object, the accomplishment of mans salvation, it must be considered as enduring until every ransomed soul has been brought home, converted from the world, and fully devoted to God. The great purpose of this coming He is affecting every day. But to the heart yet unchanged, the real advent of Christ, for mans salvation, is as much a future event as it was to Abraham.

2. The second advent is, for all who live now, a future event; and it will be for the full salvation of His people, for the universal judgment of the world, and for the final settlement of His glorious and everlasting kingdom. How far removed this day is neither men nor angels know.

II. The state of mind which is implied in this call for preparation.

1. In regard to His first advent, a Divine messenger was sent to make ready His way. The same work of preparation must be finished before your hearts can find peace with Him. The world and self are to be forsaken and denied. Your own righteousness, as a ground of hope, is to be relinquished.

2. In regard to the second coming of Christ, the exhortation of our text becomes still more solemn and important. What progress in holiness shall be too large a preparation for that momentous hour of the souls existence? What life of faith can be too elevated? What heavenliness of character can be too exalted? Personal holiness and active beneficence constitute the whole amount of pure and undefiled religion, as exemplified in the character which is required of the people of God. And though no worth can appertain to either, as proceeding from an imperfect and sinful being, yet undoubtedly, the higher are our attainments in both, the more full of peace and comfort will our souls be, at the coming of our God. In all the duties of a holy, active life, the spiritual Israel is to be prepared to meet their God.

III. The character under which God will come to his spiritual Israel. Thy God. Whether He comes in His first, or in His second advent, He comes as a Saviour who is welcome to His people; He is their God.

1. God the Saviour is ours, by His own election of us to be His people. When we knew Him not, He called us to receive the fulness of His grace.

2. By a voluntary donation of Himself for us. By this donation of Himself, He purchased for Himself a peculiar people, who shall glorify Him on the earth, and become partakers of His glory in heaven.

3. By our voluntary acceptance of His mercy.

4. By the personal consecration of ourselves to His service. This is the fourfold ground of that reciprocal property which subsists between God and His people. But we must consider Him, not only as theirs, but as their God. We may be joyful in our King, because of the glorious character of the Being whose coming is proclaimed.

IV. What will be the results of his coming to them?

1. His first advent is to their hearts, with the demonstration of the Spirit, and with Divine power, and its result is, that they are born again and made new creatures in Christ Jesus. The acceptance of the Lord Jesus Christ, in the great offices which He exercises for men, is the characteristic distinction of the people of God; the grand discriminating mark of converted souls.

2. Then, being redeemed, there will be nothing disheartening or terrible in His second coming to finish His purposes of love for us. The text having thus far been applied to spiritual Israel, may now be applied to idolatrous Israel.

To this class it is the solemn warning of an approaching judgment.

1. This text, as a warning, was addressed to those whose service and affections had been voluntarily withdrawn from the living God, and devoted to objects prohibited by Him. The Israelites had openly established idolatrous worship in the land; and had secretly withdrawn their hearts from God, even while professing outwardly to serve Him. Every unconverted man is really an idolater. The covetousness of the world is idolatry. The proud, the vain, the envious, are all idolaters. It is the voluntary idolatry of mens hearts which forms the guiltiness of their unconverted state.

2. The exhortation of this text was addressed to those who had experienced many chastising visitations from Almighty God without effect. Every painful providence dispensed to man is either a blessing or a curse. If it merely hardens us in a state of sin, it is a punishment.

3. The warning of the text was addressed to those who had been the peculiar objects of Divine forbearance, without repentance.

V. What will render the day of Gods coming intolerable to those who have done evil, and who must be judged for the evil which they have done.

1. In that day of Gods coming, you will think of the clear and inestimable manifestations of Divine love which you have neglected.

2. You will think of the laborious and expensive system which was devised and executed for your redemption.

3. The recompense of that dreadful day of Gods coming will be further aggravated by a clear view of the dignity of that holy and merciful Being who has been thus despised.

4. You will reflect upon His long-continued forbearance, which has been abused and exhausted by your perverseness in sin. Then I entreat you to look at the character of your own lives, and see if you are prepared to meet your God. Whatever be the outward habits of your lives, whatever the opinions which men entertain of your characters, without the power of godliness in your souls renewed by the Holy Ghost, you are weighed in the balance, and found wanting. Acquire, then, this spirit of true religion. Consider the value of your eternal interests. (S. H. Tyng, D. D.)

Preparation to meet God

Is this to be considered the language of irony or of seriousness? We view the words seriously. Not as an insultation over their weakness, but as an expression of kindness designed to hinder the misery it foretold. The Divine threatenings are always conditional; either stated or implied. If God ever takes a sinner by surprise, it is after the rejection of a thousand warnings addressed to him. God strikes before He destroys, and He speaks before He strikes.

I. God is coming. Coming to apprehend, and to punish, without repentance. This may be applied to any of His awful dispensations. To destroy nations, in ways of spiritual judgment. Gods coming to judgment is rendered reasonable and probable by the testimony and terrors of conscience. And this coming to judgment is rendered certain by the Word of God. Here is an event in which we are not to be mere spectators, but parties deeply concerned.

II. We ought to be prepared to meet him. Attend to three questions.

1. Can you escape?

2. Can you contend with Him?

3. Can you endure Him?

III. There is a preparation which will enable us to meet him in safety and peace. The Bible tells us what we should do, and assures us of full provision for all that we are required to do.

1. You must go forth with the world behind your backs.

2. With tears in your eyes,

3. With ropes upon your necks.

4. With a petition in your hand.

5. With Christ at your side.

Go forth thus to meet Him, and He will fully pardon you and welcome you. (William Jay.)

Preparation to meet God

I. To whom may this command be considered as addressed? All who have made no preparation for meeting God.

1. Those who have designedly crowded the whole subject from their minds.

2. Those who have deferred the subject with an intention to prepare at a future time. They have some sense of the importance and necessity of making preparation.

3. Those who spend their time in preparing for other things, so as to crowd this subject out, though without any specific or settled intention to do so.

4. Those who have given some slight attention to the subject, but have settled down on that which will, in fact, constitute no preparation when they come to appear before God. They are relying on some delusive views and hopes, some erroneous doctrine or opinions; some vague, unsettled, and unsubstantial feelings. These classes embrace a large portion of the human family.

II. Why should preparation be made to meet God?

1. Because it is to be our first interview with Him face to face.

2. Because we shall meet Him in very solemn circumstances.

3. Because we go there on a very solemn errand.

4. Because God has solemnly commanded such preparation.

5. Because when we are brought before Him, it will be too late to do what is necessary to be done.

III. What is necessary to be done in order to be prepared to meet god? Mere bravery or courage is not a preparation to meet God. Not more is he prepared to meet God who bids defiance to death. Nor is studied insensibility in death the proper preparation.

1. It is necessary to be reconciled to God. No one is prepared to meet Him to whom He is a stranger or a foe.

2. To be born again; to be renewed by the Holy Ghost.

3. There must be true repentance for sin, and true faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The sum of what I say is this,–To be prepared to meet God, we must comply exactly with what He requires. We must meet His terms. No one need ever to have made any mistake on this point.

IV. When we should prepare to meet God. We must attend to it to-day; we must defer it no longer. The Bible requires it to be done at once; it demands that everything else should give way for it; that this day may end your probation; and that there is slender probability of preparation being made on a dying bed. (A. Barnes, D. D.)

The advent message

These words contain the two elements of all advent thoughts, the promise of a coming, and the exhortation to prepare for that coming. The one great difference between Christianity and all other forms of life and thought is, that the former has an advent in it, and that the latter have not. Christ taught men to look forward. In other life there is no such definite spirit of anticipation. The plans of those who consider themselves progressive men are often more destructive than constructive. All true progress, either conscious or unconscious, voluntary or compulsory, can be defined as God and man meeting together. To some advent lessons of preparation for meeting our God let attention be given. There is always a generation that is growing up, preparing for the world, as we say. But what is this for which they are preparing? Prepare to meet thy God presents a very different ideal It supposes that the world of men and women, of events and circumstances, was made and is controlled by God. He is in it. Behind all its more evident aspects He exists as a great power which is unlimited in its plans, and unmeasured in its force. Into such a world we are called to enter, and for preparation toward such a destiny are needed spiritual acquirements,–the power of patience and self-denial, the accurate perception of what is for and what is against Gods glory, the possession of firm principle and courageous faith to resist the wrong and to assist the good. How many men have failed in the world for want of just those things! The whole moral aspect of life was obscured to them. The advent message brings back the true ideal. Its message is–Before us is God. Do not treat life as an earthly and insignificant thing; but at every step be sure that there is present the power of God, demanding our most complete preparation for what it lays upon us. The preparation for such daily meetings with God is a wide one. It neglects none of the ordinary preparations, in body, mind, and spirit; for every emergency requiring wisdom and power, it adds to that, it crowns it all, with that preparation of spirit, trained by intercourse with God Himself, in the closet, in the Church, by prayer, and by meditation, that we may be able to recognise His coming, and to do His will. Prepare to meet thy God is a command which, when we have once heard it clearly in Christian revelation, can be heard re-echoed from all the surrounding points of human life. The words of the text also relate to death. Religion did not make the grave; it only found it, and declared how it could be received. Something besides earth claims us, and we must go forth to meet it. It is the Gospel which says, Prepare to meet thy God. Let that day not come upon you unawares, as a thief in the night; refuse to be snared by and identified with that bodily life which must fail you; live by the power of Him who came from heaven, and took flesh upon Him, only that by that life in the flesh He might do the will of His Father, and call men back to Him. (Arthur Brooks.)

Preparation to meet God

The whole business which we have in the world is this, to prepare to meet God. This is the meaning of the whole Bible, to warn us that we must meet God, and to afford us every assistance and encouragement in this preparation. It is this in which mankind differs from all other creatures of God which we know of. Angels have not this call made to them. Brute creatures have not to appear before Him. Every man that is born must at last come into His presence. Who may abide the day of His coming? Our Lords warning is, Be ye ready! What it will be to meet our God no heart of man can conceive; for what thought of man can ever understand what God is? But we may come to know Him even in this world far more than we think we can, as He is revealed to us in Jesus Christ. The thought of meeting God is of itself so awful, that we might have been disposed to sit down in despair at the contemplation of it, were it not for this access to the Father which we have in Jesus Christ. It is of infinite consequence that we should be prepared, lest that day should overtake us unawares. And we know in what way we are to be prepared, what the things are which will be required of us. We cannot undo the past, which must all come before the all-seeing eye of the Judge; but during the little time that remains to us we can earnestly ask forgiveness, with lastings, and prayers, and tears, for the sake of Christ; and thus we may, with Gods mercy, gain some hope and comfort before we die. (Plain Sermons by Contribution to Tracts for the Times. )

Preparation for eternity

I. To whom this command applies. It is applicable to all those who have not made any preparation.

1. There are those who have not made religion a personal matter.

2. Those who defer the subject with the intention of preparing at some future time.

3. Those who are so engrossed with other matters as to banish this subject from their minds.

4. Those who have given some attention to religion.

II. In what does such preparation consist This is an important question. It does not consist in courage or bravery. Not in infidel stoicism. Not in beauty, wealth, etc. Not in amiability, honesty, justice, a fair character. Two great difficulties stand between a sinner and heaven: a legal one–man is a condemned sinner; a moral one–man is unholy. Justification will remove the legal difficulty; and regeneration will remove the moral one. Justification is that which God does for us; regeneration, that which He does in us.

III. Some reasons for preparing to meet god. (J. D. Carey.)

Preparation for heaven

Every one knows that this life is but the childhood of existence. A great many, and not such as pass for bad men either, are making no sort of preparation for another life. In all that respects this worlds gain, the eye of the lightning is not sharper than theirs. And nothing can exceed the thoughtfulness and attention they bestow in preparing the comfort of their declining years. But take one of these deliberate and sagacious men, ask him what duty he is doing because Christianity requires it; ask him if he makes a point of doing, not what pleases himself, but what will please God. If he tells the truth, lie will reply that he thinks of no such things. He is contented if he preserves a good moral character, and does not materially injure others. He is quite easy as to his last account with God. But after giving all the praise due to this conduct, the great question returns, What is there in all this that you can call preparation for another existence? All this begins and ends with the present world. In all this there is nothing serious, nothing devoted, nothing high, nothing which could not be done as well without Jesus Christ as with Him. So many are in error. They are moving on in the voyage of life as if they were sure of drifting to the right harbour. What is the preparation required? Devotion and benevolence constitute the preparation;–in better words, the preparation is to love God with all the heart, and our neighbour as ourselves. Devotion does not consist in solemnity. The solemnity Christianity wants is that of a heart deeply engaged, interested, busy in its duty. I call that man devout who feels, and tries to feel, the presence of God; who is not afraid nor unwilling to have the eye of God upon him. Such a man prays, to make his requests known unto God; praises, because praise is the feeling of his heart; and his greatest endeavour is to bring his thoughts and deeds into subjection to the Christian law. Devotion means devotedness, readiness to do and suffer everything that pleases God. Devotion means something more than prayer. I would judge of the devotion by the life, and not of the life by the devotion. And the benevolence that makes part of the preparation is an active desire to do good to men. Mark the words active desire; for the mere desire is nothing. Very often there is a selfishness in the midst of benevolence. There are those who are willing to do good, but will to do it in their own way. Even the benevolent must be on their guard; they are far too apt to take as much with one hand as they give with the other. Mere feeling will do good as long as it is pleasant, and no longer. Principle is something worth having; it is patient, not easily discouraged, and enduring. (W. B. C. Peabody, D. D.)

Gods voice to humanity

I. There is a period to dawn upon mankind when they shall come to a particular contact with God. This period is–

1. Certain. Nature teaches the fact. Conscience indicates the same truth.

2. Uncertain, as to its time.

3. The greatest of all periods of importance.

Then the actions of the life will be brought to the test.

II. This period which is to dawn upon mankind requires preparation on mans part.

1. Man, in his natural state, is not in a condition to meet God.

2. Man is in a state of possibility to prepare.

3. Mans agency is necessary to his preparation.

III. God feels deep interest in the worlds preparation. He desires the salvation of the world.

1. From what He has done for humanity.

2. From what He is doing in man.

3. From what He has promised to do for us in future.

Attention to Gods voice will secure our everlasting happiness. (J. O. Griffiths.)

Preparation for judgment

I. Every one of the human family must stand before God. In the world of spirits we shall all meet God.

1. When the soul is dislodged from the body.

2. In the judgment at the last day. Note–

(1) The awful character and appearance of the Judge.

(2) The surrounding changes which will take place.

(3) The innumerable multitude that will then be assembled.

(4) The suddenness of the summons.

(5) The trial, or testing, through which every one must pass.

II. The nature of the preparation necessary to enable us to meet god with comfort.

1. The justification of our persons.

2. The sanctification of our nature.

3. The improvement of the talents entrusted to our care.

III. The necessity of attending to this important precept. Consider–

1. The awful character of God.

2. The mighty purposes for which this meeting is convened.

3. The vast importance of this duty, compared with the utter insignificance of all earthly pursuits.

4. The means of attaining this great end are abundantly supplied.

5. We beseech you to act upon this advice, from the assurance that on it depends your everlasting happiness or misery.

Address–

1. Those who have made no preparation for leaving this world.

2. Those who see the need, but delay.

3. Those who are diligently making preparation.

The more they arc like God, the better prepared they will be to meet Him. Only by a diligent attendance on the means of grace can this be secured. (R. Treffry.)

The great interview

The Jews were incorrigible. God had tried for their correction, captivity, famine, too much rain, too little rain, universal sickness, lightning, and war, No good result. He now tells them that greater judgments are to come. With God we must meet.

1. In the misfortunes of life. Times of sickness, disaster, etc.

2. In the bereavements of life. We cannot escape then, unless man stands all alone–fatherless, motherless, brotherless, sisterless, childless.

3. An interview of this kind will take place in our last hour.

4. We must meet God in the great day. Common sense teaches us that there must be a judgment-day. How are we to prepare to meet God? Two words will tell you. Repent. Believe. That is, give up your sin, and be sorry for it. Take Christ for your Saviour. (T. De Witt Talmage, D. D.)

Face to face with God

The late Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, one of the most serious minded and earnest men whom England has produced in this century, was suddenly summoned to meet death and judgment. In the midst of perfect health he was attacked with spasm of the heart, and learned that in a moment he would be called into the infinitely holy presence of his Maker. He knew what this meant; for the immaculate purity of God was a subject that had profoundly impressed his spiritual and ethical mind. He felt the need of mercy at the prospect of seeing God face to face; and as he lay upon his deathbed, still, thoughtful, and absorbed in silent prayer, all at once he repeated firmly and earnestly: And Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen Me, thou hast believed; blessed are they who have not seen, and yet have believed. (W. G. T. Shedd.)

Ready to meet God

He who simply trusts the Saviour, he who faithfully performs every known duty, he who keeps a clear account with conscience, is always ready to enter heaven. There is deep truth in John Ruskins words: The only place where a man can be nobly thoughtless is on his deathbed. There ought to be no thinking left to be done there. Yes, we know how to die if we know how to live. (Sunday Companion.)

We have to do with our Maker

As a cathedral built in the heart of a great city rises with the other buildings round about it, keeps company with them a certain distance, and then leaves them all behind, soars away skyward, and at last, solitary and alone, looks up into the infinite spaces, so every man lives among men. He rests with them upon the same political and social foundation; he stands with them in a wide and important fellowship; he rises with them in a certain way, and then he goes beyond them all, and the last look and reference of his spirit is to the Eternal. We draw our being from God, we live and move and have our being in God, and at death we breathe back our life into Gods hands. The first thing in our existence is our Maker, and when we have done with all others we have still to do with Him. (G. A. Gordon, D. D.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 12. Therefore thus will I do unto thee] I will continue my judgments, I will fight against you; and, because I am thus determined,-

Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.] This is a military phrase, and is to be understood as a challenge to come out to battle. As if the Lord had said, I will attack you immediately. Throw yourselves into a posture of defense, summon your idols to your help: and try how far your strength, and that of your gods, will avail you against the unconquerable arm of the Lord of hosts! This verse has been often painfully misapplied by public teachers; it has no particular relation to the day of judgment, nor to the hour of death. These constructions are impositions on the text.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

Therefore, because none of my former methods have succeeded, as in reason might have been expected,

thus will I do unto thee, in some more terrible manner will I now proceed against thee, O Israel; you of the ten tribes.

Because I will do this unto thee, and therefore my last advice to you is to consider it well; if you think well of it, possibly you may see and prevent the threatened evil.

Prepare to meet thy God; if you humble yourselves, and so return, it will be mercy to you; but if you proudly and sinfully refuse to return, know ye that you must perish, for you can never make good your cause against God, and yet you must meet him, for he will ere he hath done with you end the controversy.

Thy God; who once was thy God, and whom thou still ownest for thy God, and who would yet be thine if thou repent.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

12. Thereforeas allchastisements have failed to make thee “return unto Me.”

thus will I do unto theeasI have threatened (Amo 4:2;Amo 4:3).

prepare to meet thy GodGodis about to inflict the last and worst judgment on thee, theextinction of thy nationality; consider then what preparation thoucanst make for encountering Him as thy foe (Jer 46:14;Luk 14:31; Luk 14:32).But as that would be madness to think of (Isa 27:4;Eze 22:14; Heb 10:31),see what can be done towards mitigating the severity of the comingjudgment, by penitence (Isa 27:5;1Co 11:31). This latterexhortation is followed up in Amo 5:4;Amo 5:6; Amo 5:8;Amo 5:14; Amo 5:15.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel,…. What he would do is not expressly and particularly said; it is commonly understood to be something in a way of judgment, and worse than what he had done, since they had no effect upon them; or these things should be done over again, until an utter end was made of them; or the reference is to Am 3:11; and the following words are usually interpreted, either, ironically, since the Lord was coming forth as an enemy to issue the controversy with them; they are called upon to meet, him in a hostile way, and muster up all their forces, exert all their power and strength, and make use of their best weapons and military skill, and see what would be the consequence of all this; feeble worms set in opposition to the mighty God; thorns and briers he can easily go through, and burn up quickly: or else they are seriously addressed, and exhorted to meet the Lord in the way of his judgments, by humiliation, repentance, and reformation; not knowing but that after all he may be gracious and merciful to them, and turn away the fierceness of his anger from them; see Am 5:15; but I rather think the words are a promise or intimation of doing something to Israel in a way of special grace and kindness, notwithstanding their conduct and behaviour, and the ineffectualness both of judgments and providential mercies; for the words may be rendered, as the same particle should be in Ho 2:14; “notwithstanding”, or “nevertheless, thus will I do unto thee” w; what I have from all eternity purposed and resolved to do, and what I have promised again and again, by the mouth of all the holy prophets, from the beginning of the world, I would do; namely, send my Son to be thy Saviour and Redeemer:

[and] because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel; the Messiah that was then to come was God, and so equal to the work of redemption and salvation he was to do; and the God of spiritual and mystical Israel, even all the elect, Jews and Gentiles, to be redeemed by him; was to be their Immanuel, God in their nature, and therefore to be met with the utmost joy and pleasure; see Zec 9:9; for this meeting him is not to be understood in a hostile way, and as spoken ironically to the enemies of Christ to oppose him, encounter with him, and mark the issue of it, who in time would cause them to be brought before him and slain, as some interpret the words; but in a friendly manner, as he was met by those that were waiting for his coming, such as Simeon and others; and by those John the Baptist called upon to prepare the way of the Lord; and as he was by his own disciples, who embraced him by faith, received him with joy, and left all and followed him; and as all such are prepared to meet him who are made truly sensible of sin, and of their own righteousness as insufficient to justify from it, and have seen the glory, fulness, and suitableness of his salvation. Christ is to be met with in his house and ordinances; and men are prepared for it when the desires of their hearts are towards him, and their graces are exercised on him; which preparation is from himself: he will be met at his second coming by his spiritual Israel; and they will be prepared for it who believe it, love it, and long for it; have their loins girt, and their lights burning, and they waiting for their Lord’s coming; see Mt 25:1; and so at the hour of death, which is the day of the Lord; a preparation and readiness for which lies not in external humiliation, outward reformation, a moral righteousness, or a bare profession of religion, and submission to ordinances; but in regeneration, in faith in Christ, and spiritual knowledge of him; in a being washed in his blood, and clothed with his righteousness; for which readiness all truly sensible sinners will be concerned, and which is all from the grace of God; see

Mt 24:43. The Septuagint, Syriac, and Arabic versions, read it, “prepare to call upon thy God”; and the Targum paraphrases it,

“to receive the doctrine of the law of thy God;”

rather the doctrine of the Gospel; but the former sense is best; for the confirmation of which it may be observed, that when God is said to do a thing to any, it is usually in a way of grace; and that when preparation is made to meet a divine Person, it is always meant of the Son of God; and that it is a common thing in prophecy, that when the Lord is threatening men with his judgments, to throw in a promise or prophecy of the Messiah, for the comfort of his people.

w “nihilominus tamen”. Vid. Noldium, p. 507.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

“Therefore thus will I do to thee, O Israel; because I will do this to thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel. Amo 4:13. For, behold, He that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind, and maketh known to man what is his thought; who maketh dawn, darkness, and goeth over the high places of the earth, Jehovah God of hosts is His name.” The punishment which God is now about to inflict is introduced with lakhen (therefore). cannot point back to the punishment threatened in Amo 4:2, Amo 4:3, and still less to the chastisements mentioned in Amo 4:6-11; for lakhen koh is always used by Amos to introduce what is about to ensue, and any retrospective allusion to Amo 4:6-11 is precluded by the future . What Jehovah is now about to do is not expressed here more iratorum, but may clearly be discerned from what follows. “When He has said, ‘This will I do to thee,’ He is silent as to what He will do, in order that, whilst Israel is left in uncertainty as to the particular kind of punishment (which is all the more terrible because all kinds of things are imagined), it may repent of its sins, and so avert the things which God threatens here” (Jerome). Instead of an announcement of the punishment, there follows in the words, “Because I will do this to thee ( pointing back to ), prepare to meet thy God,” a summons to hold themselves in readiness liqra’th ‘elohm ( in occursum Dei ), i.e., to stand before God thy judge. The meaning of this summons has been correctly explained by Calvin thus: “When thou seest that thou hast resorted in vain to all kinds of subterfuges, since thou never wilt be able to escape from the hand of thy judge; see now at length that thou dost avert this last destruction which is hanging over thee.” But this can only be effected “by true renewal of heart, in which men are dissatisfied with themselves, and submit with changed heart to God, and come as suppliants, praying for forgiveness.” For if we judge ourselves, we shall not be judged by the Lord (1Co 11:31). This view is shown to be the correct one, by the repeated admonitions to seek the Lord and live (Amo 5:4, Amo 5:6; cf. Amo 5:14). To give all the greater emphasis to this command, Amos depicts God in Amo 4:13 as the Almighty and Omniscient, who creates prosperity and adversity. The predicates applied to God are to be regarded as explanations of , prepare to meet thy God; for it is He who formeth mountains, etc., i.e., the Almighty, and also He who maketh known to man , what man thinketh, not what God thinketh, since = is not applicable to God, and is only used ironically of Baal in 1Ki 18:27. The thought is this: God is the searcher of the heart (Jer 17:10; Psa 139:2), and reveals to men by prophets the state of their heart, since He judges not only the outward actions, but the inmost emotions of the heart (cf. Heb 4:12). might mean, He turns morning dawn into darkness, since may be construed with the accusative of that into which anything is made (compare Exo 30:25, and the similar thought in Amo 5:8, that God darkens the day into night). But both of these arguments simply prove the possibility of this explanation, not that it is either necessary or correct. As a rule, where occurs, the thing into which anything is made is introduced with (cf. Gen 12:2; Exo 32:10). Here, therefore, may be omitted, simply to avoid ambiguity. For these reasons we agree with Calvin and others, who take the words as asyndeton. God makes morning-dawn and darkness, which is more suitable to a description of the creative omnipotence of God; and the omission of the Vav may be explained very simply from the oratorical character of the prophecy. To this there is appended the last statement: He passes along over the high places of the earth, i.e., He rules the earth with unlimited omnipotence (see at Deu 32:13), and manifests Himself thereby as the God of the universe, or God of hosts.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

Amos here declares, in the person of God, that the people in vain hoped for pardon, or for a modification, or an abatement, or an end to their punishment; for God had in vain made the attempt, by many scourges and chastisements, to subdue their extreme arrogance: therefore, he says, thus will I do to you. What does this particle כה, ke, thus, mean? Some think that God here denounces on the Israelites the punishments they had before experienced: but the Prophet, I doubt not, means something much more grievous. He now removes the exception which he lately mentioned as though be had said, that God would execute extreme punishment on this reprobate people without any mitigation. This will I do to thee, Israel: “Thou hast already perceived with how many things I armed myself to take vengeance on the despisers of my law; I will now deal more severely with thee, for thy obstinacy compels me. Since, then, I have hitherto produced no effect on you, I will now bring the last punishment: for remedies cannot be applied to men past recovery.” Thus, then, he says, will I do to thee Israel. (29)

And because I will do this to thee, etc עכב, okob, means often a reward or an end: this place may then be thus rendered: ‘I will at length surely do this to you;’ but the sense the most suitable seems to be this, Because I will this do to you, prepare to meet thy God. The passage may be explained in two ways: either as an ironical sentence, or as a simple and serious exhortation to repentance. If we take it ironically, the sense will be of this kind, “Come, now, meet me with all your obstinacy, and with whatever may serve you; will you be able to escape my vengeance by setting up yourselves against me, as you have hitherto done?” And certainly the Prophet, in denouncing final ruin on the people, seems here as though he wished designedly to touch them to the quick, when he says, “Meet now thy God and prepare thyself:” that is, “Gather all thy strength, and thy forces, and thy auxiliaries; try what all this will avail thee.” But as in the next chapter, the Prophet exhorts again the Israelites to repentance, and sets before them the hope of favor, this place may be taken in another sense, as though he said, “Since thou seest thyself guilty, and also as thou seest that thou art seeking subterfuges in vain, being not able by any means to elude the hand of thy judge, then see at last, that thou meet thy God, that thou mayest anticipate the final ruin which is impending.” The Prophets, we indeed know, after having threatened destruction to the chosen people, ever moderate the asperity of their doctrine, as there were at all times some remnant seed, though hidden. And similar passages we have seen both in Joel and in Hosea. It is not, therefore, improper to explain the words of Amos in this sense, — that though the people were almost past hope, he yet exhorted them to anticipate God’s wrath. Prepare then thyself to meet thy God, as though he said, “However worthy thou art of being destroyed and though the Lord seems to have closed up the door of mercy, and despair meets thee on every side, thou can’t yet mitigate God’s wrath, provided thou prepares to meet him.”

But this preparation includes real renovation of the heart: it then takes place, when men are displeased with themselves, when with a changed mind they submit to God, and humbly pray for forgiveness. There is then an important meaning in the Prophet’s words, Prepare thyself. With regard to meeting God, we know what Paul says in 1Co 9:6,

‘

If we judge ourselves, we shall not be judged by the Lord.’

How comes it, then, that God deals severely with us, except that we spare ourselves? Hence this indulgence, with which we flatter ourselves, provokes God’s wrath against us. We cannot then meet God, except we become our own judges, and condemn our sins and feel real sorrow. We now see what the Prophet means, if we regard the passage as not spoken ironically.

But that he might rouse careless men more effectually, he then magnificently extols the power of God; and that he might produce more reverence and fear in men, especially the hardened and the refractory, he adorns his name with many commendations. As it was difficult to turn the headstrong, the Prophet accumulates many titles, to move the people, that they might entertain reverence for God. “God,” he says, “has formed the mountains, and created the spirit,” and further, “he knoweth hearts, and men themselves understand not what they think of, except as far as God sets before them their thoughts; God maketh the morning and the darkness, and walketh in the high places of the earth; and his name is, Jehovah, God of hosts.” Why were all these encomiums added, but that the hearts of men might be touched, who were before void of thought and sunk in blind stupidity? We now understand the Prophet’s object. But what remains to be said on the words will be added in tomorrow’s lecture.

(29) There seems to be a reference in “thus” to the judgment denounced on Israel in the 2 nd and 3 rd verses of this chapter: he declares that he will deal with Israel “thus,” or in the manner before described. — Ed.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

THE ESSENTIAL PREPARATION

Amo 4:12

WHEN the title of these forty volumes was selected The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist it was my purpose to do what we have been doing for more than ten years now, give the morning to exposition and the evening to soul-winning. At that time I had no fears whatever for such a program as it related itself to the New Testament; I knew that it was full of evangelistic texts: but I wondered whether I should always find in the Old Testament Scriptures inspired sentences that would be particularly adapted to the evangelistic appeal. Now that we approach the end of this whole Bible study I confess to you, what you have doubtless discovered, namely, that the Old Testament is quite as rich in such texts as is the New. In fact, for sententious statements, it even surpasses the New.

The text of tonight is an instance! How significant the injunction, Prepare to meet thy God. Our fathers in the ministry were almost uniformly evangelical men; and one who studies the sermons that fell from their lips is bound to be impressed with their constant use of Old Testament texts. In brevity, clarity, direct appeal, they hold the proof of their inspiration.

The frivolous age to which we belong needs this inspired injunction Prepare to meet thy God.

Some quiet meditation upon this text would suggest the following: That Meeting Is Certain: The Time of It Is Indefinite: The Event Is Imminent.

THE MEETING IS CERTAIN

It is definitely determined. Paul, writing to the Hebrews, said: It is appointed unto men once to die (Heb 9:27).

In his First Letter to the Corinthians he also wrote: In Adam all die (1Co 15:22).

While to the Romans he writes: So death passed upon all men (Rom 5:12).

In the Old Testament the Prophet Ezekiel wrote: I say unto the wicked, O wicked man, thou shalt surely die (Eze 33:8).

Father Ryan wrote:

Only a few more years!

Weary years!

Only a few more tears!

Bitter tears!

And thenand thenlike other men,

I cease to wander, cease to weep,

Dim shadows oer my way shall creep;

And out of the day and into the night,

Into the dark and out of the bright

I go, and death shall veil my face,

The feet of the years shall fast efface

My very name, and every trace

I leave on earth; for the stern years tread,

Tread out the names of the gone and dead!

It cannot be evaded! As death reigned from Adam to Moses so it has continued until this hour victor against all men save Enoch and Elijah. In view of that history, what man can afford to ignore its certain coming; or the fact that, for him, it means a personal appearance in the presence of God?

Professor Austin Phelps is reported to be the author of the story that when Dr. Paulus of Germany who was an infidel came to die, he sent for a number of his students. To them he had taught against immortality and now that he was consciously passing into the great unknown, he addressed them somewhat as follows: Young gentlemen; I have sent for you to show you how a man believing and teaching as I have done, can die. I do not want any one to think that I have weakened at the last moment. I know that I am going into the future, but I know that there is no consciousness there. For the soul of man, there is no hereafter. While his students stood about his bed the old professor sank into a comatose condition; but, after a while, he started up and looking about him with a strange light in his eyes he cried out, There is a hereafter! and fell back to die. It was as if God had given him this conscious moment with which to correct his false teaching, and with his last word to bear testimony to the truth It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.

Robert Murray McCheyne, that matchless young Scotch minister whose life, like that of his Master, ended with his youth, bore such testimony to the truth of Scripture as to make his name immortal among men. In the volume Memoir and Remains we have this statement from him,

I was in a very wicked family today where a child had died. I opened my Bible and explained this verse to them over the coffin of the little one, It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment. Solemn words! We have only once to die and the day is fixed. If you die wrong the first time you cannot come back to die better a second time. If you die without Christ, you cannot come back to be converted and die a believer; you have but once to die. Oh, pray that you may find Christ before death finds you! After this the judgment.

Not after this, purgatory. No further opportunity to be saved, After this the judgment. As death leaves you, so judgment finds you. If you die unsaved, you will be so in the judgment. May I never see you at the left hand. If I do, you will remember how I warned you, and prayed for you, and besought you to come to the Lord Jesus.

That form of infidelity which has brought many a man of the twentieth century to doubt the hereafter is the devils own philosophy. This text was born as its antidote. The testimony of the ages is to the effect that this text points to wisdoms ways, Prepare to meet thy God.

Such preparation is possible. In Johns Gospel, fifth chapter, we read these words: Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My Word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation.

If you will consult the marginal reading of your Scofield Reference Bible you will find the word Judgments and underneath it in parenthesis (7). What a wonderful suggestion. Seven is Gods numeral for perfection. It means that all judgments for a believer are overpassed, and he can face the judgment day itself without fear.

A few days ago on the train I went into the observation car, and looked over the magazines there and found an article, in one, written by Clarence Darrow giving the history of the Massie trial in Hawaii. You will remember that Massie was convicted of murder and the penalty might have been life imprisonment or the gallows; but in the Governor of Hawaii Massie found a friend and a pardon followed hard upon the judgment of jury and the sentence of the Judge, and he quit the Island a free man. In Jesus Christ every sinner may find just such a Friend; yea, even a greater One, a Friend who, though He knows our guilt, and understands perfectly that the sentence passed upon us is just, anticipated the same and met its demands in His own person, so that when the great day of judgment shall come He will appear for us and we will not even be required to stand in that court at all, for, as Jesus says, He that heareth My Word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation. That is your opportunity of adjustment. Why not make it now?

THE TIME IS INDEFINITE

Like the Second Coming of the Lord, No man knoweth it.

There is not a single one of us that can pass from this house tonight with any conceivable assurance that we will reach our homes with life in the body. When, eight years ago, four of the officials of this church were returning from one of the most delightful days that four men of kindred spirit had ever spent, not a one of us dreamed of danger when suddenly a car, driven by drunks, and running at fifty or sixty miles an hour, down hill, swerved from its side of the road and struck us, straight head on, and put the life of each of us in instant peril, it was only of Gods grace that we lived to tell the tale. And when, three years ago the thirteenth of last July, my wife and daughter and self were speeding across the high plains of Wyoming there came from the region of the rear tire an explosive sound, and one second later we all lay bleeding and helpless in a ditch, it was only the grace of God that so manipulated our bodies as to land them with life in them.

You will pick up your newspaper tomorrow morning and there will be the report in it of one life snuffed out by a railroad crossing, another ended by an automobile collision, and the report of a third run down in the streets and left for dead. And not one single one of them will have had even a premonition of deaths approach sixty seconds before its actual occurrence.

It is not unusual, of course, for people who have long been on beds of affliction and who have seen their flesh wasted and have felt the heart weaken day by day to anticipate the end and be in the spirit of expectation when it comes; but it is altogether unusual for one to go from apparent health into the arms of death and ever realize that the last enemy is at hand.

A few years ago Van Hove De Saint Pol, Belgiums famous composer, was conducting light opera in the city of Stekene, when, suddenly, he halted the concert and said to the musicians, Play a certain funeral march. They could not understand but they were the servants of his will and they shifted instantly to the same, and their instruments sounded forth in a funeral harmony. He directed the march until the last note ended and as it died on the ears of the audience, his baton dropped from the nerveless hand and he fell dead. Apparently De Saint Pol knew that death had come and only by sheer will power held his place to the last heart beat. It is the exception that proves the rule; most people who go suddenly, go without an intimation of deaths approach and consequently without opportunity for preparation to meet God; and unfortunately multitudes of them have failed to make it.

It is not many years since the National Press Association in London gave a dinner in honor of Thomas Huxley on the occasion of his birthday and Major G. H. Putman, an American Civil War veteran, proposed a toast to the presiding officer, George Whale. When Mr. Whale responded to it this is what he said, Do I say, let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die? No, I say, Take hands and help for today we live. And from that he proceeded in a ruthless attack on Christianity, in the process of which he ridiculed the idea of the Holy Spirit. In the middle of a sentence he stopped, fell backward, and the men who ran to his assistance found him dead.

That infidel had not a moment left in which to prepare to meet his God. And yet he had enjoyed seventy-five years, of 365 1/4 days each, and had wasted them all, or at least had utilized none of them in making ready for the great adventure. In such an hour as ye think not death cometh!

The time of it is already appointed. But only that God who holds the power of life and death in His hands can know. Possibly when the hour breaks that all mysteries are made plain we shall learn that for each man it was the right time. When a wicked man dies in his youth we wonder whether God treated him justly and why He did not give him longer time in which to repent. By our very question we assume an unprovable proposition, namely, that longer continuance of life would lead to repentance. It might be that God saw that to continue longer would be to only add sin to sin and make the day of final reckoning less favorable.

When a good man dies in his youth we are disposed to complain again and say, Why did God cut off one who was so useful, and one of whom the world had such need?

When I hear men thus talk I think of what Arthur T. Pierson said concerning the death of my beau ideal in the ministry, A. J. Gordon. On the occasion of his funeral, Pierson, who was only one of the several speakers called to that solemn occasion, said,

There is something beautiful to me in Gods taking him away right in his prime, in the fullness of his beauty; for we remember men as they make their last impress upon us. We shall always remember Adoniram Judson Gordon as the full grown man in his prime of intellect, in his prime of Christian achievement, in the midst of the glory of the work that has grown to this point and now never can decline under his hand, for his hand is no more upon it. Is not that better than for him to have grown old, to have decayed in intellectual power, to have declined in social influence, to have dimmed the majesty of his imperial scepter?

This much at least ought to be the faith of believers, namely, that He who holdeth the power of life and death in His hands doeth all things well.

But in the face of that truth there is another fact that we ought to reflect upon:

Death is stealthily approaching. It makes no difference whether we are young or old, that day draws on. You may remember that in Victor Hugos Les Miserables there is a report of a man who lived in the country near D_____ and who had been a member of the National Convention. His name was G_____ . The little circle in the village in which he lived spoke of him with a sort of horror and looked upon him as a sort of monster. He had not exactly voted for the execution of the King, but had favored it, so was a half regicide, and was esteemed a terrible creature altogether. The solitude in which he dwelt added to their superstitious fears, but when the good Bishop, so loved by them all, learned that the old conventionalist was dying, and could not live through the night, he took his cane, put on his overcoat, and set out for the uncanny place, the retreat back of the trees that the citizens regarded as an accursed spot.

When the Bishop entered the house the sick man said, Who are you? This is the first time since I have lived here that I have had a visitor. The Bishop responded, giving his name, and the old man answered, Then you are my Bishop. Possibly! Come in Monseigneur, and he extended his hand. The Bishop answered, I am glad to find that I have been misinformed. You do not appear to me to be so sick as was reported. Monseigneur, replied the old man, I shall be dead in three hours. I am something of a physician. I know the steps by which death approaches. Yesterday my feet only were cold; today it crept to the knees; now it is at the waist; when it touches the heart all will be over. How true his diagnosis! But how seldom it is that we can so mark the stealthy approach of the last enemy. With the most of us it is exactly the oppositeIn such an hour as ye think not.

Then

THE EVENT IS IMMINENT

Does not the meaning of the text lie in that very factPrepare to meet thy God?

It may come at once. Life is the most valuable of all human possessions, All that a man hath will he give for his life, and yet it is the most uncertain of all riches. That is why men carry insurance upon it. If, when I came to this city thirty-five years and more ago, I could have known that I would be alive until now, I could have used that money to better advantage than in insurance investment. But I did not know! No man does; and just because the hour is so uncertain, but the event itself so very imminent, we tax ourselves for the sake of those who will be profited in the instance of our passing; and how often it turns out that that taxation was intelligent. Just a few years ago one of our first citizens in this city took out a life policy for a million dollars, and in less than eighteen months his heirs received the payment of the same.

David Everard Ford was speaking a truth with which we are all sadly familiar when he wrote:

How vain is all beneath the skies!

How transient every earthly bliss!

How slender all the fondest ties

That bind us to a world like this!

The evening cloud, the morning dew,

The withering grass, the fading flower,

Of earthly hopes are emblems true,

The glory of a, passing hour.

It must be soon! That is a statement that children do not appreciate; but every old man will bear his testimony that the statement is true. Life is swifter than a weavers shuttle.

As our great S. F. Smith wrote:

As flows the rapid river,

With channel broad and free,

Its waters rippling ever,

And hasting to the sea,

So life is onward flowing,

And days of offered peace,

And man is swiftly going

Where calls of mercy cease.

Some years ago I clipped from a newspaper an article entitled A Race with Death. It reported the breaking up of the ice of Niagara. A great ice bridge had formed in the gorge of the river and people had been accustomed to walk over the same. The warm sun touched it one day and loosened it from the bank abutment. It happened on a Sunday. There were not so many people on the ice bridge, but many on the steel arch bridge below and the cracking of the ice was indicated by the motion of the same as the terrible current began to lift it out. The hundreds on the banks shouted warnings to those on the bridge. Some had only gone a short distance and they hurried to safety; but some had even reached the center and it became a race for life. All but three people, a man near the New York side, hurried to shore and jumped the short-distance, and a man and a woman fleeing toward the Canadian shore. The woman made it. The man seemed to be alone but he kept his courage and took account of all his surroundings and seeing the steel arch bridge below waited until the ice reached its vicinity and then he clutched and hung on to the girders and climbed to safety. When the man and woman reached the Canadian shore a shout broke from the lips of the thousands who had watched with bated breath, for all were safely over. The newspaper said it was truly a race for life.

It is a very certain fact that whether we know it or not, we are all running the same race. But, unlike the Niagara experience, we are not going to win against the last enemy, but lose instead. The only exceptions will be the saints at the Coming of the Lord; all others will fail

Time is winging us away

To our eternal home;

Life is but a winters day,

A journey to the tomb:

Youth and vigor soon will flee,

Blooming beauty lose its charms;

All thats mortal soon shall be

Enclosed in deaths cold arms.

That end should be peaceful. If the text is regarded and put into practice it will be. For the man who is prepared to meet his God there is nothing to fear. When Jacob Boehme, the great German musician, was dying he said to those who stood about his bed, Open the window and let in some of that music. How sweet!

William Edgar, the Christian editor, who died a few days since, left behind him a matchless testimony of his experience in passing into the shadows of death, as he did, some years ago, when undergoing a severe surgical operation. He declared that he was consciously immortal and knew that his soul would survive his body, and he was supremely happy in the fact of passing into another better and more beautiful world.

Dr. Way land Hoyt, my predecessor in this pulpit, uttered one of those thoughtful and sound interpretations for which he was famed when he said, Etymology gives us the real meaning of that word peace. Too frequently we associate one of the results of the thing with the thing itself. Oftenest when we say peace the idea arises of calm as of a lake on a June day when the winds are whist; of freedom from the clash of warring desires; of the rest which follows when, at last, the soul settles itself on some great truth or teaching which can no more be questioned. And peace does hold capsulate all such gracious results as these, and many more of a similar sort; but all these are rather the blooms which set their beauty on the tree of peace instead of the tree itself.

Think of the root picture lying back of everything in that word peace. Primarily and etymologically peace means a joining. It means this, as to its root idea, in the Greek, the Latin and in our English. You get the picture in the old Anglo-Saxon word pak, hence comes our word compact, from pak, plainly, a joining.

One who has the peace of God has it because he is joined to God. The old fear, enmity, chasm, between the soul and God has passed. Jesus Christ has ministered a joining. And now the soul, thus through the atoning Christ, joined to God, enters into the possession of the calm, rest, stoppage of turmoilwhich are the legitimate results of such conscious joining of the soul to the Heavenly Father. There is no possession so rich and so enriching as this peacethis being joined to God through Jesus Christ!

When Stonewall Jackson, the Christian warrior, was dying, doubtless reflecting upon the long marches and hard fighting he had endured, he said, Let us cross over the river and rest under the shade of the trees.

What a beautiful way to go! Prepared to meet ones God!

Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley

THREATENED EVIL ESCAPED BY RETURN TO GOD.Amo. 4:12

When he has said, This will I do to thee, he is silent as to what he will do, in order that whilst Israel is left in uncertainty as to the particular kind of punishment (which is all the more terrible because all kinds of things are imagined), it may repent of its sins, and so avert the things which God threatens here [Jerome]. The words indicate

I. An expression of anger. Therefore, since ye persist in rebellion, regardless of former judgments and respites, thus will I do. Judgment must follow judgment until there is a full end. Gods hand is still lifted up, and the threat is the more severe, because nothing is mentioned. If a smitten people continue impenitent, and will not be corrected nor reclaimed, God will prosecute his work and inflict more plagues. His judgments are sadder or lighter according to our conduct under them, and terrible are those strokes which follow inflicted chastisement. Thou hast called as in a solemn day my terrors round about, so that in the day of the Lords anger none escaped nor remained (Lam. 2:22).

II. An exhortation to repentance. When God is about to strike he waits to be prevented. Though hardened in sin, and insensible under Divine correction, men may repent, and are exhorted to return to God. Repentance is not impossible. Set about it, prepare to meet God, and he will pardon you. If then their uncircumcised hearts be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity: then will I remember my covenant.

III. A motive to reconciliation. God can still be metthough punishment is threatened, Gods design and feelings may be seen in it. He chastens to restore. Sins may abound, but His mercy endureth for ever. He is willing to be thy God. He waits to be gracious and to be reconciled to thee. Noah, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house. Josiah endeavoured to ward off the threatened judgment by humiliation before God. But some foresee impending evil and escape not (Pro. 22:3). There is a hiding-place in Christ. Let chastisements awaken you from slumber, and urge you to lay hold of the hope set before you. We pray you in Christs stead, be ye reconciled to God.

PREPARATION TO MEET GOD

I. The solemn event. Not an ordinary event, not the meeting of man with man, but of man with his Maker. We have to meet God on earth, and especially at the judgment-day, when the atheist and the scorner, the righteous and the wicked, each one will see him for himself and not for another.

II. The needful preparation. If in judgment, prepare, for how can we contend against him? If in penitence, prepare, for he will meet us in forgiveness. A preparation of heart and life are necessary. The sinner must be reconciled; the soul must be renewed and the life be holy. Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.

III. The motives to enforce the preparation.

1. The greatness of God. If he be such as here described, what folly to oppose him, and what an argument to make our peace with him.

2. The providence of God. Because I will do this, therefore prepare; that is, Gods providential dealings with us are a motive to urge preparation to meet him. God comes near in judgments and great events. We should consider our ways. The doctrines of the gospel and the providences of life often fail to rouse attention. Men sleep unconscious of the presence of God and the impending danger. If we do not meet him as a Friend we shall have to meet him as a Judge. Prepare to meet thy God.

PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD.Amo. 4:12-13

Man forgets God. Scripture denounces this, and the great aim of its precepts, history, threatenings, and promises, is to produce and cherish the habit of remembering God. The text calls to remember God, is often applied exclusively to the meeting of God in another world; but from the context it applies to what goes on in this world also. Consider, therefore, how to meet God as he comes near.

I. During our time of probation on earth. It is common for those who dispute the reality of Gods coming to assert that he is too highly exalted to notice insignificant creatures. But in Scripture Gods greatness and mans littleness often combine to illustrate this truth.

1. In the way of repentance. A sinful course is turning back from God, fleeing from a God of mercy to a God of anger. He calls the careless and impenitent to meet him.

(1) Quickly. Now a day of grace in which outward calls combine with inward connections. This time is precious, and will be succeeded by a night wherein no man can work.

(2) Carefully. Let us search and try our ways. Rush not carelessly and without thought to the throne of God. Take with you words.

(3) Decidedly. With the firm conviction that in no other way can peace and salvation be found.

2. In the way of temporal blessings. It may please him to let our life pass peaceably onto keep off apprehended dangerto make the cup of sorrow pass from us, that we drink it not. Awful accidents and fearful calamities may have plunged others into misery, but we go on from day to day in security and peace. Meet God in a spirit of gratitude and praise.

3. In the way of temporal sorrow.

(1) Endeavour to turn judgment aside by humble prayer (Amo. 7:2-6).

(2) To hear it as coming from God. We do not meet God if we look to second causes; nor profit if we do not see his hand and will

4. In the use of the means of grace God meets his people. There is no peradventure like Balaams in the believing use of means. Special blessings rest upon family worship, social and public worship, and when we obey the injunction this do in remembrance of me. But we lose much from not preparing to meet God in ordinances. Prepare with reverence and godly fear, and with earnest expectation.

5. We meet God in the works of righteousness (Isa. 64:5). Thus we see it our duty to meet God during the time of probation. In Christ we meet him in repentance, and find him reconciledin prosperity he calls for gratitude and praisein judgment we bow with submission and endeavour to turn it asidein the means of grace we should meet him with glad reverence, and earnest expectation of good things from his Fatherly bounty.

II. Prepare to meet him after the time of trial is over.

1. Very solemn and awakening is the thought of meeting God then. Here we meet him in his works and ways, there we shall meet God himself. Remember this in the engrossing concerns of uncertain life. Eternity, and not time, is the stage of our existence.

2. After death cometh the judgment, when we must be made manifest before the tribunal of Christ. Some will meet God in anger, and cry for rocks to fall on them; others will meet a God in mercy. No righteousness will stand them but the righteousness of God. Have we that righteousness? Is the thought of that day a part of your daily meditation? Give diligence to be found in him in peace and security. Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. This waiting frame of mind will be one of the greatest helps to prepare, and one of the surest signs that you are prepared to meet your God [Ryan].

THE DISPENSATIONS OF PROVIDENCE CARRYING OUT THE DESIGNS OF GRACE.Amo. 4:13

In true repentance we must have right views of God and his claims. The prophet here describes God in the resources of creation and the wonders of providence to induce Israel to think of him and prepare to meet him. For if mercy move not, let majesty. God is great, and can carry out his designs of love

I. By his mighty power in creation. He that formeth the mountains, &c.

1. Power in the past. Before the mountains were brought forth God was. He created the solid parts of the earth, and reared the everlasting hills. Which by his strength setteth fast the mountains. They owe firmness and stability to him. The Alps and the Andes are girded and preserved from falling down by his power.

2. Power in the present. And createth the wind. The heathens believed in an inferior God, whom Jupiter appointed a store-keeper to raise and still the winds at pleasure. But God bringeth forth the wind out of his treasuries (Jer. 10:12). The winds and the seas obey him. He commandeth and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof. He maketh the storm a calm, so that the waves thereof are still. The most solid and the most subtle, the mildest and the most terrific, agents were created by God. If we read rightly we see not only power but mind in the works of God. Men are thus encouraged to flee unto him. The salvation expected from the hills typifies deliverance from sin and protection in Christ (Psa. 89:11-12). Control over winds sets forth his dominion over minds. All creation manifests his beneficence to men.

II. By his unceasing activity in providence. That maketh the morning darkness. God not only created, but governs all things according to the counsel of his will. He is unceasingly active for the good of his creatures. My Father worketh hitherto and I work.

1. Literally God makes the morning dark. He spreads the clouds and overcasts the sky. He creates light and darkness, and gives day and night.

2. Providentially God makes the morning dark. The morning of joy and prosperity is turned into the night of sorrow and distress. The sunshine of Divine favour may be followed by retributive judgments. It is folly to trust in any means of deliverance but his. Our expectations may be darkened by unlooked-for changes. Everything that is joyous and beautiful may be effaced by darkness. Seek him that turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night.

For we have also our evening and our morn.

III. By his omniscient presence with men. And declareth unto man what is his thought. He can read the heart and understand the thought afar off (Psa. 139:2). We hide our sins and do not wish to know our hearts; but God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. He reads and reveals us to ourselves and sets our sins in order before us. The thought of God as a Creator or Preserver without, says Pusey, affects man but little. To man a sinner, far more impressive than all majesty of creative power, is the thought that God knows his inmost soul. God knows our thoughts more truly than we know ourselves. There is no deceiving him in our conduct. We have to do with One who searches the heart. I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins (Jer. 17:10; Psa. 7:9). The moral government of God is ever administered on the principle that man is accountable for his thoughts. The law of God weighs the purposes of men and the dispensations of God. Give to every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.

On human hearts he bends a jealous eye.

IV. By his supreme control in all things. The Lord, the God of hosts, is his name. Not only the God of Israel, but the supreme Ruler of men and Disposer of all things.

1. He is supreme in the universe. The Lord of hosts. Head over all principalities and powers in heaven and earth. He has being in himself, and is the fountain of being and blessedness to others. Who is over all, God blessed for ever.

2. He makes all things subservient to his purpose. Treadeth upon the high places of the earth. He walks on the sea (Job. 9:8), and on the wings of the wind (Psa. 104:3). He subdues the proud and dethrones the mighty. Whatever is eminent and exalts itself against him he will put down. He reigns above all creatures, controls the highest spheres of power, and everything around him stands ready to execute his will. Thus the prophet sees in the course of nature the will of God, links the physical with the moral events, and makes the one find its loftiest end in the other. National calamities are revelations of Gods wrath. But these only endanger the material welfare of a people. A God of transcendant greatness sends them to draw us to himself. Nothing will avail before him but righteousness and truth. Prepare to meet him with joy and not with grief.

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 4

Amo. 4:12-13. The Rev. Mr Madan was desired one evening, by some of his companions who were with him at a coffee-house, to go and hear Mr John Wesley, who they were told was to preach in the neighbourhood, and to return and exhibit his manners and discourse for their entertainment. Mr M., educated for the bar, went with that intention, and just as he entered the place, Wesley named his text, Prepare to meet thy God, with a solemnity of accent which struck him, and which inspired a seriousness that increased as the good man exhorted his hearers to repentance. Mr M. returned to the coffee-room, and was asked, if he had taken off the old Methodist? No, gentlemen, said he, but he has taken me off; and from that time he left their company and became a converted man [Whitecross].

Amo. 4:13. I never had a sight of my soul, said the Emperor Aurelius, and yet I have a great value for it, because it is discoverable by its operations; and by my constant experience of the power of God, I have a proof of his being, and a reason for my veneration [Whitecross]. Let us incessantly bear in mind, that the only thing we have really to be afraid of, is fearing anything more than God [Book of the Fathers].

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

REVELATION CALLS FOR REPENTANCEGODS CHARACTER AND WILL REVEALED

TEXT: Amo. 4:12-13

12

Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel; and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.

13

For, lo, he that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind, and declareth unto man what is his thought; that maketh the morning darkness, and treadeth upon the high places of the earth; Jehovah, the God of hosts, is his name.

QUERIES

a.

How is Israel to prepare to meet its God?

b.

Whose thought does Jehovah declare to man?

PARAPHRASE

On account of your impenitence, O Israel, I am about to visit you with great and terrible judgment. Therefore, now, while there is time, prepare to avert your doom by repenting when you meet your God in judgment. Remember, the One you are going to meet in judgment is Lord of all the universe; He is the One who created the mountains and the winds; He is the one who, through His prophets, reveals to men the thoughts and intents of their hearts and He judges by the secret thoughts of the heart as well as by the outward actions. He is the one who created, who sustains and who controls the universe. Jehovah, the Omnipotent and Omniscient One, is His name!

SUMMARY

Israel, in light of her past hard-heartedness, is warned to prepare to meet the Lord of the universe in judgment.

COMMENT

Amo. 4:12 . . . PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD, O ISRAEL . . . This is one of those electrifying phrases so characteristic of the prophets. It has been repeated over and over through the centuries by preachers, who, like Amos, and Paul the apostle after him, knowing the terror of the Lord, would fain persuade men! Due to Israels past impenitence when called to repent by national disasters, the coming judgment, if impenitence persists, will be so terrible God does not even choose to delineate it. But this blunt, piercing statement is a last call of God to His called out ones to perfect themselves in holiness. He does not say to them prepare to meet your doom as if their doom were irrevocably sealed, but, prepare (that is, get yourself ready by repenting) to avert your doom. We are reminded of Jesus warnings (Mar. 13:32-37, etc.). We are also reminded of the perverted, ignorant bliss of these people of Israel who said they were actually looking forward to the Day of Jehovah (cf. Amo. 5:18 ff). They were wilfully ignorant of their sin and thus blissfully ignorant of what the Day of Jehovah would mean when it came. For them, if they did not repent, they would meet their God in darkness, not light!

Amo. 4:13 . . . JEHOVAH, THE GOD OF HOSTS, IS HIS NAME . . . Israel is reminded that they are not dealing with one of the impotent gods of the nations of whom they had grown so fond. Idolatry (ancient or modern) is convenient! When one creates his own gods he may manipulate his god to serve his own purposes. One may shelve it, gag it, blindfold it and even destroy it at will. One need not fear it nor feel any responsibility to it. But with Jehovah it is as different as light is from dark! He is the omnipotent Creator; He is the omniscient Revealer; He is the beneficent Sustainer. God is the searcher of the heart (Jer. 17:10; Psa. 139:2). Israel is reminded that when they meet their God, and meet Him they surely will for He is not a weak, man-made god, unable to bring His word to pass, He will judge their innermost secret thoughts and intentions (cf. Heb. 4:12; 1Sa. 16:7). He is Lord of the universe; He commands all the heavenly and earthly hosts (Psa. 103:20 ff) and every creature and creation must reckon with Him! Let the nature of God call you to repentance, O Israel, both then and now!

QUIZ

1.

What did Amos intend to say to Israel by prepare to meet thy God . . .?

2.

What did the people of Israel think about the coming Day of Jehovah?

3.

Why did Amos elaborate on the nature of God in this context?

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

(12) Thus will I do.What is he about to do? It is left in awful uncertainty, but the doom is wrapt up in the boundless possibilities of the Divine judgment involved in the drawing very near of the Lord Himself, to execute what He has said and sworn by His Holiness in Amo. 4:2-3. All that had previously been done in famine, drought, blighting pestilence, and earthquake, was not final, and had failed in its effect. The summons to meet God in some other unknown form than these is very solemn.

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

12, 13. The sentence. The corrupt nation must bear a heavier blow.

Therefore Because previous judgments have failed.

Thus How? One would expect a description of the threatened judgment, for the words point to something not yet mentioned, but no description is given. This very indefiniteness suggests the worst.

This Points to the same thing as thus.

Because Because this terrible and indescribable judgment is about to fall.

Prepare to meet thy God Who is coming in judgment. The words cannot be interpreted as an exhortation to repentance, except in the sense in which “every prediction of disaster was in itself an exhortation to repentance.” They are addressed to the whole nation; but Amos, when delivering this discourse, evidently no longer expected national repentance (but compare Amo 5:4 ff.). They are rather an appeal to prepare for the worst. However, this does not exclude the possibility of repentance on the part of isolated individuals (Amo 5:15). 13. The fulfillment of the threat is assured by the character and power of Him who inspired it.

For The transition is abrupt; there is an ellipsis in thought. The connection may be expressed thus: “Prepare to meet thy God. Do not mock or disregard this announcement, for he who formeth the mountains , the almighty Jehovah, is the author of it.” Amo 4:13, therefore, serves a purpose similar to that of Amo 2:3-8, to win a reverent hearing for the prophet’s message. The verbs are participial forms throughout, and may be translated, without the relative construction, “He formeth he createth.”

Formeth the mountains The verb is one used of the occupation of the potter. Jehovah finds it as easy to fashion mountains as it is for the potter to fashion a vessel (Gen 2:7-8; Gen 2:19; Compare Psa 104:8).

Createth While the verb does not imply the making of “something out of nothing,” it is used in the sense of producing something fundamentally new by powers transcending the ordinary powers of man.

Wind Not “spirit”; may include all the “unseen but mighty forces of nature.”

What is his thought Not the thought of Jehovah, but the thought of man. It requires greater powers to discover the secret thoughts of man than to make known one’s own thoughts to another. Jehovah possesses the greater power; that he can do the other is assumed throughout the Old Testament. The ancient versions present different readings, each one going its own way.

Maketh the morning darkness Or, maketh darkness into morning. The last word is literally dawn. He does this by his sudden appearance in a storm cloud (Psa 18:9), or by the natural change of day into night, or night into day. Some interpret it, with less probability, of the transformation of spiritual darkness into light.

Treadeth upon the high places of the earth Jehovah is described frequently as riding upon the clouds; in doing so he treads upon the high places, the mountains of the earth (Psa 18:10; Mic 1:3; compare Jdg 5:4-5).

Jehovah, The God of hosts The mention of this title would in itself call attention to the majesty and power of Jehovah (see on Hos 12:5; compare Amo 3:15). On the authenticity of Amo 4:13, and the similar passages Amo 5:8-9; Amo 9:5-6, see Introduction, pp. 217ff.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Having Failed To Respond To All God’s Pleadings By Judgment There Could Only Be One Inevitable End. Like Pharaoh Before Them They Would Have To Find Out The Severity Of His Judgment When All Else Had Failed ( Amo 4:12-13 ).

It is made apparent that God had done all that He could to win them back to Himself, for that had been the aim of all His past judgments. But now they were coming to the end of the road. Chastening had failed, now they must face the final climax, His final judgment which would include all the above in overflowing measure. God would not be mocked. In the end, if they did not repent, men would reap what they had sown. Thus Israel must now be prepared to meet their God, the One Who turns light into darkness (a grim prospect), Who tramples on the most exalted, and Who rules over all, Whose Name is YHWH, the God of Hosts (of heaven and earth).

Amo 4:12

“Therefore thus will I do to you, O Israel; and because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, O Israel.”

As they had failed to respond to a judgment here and a judgment there, now all His judgments would be piled upon them, and by this they would be brought to meet face to face with God in all His holiness and wrath (His antipathy against sin). Compare Exo 19:17, which resulted in their pleading for ‘no more’ (Exo 20:19). Thus in view of their continuing disobedience they must prepare to meet their God as He is, face to face with no restrictions. All the judgments of Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28-29 would come upon them, and more. This would include therefore destruction and exile.

Amo 4:13

“For, lo, he who forms the mountains, and creates the wind, and declares to man what is his thought; who makes the morning darkness, and treads on the high places of the earth YHWH, the God of hosts, is his name.”

Furthermore let them consider Who it is Who will do this thing. There may well in these words be a reflection of their festal worship formulae, or of some hymn, of which he is reminding them (see excursus on Amo 9:6). The One of Whom he speaks is the One Who forms the mountains and creates the wind, Who is in control of the most powerful forces of nature, the One Who can turn morning into darkness so that there is no light (without which there is no life), and who strides like a Colossus over the highest places of the world, trampling on both ‘gods’ and men. And His Name is YHWH, the God of the hosts of heaven and earth. Similar ideas occur again in Amo 5:8-9.

The prophetic warning gives the appearance of finality as if there was no hope. And so it would be if they did not repent. But God had not sent Amos simply as a harbinger of Doom, His hope was always that men would repent. And as, Amos will now make clear, if they did so they would find life. (But let us remember that the majority did not repent, and that all that Amos had warned of came upon them. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God unless we do so with repentant hearts).

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Amo 4:12. Therefore thus will I do unto thee, &c. But now what shall I do unto thee, O Israel, after I have done these things? Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel! Amo 4:13. For lo, he is at hand, who formeth, &c. Houbigant. “Thy God himself will come to take full vengeance upon thee.” Others paraphrase it, “Prepare yourselves to stand before the Messiah: for he shall come to exercise against you my whole vengeance, and to execute all my threatenings.” And they suppose it to refer to the last destruction of Jerusalem.

REFLECTIONS.1st, God’s controversy against the oppressors and idolaters is here continued.

1. The oppressors are convicted, and their punishment read. Like kine of Bashan, they were strong, wanton, unruly, breaking down the fence of justice, and treading the weak under their feet; they fattened on the mountains of Samaria, oppressing the poor, and crushing the needy, by an enormous load of taxes, or the perversion of justice; or with a hard hand extorting such rents from their indigent tenants, as left them scarcely a sufficiency to live; which say to their masters, Bring and let us drink; which may be the words of the magistrates encouraging the masters of the poor to find some accusation against them, and for an entertainment they would decide the cause in their favour; or of one oppressive lord to another, willing to feast with him on the spoils of oppression. But God will not suffer such deeds to pass with impunity; He hath sworn by his holiness, and irrevocable is the decree; they shall be taken and destroyed, as easily and irresistibly as the fish which is caught by the hook; and they and their posterity, who should survive the slaughter made by the Assyrians, shall be sold for captives, and carried, as fish out of their element, into a strange land. Their city walls being beaten down by a besieging army, some would attempt to escape at the breaches, whilst others cast themselves into the palace or citadel, or lodged their substance there, but in vain; the fugitives will be pursued, and the high fortress laid low, even to the dust. Note; (1.) God will one day appear the patron of the injured, and avenge their wrongs. (2.) The fruits of oppression are often made the food of intemperance, and thus doubly aggravate the sinner’s guilt. (3.) What is got by wickedness often perishes strangely, and every observer may see the finger of God in the visitation.

2. The idolaters are abandoned to their own devices, and a heavier curse cannot be laid upon them. Ironically speaking, God bids them to go on to multiply their transgressions at Beth-el and Gilgal, to bring their daily sacrifices, and offer their tithes at their idol-temples and altars, instead of the sanctuary at Jerusalem: and, calling on them ironically to mimic the worship of his temple, Lev 7:13 he says, Offer your sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven to your idols; and out of ostentation of piety, or inviting others to the feast, proclaim and publish the free offerings; for this liketh you, O ye children of Israel. They took a pleasure and pride in these idolatrous services: justly therefore doth God give them up to their own inventions, to fill up the measure of their iniquities.

2nd, The incorrigibleness of this people left them wholly inexcusable in their sins. God had tried repeatedly by his visitations to bend their stubborn hearts, ready to receive them if they humbled their souls; waiting with long patience, and loth to abandon them to ruin; but neither mercies nor judgments had any effect: five times he complains, yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. We have,

1. An account of the methods that God had taken, by lesser judgments, to bring them to repentance.

[1.] He had visited them with famine in all their cities, 2Ki 8:1. I have given you cleanness of teeth, there being no provision left, not even bread to chew, and satisfy the cravings of hunger: yet this was ineffectual; they repented not.

[2.] He sent a drought upon the land, and withheld the rain when there were yet three months to the harvest, the time when it usually fell; and without it the corn was scorched up and withered away; but, that they might observe that this was not a thing merely accidental, or owing to any influence of secondary causes, but by divine direction, as a judgment upon them, he caused it to rain on one city, and not on another, and gave the clouds their commission to water one piece, or inheritance, while the estate which lay contiguous, was scorched up with heat and drought: and probably this distinction was observable, the idolaters being punished, and the few faithful miraculously spared. In this distress, two or three cities wandered unto one city to drink water, but they were not satisfied, there being none, or but little to spare from their own wants; and even this produced no change.

[3.] Blasting and mildew next destroyed their corn and wine, and the palmer-worm devoured all their trees and herbage; yet they persisted in impenitence, and turned not to him that smote them.
[4.] The pestilence succeeded. They fell by a sudden stroke, like the first-born of Egypt, and God slew their armies with the sword of an enemy; or in the way of Egypt, as they went thither for food, some fell by the pestilence; and others, who went in companies, were intercepted and slain by their enemies, and their corpses left unburied, filling the air with noisome effluvia: yet, notwithstanding, the survivors repented not.

[5.] By fire from heaven God overthrew some of them, like Sodom and Gomorrah, as monuments of vengeance, and a warning to the rest who were spared, as brands plucked out of the burning; yet all their judgments left them as they found them, hardened in sin.

2. Since all has proved hitherto ineffectual, God will nevertheless send them the divinely appointed Messiah, and make to them his last great offer of salvation from guilt and corruption. Therefore thus will I do unto thee, or nevertheless, notwithstanding all these provocations, I will do as I have promised, sending the divine Messiah, who shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob, from every soul that embraces him in faith: and because I will do this unto thee, let such an act of astonishing mercy and grace at last bend thy stubborn neck; and prepare to meet thy God, O Israel; to receive him with readiness, submission, and delight, who comes with tidings of salvation. For lo, he that formeth the mountains, the great Creator of all, and who can make every mountain of difficulty a plain before the believer; and createth the wind, holding these turbulent servants under his command; and declareth unto man what is his thought, being the searcher of hearts, and revealing unto men, by his prophets, his own purposes concerning them, which are thoughts of peace, and not of evil; that maketh the morning darkness, changing prosperity into adversity, or the darkness morning, causing Christ, the day-star, to arise; and treadeth upon the high places of the earth, exalted above all, and treading down the proudest of his foes; the Lord, Jehovah, the God of Hosts is his name, to whom all must bow, in the way of mercy or judgment, and humble their souls at his feet.

The words are generally understood in a quite different sense, as a threatening of more terrible judgment, since the former visitations were ineffectual. They must now prepare to meet an offended God, coming forth to execute vengeance; and how would they be able to stand when he appeared, whose power was irresistible as his wrath was intolerable. It is our wisdom to prepare to meet God as our God, by faith, penitence, and prayer, before we are summoned to appear at his bar in an hour of death, or at the day of judgment.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

Amo 4:12 Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: [and] because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.

Ver. 12. Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel ] Thus? how? Non nominat mala ut omnia timeant, saith Ribera. He tells them not how, that they may fear the worst; even all that is written and unwritten. It was the very policy of Julius Caesar never to extenuate or deny to his soldiers the danger of an enemy, but rather to raise up thoughts of valour by aggravating the contrary forces: and this way he did (not seldom) hyperbolically rhetoricate saith the story. Now the Lord need not do so; since his judgments are a great deep, neither can any man know the power of his anger, Psa 90:11 : let a man fear it never so much, he is sure to feel it a great deal more if he once fall into his fingers. Is it nothing to drink the dregs of God’s displeasure, when it is eternity unto the bottom? Is it nothing to launch into an infinite ocean of scalding lead, and to swim naked in it for ever? Oh, do anything rather than be damned; and as Lewis, King of France, cast the pope’s bulls into the fire, saying, he had rather they should burn than himself fry in hell for obeying them; or as Mary, Queen of England, restored again all the ecclesiastical livings assumed to the crown, saying that she set more by the salvation of her own soul than she did by ten kingdoms; so “let the wicked forsake his ways, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; and let him return to the Lord, that he may have mercy on him; and to our God, that he may multiply pardon,” Isa 55:7 .

And because I will do this unto thee ] Which (had I not wished thee well) I would never have told thee. But God loves to forewarn; and therefore threateneth evil that he may not inflict it ( Ideo minatur ut non puniat ): he would gladly be prevented by our humble addresses unto him, and by our entreaties of peace. Hear him else.

Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel ] Turn and try; thou canst not likely lose thy labour; or if thou shouldest, yet thou hast lost many a worse. Let Ephraim but bemoan himself, and God will soon melt over him, Jer 31:20 . Let God’s prodigals return to their merciful Father and he will meet them half-way, and receive them with all sweetness. Tantum velis, et Deus tibi praeoccurret. Do as those, Jer 3:17 . Alexander’s Macedonians, being sensible of his displeasure, laid by their arms, put on their mourning attire, came trooping to his tent, where, for almost three days, they remained with loud cries and abundance of tears, testifying their remorse for offending him, beseeching his pardon, which at last they gained. And Guicciardin tells us, that Lewis XII of France (when he entered Genoa in his triumphant chariot with his sword naked), resolved to make a prey of their riches, and an example of many of the chief among them, and to leave the rest to his soldiers’ mercies. But being met first by the chief, afterward by the multitude, making great lamentation for their folly, with abundance of tears and cries, his wrath was appeased toward them. The like we read of Henry VII, emperor, toward the citizens of Cremona; of our Edward III toward the inhabitants of Calais. And in Cade’s conspiracy here, after that twenty-six of the chief rebels were executed, the multitude, naked in their shirts, met the king on Blackheath, humbly praying mercy; which they obtained.

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

prepare to meet, &c. i.e. in judgment. Compare Eze 13:5; Eze 22:30. Amo 4:11 and Amo 4:12 are not “out of place” or an “interpolation”, but are required by the Structure, “M”, below.

Amo 4:1-13 (F2). THE NORTHERN KINGDOM. (THE KINE OF BASHAN.) (Extended Alternation.)

F2 | K |1-. call to Hear.

L | -1. Judgements deserved.

M | 2,3. Threatening.

| K | 4,5. call to Come.

L | 6-11. Judgements inflicted.

M | 12,13. Threatening.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Amo 4:12-13

REVELATION CALLS FOR REPENTANCE-

GODS CHARACTER AND WILL REVEALED

TEXT: Amo 4:12-13

Israel, in light of her past hard-heartedness, is warned to prepare to meet the Lord of the universe in judgment.

Amo 4:12 . . . PREPARE TO MEET THY GOD, O ISRAEL . . . This is one of those electrifying phrases so characteristic of the prophets. It has been repeated over and over through the centuries by preachers, who, like Amos, and Paul the apostle after him, knowing the terror of the Lord, would fain persuade men! Due to Israels past impenitence when called to repent by national disasters, the coming judgment, if impenitence persists, will be so terrible God does not even choose to delineate it. But this blunt, piercing statement is a last call of God to His called out ones to perfect themselves in holiness. He does not say to them prepare to meet your doom as if their doom were irrevocably sealed, but, prepare (that is, get yourself ready by repenting) to avert your doom. We are reminded of Jesus warnings (Mar 13:32-37, etc.). We are also reminded of the perverted, ignorant bliss of these people of Israel who said they were actually looking forward to the Day of Jehovah (cf. Amo 5:18 ff). They were wilfully ignorant of their sin and thus blissfully ignorant of what the Day of Jehovah would mean when it came. For them, if they did not repent, they would meet their God in darkness, not light!

Zerr: Amo 4:12. Prepare to meet thy God. Many Impassioned speeches have been made on this statement by public speakers, exhorting men to get ready for the great judgment day. The exhortations are important in themselves, but they are a farfetched application of this passage. The last words, 0 Israel, are generally omitted in the exhortations, and hence the correct meaning of the statement is lost. The admonition is addressed to the 10-tribe kingdom of Israel, and it is said in view of the things soon to happen to the nation. A key word to the verse is thus, referring the reader back to Amo 4:2-3, where the Lord is predicting the siege and captivity of the kingdom. Amo 4:4-11 recounts the various instances of their misbehaviour in the past, and of the temporal misfortunes that God brought upon the people for their sins. But those chastisements had failed to bring them to repentance, therefore God determined to do unto them according to the prediction in Amo 4:2-3. In view of that great event to come upon the nation, it is exhorted to prepare (get ready) for the time. The word meet is from QIRAB. which Strong defines. An encountering. It is called an encountering with God because He is the one bringing the Assyrians against them.

Amo 4:13 . . . JEHOVAH, THE GOD OF HOSTS, IS HIS NAME . . . Israel is reminded that they are not dealing with one of the impotent gods of the nations of whom they had grown so fond. Idolatry (ancient or modern) is convenient! When one creates his own gods he may manipulate his god to serve his own purposes. One may shelve it, gag it, blindfold it and even destroy it at will. One need not fear it nor feel any responsibility to it. But with Jehovah it is as different as light is from dark! He is the omnipotent Creator; He is the omniscient Revealer; He is the beneficent Sustainer. God is the searcher of the heart (Jer 17:10; Psa 139:2). Israel is reminded that when they meet their God, and meet Him they surely will for He is not a weak, man-made god, unable to bring His word to pass, He will judge their innermost secret thoughts and intentions (cf. Heb 4:12; 1Sa 16:7). He is Lord of the universe; He commands all the heavenly and earthly hosts (Psa 103:20 ff) and every creature and creation must reckon with Him! Let the nature of God call you to repentance, O Israel, both then and now!

Zerr: Amo 4:13. As proof that God is able to bring this great encounter upon the nation, mention is made of the other vast works that He has already done in creation.

Questions

1. What did Amos intend to say to Israel by prepare to meet thy God . .?

2. What did the people of Israel think about the coming Day of Jehovah?

3. Why did Amos elaborate on the nature of God in this context?

Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary

Prepare to Meet Thy God

Amo 4:12-13; Amo 5:1-15

Worse judgments than those mentioned in the previous verses were in store but before they are inflicted, the entire nation is summoned to the divine bar. Whether we choose or not, we must all appear before the judgment seat of God. Prepare, my soul, to meet Him! Note the sublimity of that last verse of Amo 4:1-13. How great is God, who made the mountains! How mysterious, who made the wind! How sublime, who calls to the dawn! How mighty, to whom mountains and peaks are stepping-stones!

But great and holy though God is, we are invited to seek Him. He desires to bless, but He must be sought. Were we more diligent in seeking, as the miner for gold, or the scientific man for natures secrets, we should be marvelously repaid. Eye hath not seen, etc. Amos speaks as natures child. Often as he had tended his flocks, he had watched the Pleiades with their gentle radiance, and Orion, the herald of storm. He had listened to God calling across the waters, and had drawn life from Him. Seek and live! O soul, what a God is thine! Thy springs and storms await His word of command. He can turn thy darkness into the morning. Be of good cheer!

Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary

A Meeting with God

Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.Amo 4:12

1. The writings of the prophet Amos have a peculiar interest to the student of the Bible. They are the earliest extant Hebrew prophecy of any length upon the date of which scholars are agreed. But it is not to students alone that the writings are interesting. Amos himself was not a scholar. He was a shepherd and a fruit-dresser. He had not been educated among the sons of the prophets. He had been trained in the school of nature. Hence it is that his writings reflect more closely the life and thought of the nation to which he belonged, and have a deeper interest for the ordinary man than they would have had if they had been composed by a divine in his study.

2. The story from which the text is taken belongs to the reign of Jeroboam, the son of Joash, when the kingdom of Israel was at the height of its glory and its frontier extended beyond the farthest point reached in the brightest days of Solomon. This was a period of unexampled material prosperity for the Northern Kingdom. It was not a country of great natural resources in itself, but it lay on the main trading route between Assyria on the one hand and Egypt on the other. It was therefore rapidly growing wealthy, and had produced an order of great merchant princes. The immediate result of this increase of prosperous intercourse with foreign nations was an outburst of luxury and vice. As usual, the concentration of great wealth in the hands of a few tended towards the oppression of the many. The lot of the poor was intolerable owing to there being no justice in the land. Slavery grew rapidly; there were crowds of foreign slaves in the palaces of the nobles, while the freemen of Israel were being reduced to the position of serfs on the soil they had formerly owned. These palaces must have been enormous structures, replete with everything that could minister to the senses. They were often built of marble and inlaid with ivory and gold. The women of the rich classes seem to have become demoralized and heartless. Religion was punctiliously attended to, but was almost completely divorced from morality. The priests accommodated themselves to the manners of the time, and taught that Jehovah was the God of Israel only, and that the national prosperity was a token of His favour. The worshippers believed that God was their God much in the same way as serfs believed in their feudal lord. It was His business to look after them and to secure to them material enjoyment and victory over their enemies; they, on their part, had to endow His sanctuaries and be careful to observe His feasts and sacrifices.

3. This, then, was the first thing Amos saw, that, although the land was full of religion, it was as full of iniquity, which, God being judge, could not go unpunished. In the next place he saw that the punishment was near. On the horizon was a cloud that would spread itself and overwhelm themthe great conquering empire of the Assyrians. Amos nowhere mentions the Assyrians by name, but the people knew whom he meant. That made the treason of his prophecyto think that the kingdom could be overthrown; and that also made the blasphemy of itto prophesy that Jehovahs people could fall before the heathen. The people knew quite as well as Amos that their land was in danger from the Assyrians, for it was through the Assyrian weakening of Damascus, with whom they had fought for years, that they had been able to extend their borders; and now that Damascus had fallen, nothing stood between them and the Assyrians. But for all that, they had no fear; they put their trust in the God of their fathers. By His stretched-out arm they had conquered the nations round about; the gods of the nations had fallen down before Jehovah. Who, compared with Him, was Baal or Moloch? Rimmon of Damascus had fallen; Chemosh had not saved Moab from His anger, nor Milcom the children of Ammon. And now that Asshur, the god of the Assyrians, was leading on his nation against them, it would be seen once more which of the two was the Lord of Hosts. And so they redoubled their sacrifices, and were confident of the issue.

4. And what had Amos to tell them about this impending struggle between Jehovah and Asshur? He told them that it was not Asshur but Jehovah who was leading the Assyrian army against them. We are so accustomed to the truth that God is the God of all flesh, that He has made of one blood all the nations of men, that we can hardly throw our imagination back to a time when this great fact was a new and startling revelation. But that is the truth Amos is labouring to impart to his countrymenthat although God had known them alone of all the nations, yet it was He who guided the blind movements of all the wandering peoples of the earth. Jehovah, the God of hosts, is his name. Yes, the God of hostsas the Israelites were so proud to call Him; but of what hosts? Not of the hosts of Israel merely; they were but as dust in the balance. And so, because it was not Asshur but Jehovah that was bringing up the Assyrian army against them, Amos bade the people prepare to meet Him. That sentence, Prepare to meet thy God, which has almost lost power to arrest us from being placarded in waiting-rooms and stencilled on the pavement of our streets, had a terrible significance as it first comes into Scripture. It meant, The God of your nation is bringing up an army against His own people; when you prepare yourselves for battle, it will be to fight against your own God, who is advancing against you. Prepare to meet thy God, O Israel.

Lotze and those who side with him, though they are Monists inasmuch as they believe that there is only one substance in the Universe, viz., Spiritual Life and Energy, yet at the same time believe that the Eternal God, who by the partial differentiation of His own essential being calls into existence the world of nature and humanity, has also, while remaining immanent in all His creatures, given to these finite and dependent existences in progressive degrees a real selfhood; which selfhood culminates in that self-consciousness and moral freedom in man which enables him both to know and even to resist God. According to this view, God is immanent and active both in the inorganic and in the organic world; and in the latter He, without the animals consciousness of the purpose, controls and directs its instinctive life. And when, as Prof. John Fiske has so well explained, physical evolution reaches its acme and the all-important and unending process of psychical evolution takes its place, then for the first time the Creator begins to take the creature into His intimate confidence; and in mans rational, sthetic, moral, and spiritual nature makes an immediate but progressive revelation of His own presence and His own character.1 [Note: The Life and Letters of James Martineau, ii. 411.]

I

1. There is a voice within every one of us, if we will but let it speak, which says solemnly, sternly, Prepare to meet thy God. If we hear not this voice now, we shall hear it hereafter; if not in the day of rude health, yet, unless the moral nerve has been cauterized, when we are sick or dying. Every man who believes that God exists, and that he himself has a soul which does not perish with the body, knows that a time must come when this meeting with God will be inevitable. At the hour of death, whether in mercy or in displeasure, God looks in the face of man, His creature, as never before. The veils of sense, which long have hidden His countenance, are then stripped away, and as spirit meets with spirit, without the interposition of any fibres of matter so does man in death meet with God. It is this that makes death so exceedingly solemn. Ere yet the last breath has fairly passed from the body, or the failing eyes have closed, the soul has partly entered upon a world altogether new, magnificent, awful. It has seen beings, shapes, modes of existence, never imagined before. But it has done more; it has met its God, as a disembodied spirit can meet Him. Surely, Prepareprepare for death! is the voice of prudence. The one certain thing about life is that we must leave it. The one certain thing about death is that we must die. What will happen first, we know not. How much time will pass before our hour comes, we know not. What will be the manner of our death, violence or disease, an accident, or what we call natural causes, we know not. Where we shall die, at home or on a visit, in our beds or in the street, or in a railway train, or in a sinking steamboat,this, too, we know not. Under what circumstances we shall die, in solitude or among friends, with the consolations of religion or without them, in spasms of agony or softly, as if we were going to sleep, we know not. The time, the place, the manner, the circumstances of death, are hidden from every one of us; but that which stands out from all this ignorance, in absolute, unassailable tragic certainty, is the fact itself that we must die, all and each of us. Scripture says, and experience echoes, It is appointed.

There is a light-hearted way of discounting death, and mocking the fear of it, which passes for courage, and is really mere slightness of intellect and poverty of conscience and imagination. The awfulness of death remains, felt by ineradicable instinct, and it was meant to remain. The subject may be called crude, harsh, morbid, if you like; but the winding-sheet, the coffin, and the six feet of earth are facts that wait for us. We may change the colour of its livery, but the fact we cannot change. It has been supposed to be a religious thing to meditate on death, and forecast its circumstances, and in this way religion has grown morbid. A well-known passage in Mr. Hardys Tess of the dUrbervilles illustrates the morbidness without the religion. Thinking of her birthdays, she suddenly thought one afternoon, when looking in the glass at her fairness, that there was yet another date, of more importance to her than those; that of her own death, when all these charms would have disappeared; a day which lay sly and unseen among all the other days of the year, giving no sign or sound when she actually passed over it; but not the less surely there. When was it? Why did she not feel the chill of each yearly encounter with such a cold relation? The only use of such speculations is to force death back into the region of actual realities that we may reckon with it, and pass on to the true business of life. Lost in the mists of the future, the event of death seems uncertain and life eternal. Did we know the hour, life, foreshortened by the exact sight of the end, would shrink to a very small appearance though the limit were at five-score years.1 [Note: John Kelman, The Road, i. 7.]

2. The text does not speak of to-morrow. Its cry, Prepare! has regard to the present. We are urged to the duty as a duty to be performed now. There is no to-morrow in the Christians calendar, as assuredly there is none in the texts exhortation. There is perhaps no expression in our language that has done more mischief to more souls than by-and-by. Prepare to meet thy God! Time enough, says the youth; wait till manhood comes. Prepare to meet thy God! Time enough, says the man; wait till age comes. Prepare to meet thy God! Time enough, says age; wait till death comes. And thus the present duty is constantly shifted off; the pleasures of youth hand the matter over to the business of manhood; the business of manhood bequeaths it to the infirmities of age; age takes up the accumulated legacy, and, with irresolute purpose, and feeble will, and exhausted strength, pushes it still nearer the grave, places it on the very confines of the eternal world, resolves, and resolves, and dies the same.

Whymper traces the stagnation of the South American Portuguese to their constant word maana (to-morrow). It is an inseparable feature of genuine spiritual and moral truth that it demands earnestness, and presents a situation which is urgent and immediate.1 [Note: John Kelman, The Road, i. 75.]

It is said that when the late Prince Imperial was but a child he gained for himself the sobriquet of Little Mr. Ten Minutes, owing to an inveterate habit he had acquired of pleading for ten minutes longer when asked to do anything. Whether it were the dinner hour, or time for sleep, the invariable ten minutes were demanded and usually granted. When in the morning he was called to rise, too sleepy to speak, he would hold up his hands with the ten fingers extended, signifying the desired delay. Who could have dreamed that the habit was one day to cost him his life? Yet so it was. Ten minutes in a soldier-guarded palace in France was one thing. Ten minutes in the face of an agile enemy in Zululand made just the difference between safety and death. And the heir-apparent to an imperial throne sacrificed all his prospects for an unchecked childish whim. Terrible must have been the anguish of the royal mother in realizing that her indulgence had sealed a fate which timely firmness might have averted!2 [Note: F. de L. Booth-Tucker, The Life of Catherine Booth, ii. 103.]

Brownings Karshook appeared in 1856 in The Keepsake; but, as we are told on good authority, has been printed in no edition or selection of the Poets works. I am therefore justified in inserting it here

Would a man scape the rod?

Rabbi Ben Karshook saith,

See that he turn to God

The day before his death.

Ay, could a man inquire

When it shall come! I say,

The Rabbis eye shoots fire

Then let him turn to-day!1 [Note: Mrs. Sutherland Orr, Life and Letters of Robert Browning, 198.]

3. What makes a death-bed terrible? The consciousness that there has been no preparation for it. What makes a death-bed happy? The consciousness of a lifelong preparation. Why did St. Paul cry, when death in no gentle form stared him in the face, I am now ready to be offered? Because he could say, I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.

Every day we are either fitting or unfitting ourselves for the final meeting with God our Maker. It behoves us to practise ourselves, to unlearn what we need to unlearn, making a right use of our time, doing our work well, availing ourselves of all our openings for amendment and improvement, living with a constant reference to the unseen, watching, praying, looking for the signals of the Masters coming. It is like preparing for an examination. We cannot recover the ground we have lost by making a tremendous effort to hurry up at the end; we cannot make up for past neglects by putting on a spurt at the last. The best preparation consists in giving constant attention to the regular daily lessons, to the steady plodding round of work, when as yet the examination is a long way off, and we do not feel the pressure of any immediate urgency. What should have been the slow result of years cannot be reached by any violent effort or sudden spring.

Bossuet, the great poet of the tomb, says:

It is not worthy of a Christianand I would add, of a manto postpone his struggle with death until the moment when it arrives to carry him off.

It were a salutary thing for each of us to work out his idea of death in the light of his days and the strength of his intelligence and stand by it. He would say to death:

I know not who you are, or I would be your master; but, in days when my eyes saw clearer than to-day, I learnt what you were not: that is enough to prevent you from becoming mine.

He would thus bear, graven on his memory, a tried image against which the last agony would not prevail and from which the phantom-stricken eyes would draw fresh comfort. Instead of the terrible prayer of the dying, which is the prayer of the depths, he would say his own prayer, that of the peaks of his existence, where would be gathered, like angels of peace, the most lucid, the most rarefied thoughts of his life. Is not that the prayer of prayers! After all, what is a true and worthy prayer, if not the most ardent and disinterested effort to reach and grasp the unknown?1 [Note: M. Maeterlinck, Our Eternity, 7.]

II

1. The words Prepare to meet thy God! taken in their general and not merely historical signification, are commonly used to warn men of the fact that they must meet God in the judgment to come. It is natural that the words should be applied in this manner. The reasonableness, one may say the necessity and the certainty, of such judgment can hardly be disputed by any who acknowledge the existence of a God, and the principle of mans responsibility to God. In this world neither vice nor virtue meets with its due reward; in many cases the worst men suffer least, and the best men most. It is to little purpose that dramatists, novelists, and poets so often represent retribution as falling upon the wrong-doer and vindicating the innocent. Such representations utter what we feel ought to be rather than what is. They are confounded and contradicted by the hard facts of history and of everyday life, which show that wrong is often triumphant to the last, and that the sinner is often spared, not only everything in the form of outward calamity, but also the uneasiness of a guilty conscience. The more we think of these wrongs that are never in this world rectified, the more does our moral sense cry out for a judgment to come.

Amos knewas we Christians should knowthat the ever-swelling tide of rebellion against the Ruler of the universe is, by a law which cannot fail to assert itself, bringing judgment nearer and nearer. It is not merely in the obedience of saints, in the conversion of sinners, in the extension of the Divine Kingdom, that we see the tokens of the approaching Advent; it is in the contemptuous rejection of the claims of God, it is in the resolute exclusion of the King of kings from large departments of human thought and life; it is in the coarse blasphemies which meet the eye and the ear in our streets, but yet more in the refined ungodliness which underlies the graceful sentences of well-educated infidelity; it is in the placid indifference to God, as if He had had His day, and it were high time to forget Him.

M. Renan says that a good deal of his gentleness is probably due to a bottom of indifference,and, on the whole, I agree with him. Complacency with himself, a sentiment of kindliness to the world at large, a deeply-rooted horror of the selfishness of exclusive friendships, a vague feeling of gratitude to some one, without exactly knowing to whom I ought to be grateful,this last naturally enough, as M. Renan is deeply convinced that there is no appreciable trace of the action of any Will in the world superior to that of man,such is the stock of moral virtues of which M. Renan has made salvage, after the wreck of his faith. In fine, they do not leave me with any very deep respect for this smooth, humorous, learned, industrious, imaginative man, who has slipped so easily along the charming promenade of his extremely sentimental existence.1 [Note: R. H. Hutton, Criticisms on Contemporary Thought and Thinkers, i. 234.]

2. Is there not something startling in the reflection that it is a Being of a perfect holiness and a most absolute justice who is to be our Judge? Who can uncover his heart even to a friend without a sense of shame? And yet what is the holiness of the holiest saint compared with the holiness of God? But add to the thought of Gods holiness the idea of His omnipresence; think of Him as about our path and about our bed, no secret sin not set in the light of His countenance, no thought too transient to escape His notice, no desire veiled in the darkness of our in most soul, but telegraphed at once upon His pure intelligence; and who will not be solemnized by the thought that his Creator must be his Judge?

Not only are our hearts awed; we are afraid to go near to God. Why is it so? Why is a child that has disobeyed his parent in his absence afraid of that parents return at eventide? Why does he think the afternoon hours are posting very fast away? Why is a scholar who has committed some offence against rule afraid to meet the teachers eye? Why is a servant who has been unfaithful to his master afraid to be called to give account of his stewardship? Why is a man hiding from the officers of justice for some crime against the law ready to start at every knock which comes to the door of the house where he is staying? Why does a criminal in prison dread the bar, and the judge, and the assize-day? To all these questions the answer is the same. Sin leads in fear. It is this that makes us shrink from meeting the eye of God.

A Hungarian king, being sad one day, was asked by his brother the reason of his heaviness of heart. I have been a great sinner, said he, and know not how to die, and appear before God in the judgment. His brother laughed at him. It was the custom in that country for the executioner to sound a trumpet before the door of the man who was to be executed. At midnight the trumpet sounded at the door of the kings brother. He arose and came in great haste to the king, and inquired in what he had offended. The king replied, You have not offended me, but if the sight of my executioner be so dreadful, then shall I not, who have greatly offended, fear to stand in judgment before Christ?1 [Note: C. W. Bibb, Sharpened Arrows and Polished Stones, 273.]

3. Amoss prophetic call is accordingly not misapplied when directed to the final day of the Lord. Common sense teaches preparation for a certain future, and Amoss trumpet-note is deepened and re-echoed by Jesus. Be ye ready also, for the Son of man cometh. The conditions of meeting the Judge, and being found of him in peace, are that we should be without spot, and blameless; and the conditions of being so spotless and uncensurable are what they were in Amoss dayrepentance and trust. The words of the text bid us detach desire from unworthy and unsatisfying objects while yet we may. They bid us attach desire to the One Object which can ever-lastingly satisfy it; to the Being who made us, revealed in His Adorable Son. They bid us, while we may, wed desire to understanding; to that true understanding of the real meaning and conditions of our existence which God gives to those who would keep His law with their whole heart. Desire and understanding are the parents of will; will is but intelligent desire. And will is, or should be, the monarch among the faculties of the regenerate soul; shaping life in accordance with an apprehension of its true purpose; overcoming the obstacles which oppose themselves to the attainment of that purpose; bringing circumstances, habits, passions, even reasons, into harmonious co-operation for the attainment of the true end of man. Prepare to meet thy God! Yes! where will is supreme in a regenerate soul, soon the crooked places are made straight, and the rough places plain, as of old across the desert for the passage of God. Everything is welcome, because everything, either as an assistance or as a discipline, must further our purposethat of reaching the supreme object of desire, the Vision of God.

It is not improper to explain the words of Amos in this sensethat though the people were almost past hope, he yet exhorted them to anticipate Gods wrath. Prepare then thyself to meet thy God, as though he said, However worthy thou art of being destroyed, and though the Lord seems to have closed up the door of mercy, and despair meets thee on every side, thou canst yet mitigate Gods wrath, provided thou preparest to meet Him. But this preparation includes real renovation of the heart: it then takes place when men are displeased with themselves, when with a changed mind they submit to God, and humbly pray for forgiveness. There is then an important meaning in the Prophets words, Prepare thyself. With regard to meeting God, we know what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9, If we judge ourselves, we shall not be judged by the Lord. How comes it, then, that God deals severely with us, except that we spare ourselves? Hence this indulgence, with which we flatter ourselves, provokes Gods wrath against us. We cannot then meet God, except we become our own judges, and condemn our sins and feel real sorrow.1 [Note: Calvin, Commentaries on the Minor Prophets, ii. 244.]

Repentance is not merely a change of conduct, but a change of conduct based upon a change of feeling and mind. It is a repudiation of what is now felt to be sinful. It is not enough to leave off doing wrong and begin to do right; there must be a sense of guilt, joined with sorrow for having done wrong in the past, and for being still tainted by inward evil. And in order that the repentance may be good, the motive for sorrow must be found not solely in the sinners hopes or fears for himself, nor even in the thought of the injury he has inflicted upon his fellow-men; but in the knowledge that he has grieved and offended God. The determination to make what amends may be possible, and the readiness to acknowledge to God and (where advisable) to man the whole extent of the wrong done, must be the outcome of a loving and unselfish grief, which bears the name of contrition. These, contrition, confession, amendment, are the three parts of repentance.1 [Note: A. J. Mason, The Faith of the Gospel.]

III

1. But the text in its original setting bears no reference to death and judgment after death; it is simply a warning of the destruction that was about to befall the kingdom of Israel. It is only natural that words so striking and so solemn should impress themselves upon the mind and conscience of every one who reads them, and that each should take them as a message from God to himself. And so, when men read this text in the Bible, or hear it preached upon in the pulpit, it is to death and judgment, to the meeting with their God there, that their thoughts are generally directed. They suppose that the preparation commanded by these words, Prepare to meet thy God, is preparation for that. But this reading of the verse, while not in itself incorrect, often leads to mistakes. I shall have to meet my God there after death; but death is still a great way off, and I need not now prepare. And so men quietly live on unprepared, and knowing that they are unprepared, presuming upon the chance of continued life, intending, when once they have reason to believe that their end is near,intending then to prepare. They may be suddenly cut off without a moments preparation; the pains and anxieties of sickness may render them incapable of preparation. It is generally to very little purpose that men in the hour of death prepare to meet their God, when they have not in life prepared to meet Him. This is far from saying that such death-bed preparation is never sincere, or never accepted of God, but one must own that it is incapable of proof and verification. Surely preparation to meet our God is too serious and important a matter to be risked upon the thousand chances of our last hours and our capacity in those hours to make any preparation whatever. The fact is, that men make a great and miserable mistake in supposing that the only meeting with God for which they are to prepare, and indeed the only meeting with God that is possible, is that compulsory meeting with Him in the day of judgment.

2. In a manner sometimes unscriptural, God is frequently represented as at a great distance, seated on a throne in the highest heavens, entirely separate and apart from us now, but proposing at some future time to come and arraign us before His bar, that we may give account of ourselves to Him, and that our only meeting with Him will be on that occasion. Now let us remember Gods omnipresence. In him we live, and move, and have our being. Thou compassest my path and my lying down, and art acquainted with all my ways. Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? Instead of having to meet God only at the day of judgment, we meet Him every day, or at any rate He meets us. Remember the words of Jesus: If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. And again: Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

Thus to meet with God is not the terror of the future; it is the privilege, the blessing, of the present. A Christian can say with truth and with thankfulness, I meet my God every day of my life; in prayer I speak to Him as a man speaketh to his friend. To me He is not a God afar off, whom some day I meet in judgment; He is near me, He holds me by the hand, and leads me. No one is so near to me as He, so constantly with me as He. You need not tell me to prepare to meet Him. I met with Him long ago, and have been with Him ever since; and, meeting Him here so much as my Friend, I am perfectly prepared to meet Him hereafter as my Judge. I know that I have often sinned. But when I met with Him He convinced me of my sin, but also convinced me of His willingness to forgive it, and impressed upon my mind the glorious truth, that His dear Son died to make atonement for my sin, and to make peace for me with Him. And so I asked Him to forgive me for Christs sake; I asked Him to receive me as His child; I asked Him to remain with me to guide and help me. And He heard my prayer.

The text of Bishop Lightfoots enthronement sermon was And they shall see his face. The prayer which from the first he asked his Diocese to offer for him was

That the Eternal Presence, thus haunting him night and day, may rebuke, may deter, may guide, may strengthen, may comfort, may illumine, may consecrate and subdue the feeble and wayward impulses of his own heart to Gods holy will and purpose!

The consciousness of an Eternal Presencethat was the principle of his life. That made him strong; that made him sympathetic; that gave him absolute singleness of aim and simplicity of life; that filled him with a buoyant optimism which expressed itself in constant joyousness; that was the source of an almost unparalleled generosity which in life gave to God and the Church every gift which God gave him, and at death made his chaplains his executors, and his Diocese his residuary legatee; that was the strength which nerved the mind to think and the hand to write in the solitary room before the hard day of public life began and after it ended; that was the wondrous power of personality which made itself felt in Cambridge, in London, in Durham, by men of every degree. He was ever conscious of the Eternal Presence. He ever went to men from God, and the human presence was illumined by the Divine.1 [Note: Quarterly Review, Jan. 1893, p. 103.]

3. God has ordained prayer as the means whereby we may meet with Him. To this man will I look, and with him will I dwell, even with him who is of a humble and of a contrite spirit. The first sacrifice to bring to God is the sacrifice of a broken heart, the frank and full confession of utter sinfulness and worthlessness. And to this confession we must add the prayer that, for Christs sake, we may be forgiven. And we must ask for the inclination and the power to forsake sin, and to live a holy life. And then it is necessary to keep up this communion with God; to meet Him in prayer day by day; to go to Him in prayer with every temptation, every difficulty, every sorrow, every duty, and every sin. So meeting with Him, such Divine companionship of thought, and feeling, and will, and purpose will be an infinite blessing; it will keep us out of sin, it will render us joyful all our days, it will give us a confidence in Him which nothing can disturb. Meeting with God, and walking with God, our whole character will be ennobled; and beholding so constantly the glory of the Lord, we shall be changed into the same image, from glory to glory, by the Spirit of the Lord.

So, meeting God in life, we need have no anxiety about meeting Him after death. Having met with Him and walked with Him; having been, through repentance and faith, forgiven and justified; having, through fellowship with His Spirit, been sanctified, having so lived on earth as to please Him, we can meet Him in the judgment with assurance and joy. We shall meet with Him then to know Him better than we can know Him now; we shall meet Him, so changed by a glorious resurrection as to be able to see Him; we shall meet Him prepared for whatever service He may ordain for us in His perfected Kingdom, for we shall have so learned to serve Him here as to serve Him better hereafter. There is no other way of preparing to meet our God than this,repentance, faith, obediencethe preparation that results from a personal knowledge of God, in a life consecrated to His service, and lived in the consciousness of His presence, and in the desire to please Him.

The day following Erskines death, Dr. John Brown, who attended him, wrote: Our dear sweet-hearted friend is away. He died very gently last night at a quarter to ten; laid his pathetic weary head on the pillow like a child, and his last words were, Lord Jesus. As might have been anticipated, the scene beheld at his death-bed was as heavenly as his life had been. His nephew, who was present, declared that if many loved him for his life, more would have loved him in his death. And thus, to quote Dr. Hannas beautiful words, few have ever passed away from among their fellows, of whom so large a number of those who knew him best, and were most competent to judge, would have said as they did of Mr. Erskine, that he was the best, the holiest man they ever knewthe man most human, yet most divine, with least of the stains of earth, with most of the spirit of heaven.1 [Note: H. F. Henderson, Erskine of Linlathen, 136.]

It is evident there is a genius of holiness just as there is a genius in music or in mathematics. But it is not enough to say that. When we speak of genius here, what do we mean? At bottom it is a greater receptivity. The vision of the unseen; the conception of a higher life that controls the lower one; the love of the Highest and the Holiest which these souls display does not mean that the saints are in possession of treasures denied to other men. The grace of which they partake is a common grace. The spiritual power they touch is a power which is around us all, waiting for entrance. What separates them from the rest of us is a finer faculty for discerning this, a thinner barrier for the obstruction of its inflow. All they know and feel is objectively there, the common property of the race. We must wait for their vision till we have reached their level.1 [Note: J. Brierley, The Secret of Living, 126.]

One feast, of holy days the crest,

I, though no Churchman, love to keep,

All-Saints,the unknown good that rest

In Gods still memory folded deep;

The bravely dumb that did their deed,

And scorned to blot it with a name,

Men of the plain heroic breed,

That loved Heavens silence more than fame,

Such lived not in the past alone,

But thread to-day the unheeding street,

And stairs to Sin and Famine known

Sing with the welcome of their feet;

The den they enter grows a shrine,

The grimy sash an oriel burns,

Their cup of water warms like wine,

Their speech is filled from heavenly urns.

About their brows to me appears

An aureole traced in tenderest light,

The rainbow-gleam of smiles through tears

In dying eyes, by them made bright,

Of souls that shivered on the edge

Of that chill ford repassed no more,

And in their mercy felt the pledge

And sweetness of the farther shore.2 [Note: J. R. Lowell, Under the Willows and Other Poems.]

A Meeting with God

Literature

Beeching (H. C.), Inns of Court Sermons, 96.

Brown (H. S.), Manliness and Other Sermons, 24.

Campbell (R. J.), Thursday Mornings at the City Temple, 89.

Hodge (C.), Princeton Sermons, 23.

Keble (J.), Sermons for the Christian Year: Septuagesima to Ash-Wednesday, 209.

Kingsley (C.), All Saints Day Sermons, 9.

Kuegele (F.), Country Sermons, New Ser., v. 301.

Liddon (H. P.), Advent in St. Pauls, 317.

Robinson (F.), College and Ordination Addresses, 142.

Spurgeon (C. H.), Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, xvi. (1870), No. 923; li. (1905), No. 2965.

Stewart (J.), Outlines of Discourses, 287.

Stowell (H.), Sermons, 297.

Stuart (J.), Sermons, 255.

Vaughan (J.), Sermons (Brighton Pulpit), i. (1860), No. 303.

Christian World Pulpit, xiv. 385 (H. P. Liddon).

Churchmans Pulpit: General Advent Season, i. 135 (F. E. Lawrence); Sermons to the Young, xvi. 4 (J. Edmond).

Literary Churchman, xxxi. (1885) 501 (S. Pascoe).

National Preacher, viii. 233 (R. S. Storrs); xxx. 183 (D. H. Coyner).

Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible

thus: Amo 4:2, Amo 4:3, Amo 2:14, Amo 9:1-4

prepare: Amo 5:4-15, Isa 47:3, Eze 13:5, Eze 22:30, Hos 13:8, Mat 5:25, Mat 24:44-51, Mat 25:1-13, Mar 13:32-37, Luk 14:31, Luk 14:32, Luk 21:3-36, 1Th 5:2-4, Jam 4:1-10, Rev 3:3

Reciprocal: Exo 19:15 – Be ready Deu 21:18 – will not Eze 38:7 – General Mat 25:6 – go Luk 1:17 – to make

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

PREPARATION TO MEET GOD

Prepare to meet thy God!

Amo 4:12

That man has still to learn the real lesson of life, who has not yet been taught to read it, in all its chapters of joy and sorrow, as one great preparation for another world.

For, in passing out of this world into another, we must, every one of us, meet God.

They are words easily said, to meet God; but it is hard, sometimes, to attach to the language which enunciates the simplest of truths any appreciable idea.

Have you bethought you, brethren, that that will be the first time that the spirit of a man ever comes into real and visible communication with a spiritual being? that, till that moment, we had no capability of even conceiving what spirit is? and that then we shall stand in actual intercourse with it.

To many, it is too awful to be dwelt upon; a matter in which fear is only too glad to seek its refuge in oblivion.

To a few, it is a pleasant feeling; but one that has never taken shape.

And how exceedingly rare is the mind, which has any distinct idea at all of how it will feel, and what it will say, and what it will do, at that awful moment of recognition by the Eternal.

And yet, so simple a coming fact is it, that no fact is fact now, which once was future and now is past, so much a fact as that fact is fact; and every other future fact, be it what it may, is an uncertainty compared to the certainty of this fact; and to every living man in his existence the next fact in the series of the events of his immortality, may be this moment when he shall meet God.

No one can have studied the New Testament carefully without conceiving that, in contrast with the Old Testament, it seldom, I had almost said never, refers to the contemplation of death, but always to the meeting of God.

I. What the exact character of that meeting shall be, I am not going to commit the rash act of endeavouring to unfold.It is likely thatall, as it were, in a momentat that moment the whole of the past life will relive, and stand out in its clearness; just as pictures, which are fading, are sometimes, by certain processes, restored, in a moment, to their original brightness.

But, however it may be with the retrospect, assuredly that meeting, how brief soever, will determine, irrevocably determine, the vast eternity which reaches on beyond it.

Therefore, in that interview with God, the past and the future will come together: the past, to its crisis; the future, to its doom. And therefore I do not say to you, this morning, Prepare to die! I do not say, Prepare to live for ever! but I say to you that which is greater than bothPrepare to meet thy God!

II. And now the first consideration is, Whom shall we meet?And I answer, unhesitatingly, The Lord Jesus Christ. Whether it be by judgment, or whether it be by the Second Advent, it is always The Son of man.

And here lies a thought of exceeding comfort. Our view of God, at least our first view of God, will be of the Godhead as it is in Christ. And if in Christ, it must be in human form. Christ has never laid aside His body. We can trace it by successive links in all its stages. All the disciples saw that body, spiritualised, after the resurrection. The twelve saw it, as it was become glorified, at the point of the ascension. And the angels declared distinctly that, as it ascended, so it would return again, bodily. St. Stephen, St. Paul, and St. John have all been permitted to see that form, in its perfectly glorified state, in heaven. Therefore the God we shall meet, at that moment, will be the Man, Christ Jesus.

Therefore it is I urge you, in your thoughts, never to discard the thought of the God you are going to meet, from that of the Man, Christ Jesus; but let Jesus, in all His exalted manhood, Jesus in all the perfections of His work, be present to you, by the eye of faith, whenever you hear the words said, Prepare to meet thy God!

This thought leads me to appreciate the propriety and the wisdom of the exact words, which the Holy Spirit has selected.

It is thy Godthine own Godwhom you are to be ready to meet. For it is He who made youGodthe sinners Godit is He Who has given Himself for youHe, in Whom all heaven is thine. And do you only feel Him thinemake Him thine by a strong act of appropriating faiththen do not doubt that you will be able to meet Him as thine, and it will leave you nothing else to contemplate. And if you can say the last words, you need not be afraid of the first wordsPrepare to meet thy God.

II. By meeting God, here, I understand two things.The first is, to go forth, to respond, with your whole heart, to those approaches, which God is continually making, by His Spirit, to your soul. We all know what it is, at times, to feel God drawing more than usually near to us. To return those advances of God, by grateful echo within, and quick obediences without, that is what I mean by meeting God.

And the second way is, have as much intercourse as you can with God, in your own retirementin thought, in prayer, and sacred study of the Bible. Put yourself in frequent converse with the grandnesses of an unseen world. These things will be the rehearsing of that greater meeting which is to come: the practising of that high part which you are one day to take. God will become a known God. You will be familiar with His invisible glories; and when you come to see and hear Him as He is, it will be no violent transition; there will be no great revulsion; it will be no stranger you are called to meet; but Him, Whom having not seen, you love. A FriendOne, with Whom to hold fellowship, has often been the sweetest joy of lifeOne, Whose smile has often passed before you. And you will not tremble; but you will run to it when the herald cries, The Bridegroom cometh; go ye out to meet Him.

III. But, look well to it, that you are robed, as befits the royal presence.This whole earth is the ante-room to that great banquetting-house. Here, the garments are kept, which every guest must wear: and woe be to the man who dares to meet his Masters eye unrobed!

Need I say to you what those robes are; or, how they were woven?

Christ, in His manhood, made robes of righteousness for man. He needed them not. Therefore He left them to His Church. Any sinner, by the hand of faith, may put on one of those perfect robes, and, from that moment, the rags of his own righteousness, and all the defilements of his life-long sins, are covered; so covered, that God Himself sees nothing in that man but infinite perfection. He stands before the immaculate holiness of Jehovah, perfect and entire, wanting nothing. In all that grand conclave of saints and angels, which shall circle around that throne, there is nothing so spotless as that man. He is prepared to meet His God.

But, after all, the preparation to meet God, lies more in an habitual frame of mind, than in any distinct acts. I would earnestly say to you, brethren, as you wish to do the greatest thing in existence well, never be in any place, from this moment, nor in any company, nor in any amusement, nor, God helping you, in any state of mind, in which you would not like Christ to find you, if He should come then.

Rev. Jas. Vaughan.

Illustration

The certainty of judgment is the basis of a call to repentance, which may avert it. The meeting with God for which Israel is besought to prepare, was, of course, not judgment after death, but the impending destruction of the Northern kingdom. But Amos prophetic call is not misapplied when directed to that final day of the Lord. Common-sense teaches preparation for a certain future, and Amos trumpet-note is deepened and re-echoed by Jesus: Be ye ready also, for the Son of man cometh. Note, too, that Israels peculiar relation to God is the very ground of the certainty of its punishment, and of the appeal for repentance. Just because He is thy God will He assuredly come to judge, and you may assuredly prepare, by repentance, to meet Him. The conditions of meeting the Judge, and being found of Him in peace, are that we should be without spot, and blameless; and the conditions of being so spotless and uncensurable are, what they were in Amos day, repentance and trust. Only we have Jesus as the brightness of the Fathers glory to trust in, and His all-sufficient work to trust to, for pardon and purifying.

Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary

Amo 4:12. Prepare to meet thy God. Many Impassioned speeches have been made on this statement by public speakers, exhorting men to get ready for the great judgment day. The exhortations are important in themselves, but they are a farfetched application of this passage. The last words, 0 Israel, are generally omitted in the exhortations, and hence the correct meaning of the statement is lost. The admonition is addressed to the 10-tribe kingdom of Israel, and it is said in view of the things soon to happen to the nation. A key word to the verse is thus, referring the reader back to verses 2, 3, where the Lord is predicting the siege and captivity of the kingdom. Verses 4-11 recounts the various instances of their misbehaviour in the past, and of the temporal misfortunes that God brought upon the people for their sins. But those chastisements had failed to bring them to repentance, therefore God determined to do unto them according to the prediction in verses 2 and 3. In view of that great event to come upon the nation, it is exhorted to prepare (get ready) for the time. The word meet is from QIRAB. which Strong defines. An encountering. It is called an encountering with God because He is the one bringing the Assyrians against them.

Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary

Amo 4:12-13. Therefore thus will I do unto thee I will continue to send these several judgments upon thee till I entirely destroy thee. And because, or, forasmuch, as I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel Expect that he will come to take full vengeance upon thee, and consider whether thou art able to contend with him; (so the expression of meeting an adversary is understood, Luk 14:31;) or if that be impossible, endeavour to avert his anger by confession of sin, humiliation, repentance, and reformation, before it actually break out upon thee. For lo, he that formeth the mountains, &c. For lo, I am he that formeth the mountains, and createth the wind I am the former of all things, both those which are seen, and those which are so fine and subtle as to escape the discernment of man. And declareth unto man what is his thought Who can search into the very thoughts of man, and declare what they are before they are put into execution, or are expressed in words. That maketh the morning darkness The Vulgate reads, Forming the morning cloud. Houbigant and Grotius, however, with some others, read, He that maketh the morning, and the darkness, namely, the day and the night, or, as the latter interprets it, gives prosperity to the godly, and adversity to the wicked, as the Chaldee here explains it. And treadeth upon the high places of the earth That is, says Grotius, Who treadeth under foot the proud: in other words, who can humble the great and mighty, and overthrow the strongest fortresses, or places of strength. The Lord, The God of hosts is his name Whose sovereign power all creatures obey, and act for or against us as he willeth. Let us humble ourselves before this God, and give all diligence to make him our God. For happy are the people whose God he is, and who have all this power engaged for them!

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

4:12 Therefore thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: [and] because I will do this unto thee, prepare to {n} meet thy God, O Israel.

(n) Turn to him by repentance.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

The inevitable outcome 4:12-13

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

The Israelites should prepare to meet their God because they had failed to repent (cf. Exo 19:10-19; 2Co 5:10). He would confront them with even greater punishments (cf. Amo 3:11-15). They should prepare to meet Him, not in a face-to-face sense, but as they would encounter a powerful enemy in battle. The prophet’s call was a summons to judgment for covenant unfaithfulness, not a call to repentance or an invitation to covenant renewal. [Note: Paul, p. 151.] The absence of a stated punishment makes the summons even more foreboding.

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)