Amos 7–8: Go, Prophesy to My People Israel": The Plumb Line and the Priest

Scripture: Berean Standard Bible

This is what the Lord GOD showed me: He was preparing swarms of locusts just after the king’s harvest, as the late spring crop was coming up. And when the locusts had eaten every green plant in the land, I said, “Lord GOD, please forgive! How will Jacob survive, since he is so small?”

So the LORD relented from this plan. “It will not happen,” he said.

This is what the Lord GOD showed me: The Lord GOD was calling for judgment by fire. It consumed the great deep and devoured the land. Then I said, “Lord GOD, please stop! How will Jacob survive, since he is so small?”

So the LORD relented from this plan. “It will not happen either,” said the Lord GOD.

This is what he showed me: Behold, the Lord was standing by a wall true to plumb, with a plumb line in his hand. “Amos, what do you see?” asked the LORD.

“A plumb line,” I replied.

“Behold,” said the Lord, “I am setting a plumb line among my people Israel; I will no longer spare them:

The high places of Isaac will be deserted,and the sanctuaries of Israel will be laid waste;and I will rise up against the house of Jeroboamwith my sword.”

Then Amaziah the priest of Bethel sent word to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying, “Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel. The land cannot bear all his words, for this is what Amos has said:

‘Jeroboam will die by the sword,and Israel will surely go into exile,away from their homeland.’ ”

And Amaziah said to Amos, “Go away, you seer! Flee to the land of Judah; earn your bread there and do your prophesying there. But never prophesy at Bethel again, because it is the sanctuary of the king and the temple of the kingdom.”

“I was not a prophet,” Amos replied, “nor was I the son of a prophet; rather, I was a herdsman and a tender of sycamore-fig trees. But the LORD took me from following the flock and said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’

Now, therefore, hear the word of the LORD. You say:

‘Do not prophesy against Israel;do not preach against the house of Isaac.’

Therefore this is what the LORD says:

‘Your wife will become a prostitute in the city,and your sons and daughters will fall by the sword.Your land will be divided by a measuring line,and you yourself will die on pagan soil.And Israel will surely go into exile,away from their homeland.’ ”

This is what the Lord GOD showed me: I saw a basket of summer fruit.

“Amos, what do you see?” he asked.

“A basket of summer fruit,” I replied.

So the LORD said to me, “The end has come for my people Israel; I will no longer spare them.”

“In that day,” declares the Lord GOD, “the songs of the temple will turn to wailing. Many will be the corpses, strewn in silence everywhere!”

Hear this, you who trample the needy,who do away with the poor of the land,asking, “When will the New Moon be over,that we may sell grain?When will the Sabbath end,that we may market wheat?Let us reduce the ephah and increase the shekel;let us cheat with dishonest scales.Let us buy the poor with silverand the needy for a pair of sandals,selling even the chaff with the wheat!”

The LORD has sworn by the Pride of Jacob:

“I will never forget any of their deeds.

Will not the land quake for this,and all its dwellers mourn?All of it will swell like the Nile;it will surge and then subsidelike the Nile in Egypt.

And in that day,declares the Lord GOD,I will make the sun go down at noon,and I will darken the earth in the daytime.I will turn your feasts into mourningand all your songs into lamentation.I will cause everyone to wear sackclothand every head to be shaved.I will make it like a time of mourning for an only son,and its outcome like a bitter day.

Behold, the days are coming,declares the Lord GOD,when I will send a famine on the land—not a famine of bread or a thirst for water,but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD.People will stagger from sea to seaand roam from north to east,seeking the word of the LORD,but they will not find it.In that day the lovely young women—the young men as well—will faint from thirst.Those who swear by the guilt of Samariaand say, ‘As surely as your god lives, O Dan,’or, ‘As surely as the way of Beersheba lives’—they will fall, never to rise again.”