Amos 5:8 Seek him that makes the seven stars and Orion, and turns the shadow of death into the morning, and makes the day dark with night… The text brings the works of God and the name of God into one focus, and makes use of both as an argument with man to raise himself from the low and unworthy pretences of religion, such as are represented by the calf-worship of Bethel, to Him who sits high above the magnificence of all material forms, yet deigns to listen to the whisper of a kneeling child. I. Seek Him because He is IMMUTABLE. This is declared by "the seven stars and Orion," and by all the constellations among which the Pleiades are set. It is a wonderful thought, that when we look up to the mighty heavens, we see precisly what Adam and Eve saw. They beheld the Pleiades, that group of stars so beautifully likened to "a knot of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid." They beheld those shining orbs in which we detect the appearance of an armed warrior, and call Orion. Through all the changes of human history, those celestial bodies have shone with like brilliancy, and moved with like pomp in the great spaces overhead. The Chaldeans from their astronomical towers, the Phoenicians from their bold sea-tracks, the Egyptian sages from their mystic temples, the Idumean shepherds from their broad pastures, the Jewish kings from their palace roofs, beheld those august revelations of Almighty power and wisdom; and they are as superb, as radiant, now as then. "And the heavens are the works of Thine hands. They shall perish;... and they all shall wax old, as doth a garment; and as a vesture shalt Thou fold them up, and they shad be changed." "But Thou art the same, and Thy years shad have no end." And now look at man. "As for man, his days arc as grass: as a flower of the field so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more." Thus frail, and in the midst of frailty, what is to become of us? Where is the arm on which we can lean? What is the hope to which we can cling? The reply to these inquiries comes not from the oracles of human wisdom, but from Amos, the herdsman of Tekoa. "Seek Him that maketh the seven stars and Orion." Let us seek Him as He bids us in His Word; and when the Pleiades are bereft of their sweet influence, and when the bands of Orion are loosed, his zone of mighty worlds unclasped, and his flaming sword sheathed in eternal darkness, we shall shine with light which can never fade, and be glad with a gladness which can never die. II. Seek Him because He is ALL-POWERFUL. This also is declared by "the seven stars and Orion." Many have looked on the Pleiades as but an insignificant group in the heavens; but that constellation has depths of glory which the unaided eye cannot reach. We count seven stars, but the telescope announces fourteen magnificent sun-like bodies clustered comparatively near to one of the seven. This, however, is not the special peculiarity of the Pleiades. For some time it was suspected that there is one great central sun, round which our planetary system, and many, if not all, other suns and systems are revolving in measured and majestic movement; and at length an eminent continental astronomer decided that a bright star in the Pleiades is the sublime centre of this sublime march. Here, then, is a thought of almost appalling grandeur. Myriads of orbs keeping their own relative position, and sweeping round and round in the path of their own revolutions; yet the vast host — suns compared with which ours is but a speck of fire — worlds of such magnitude as to dwarf ours into a mere grain of sand — all rolling through space as if doing homage to the influence of what to us is but a point of light in the blue immensity. According to this theory, those thousands of bodies are speeding along with amazing velocity; yet such is the long curve on which they travel, that it will take more than eighteen millions of years for even some of the less remote to complete one circuit round that great luminary. Now glance at Orion, as he gleams aloft in more than imperial pomp and blazonry. We may well look on this constellation with awe and wonder when we take into account the following statement in reference to it. In what is Called the sword of Orion there is a hazy glimmer, which has been thought by some to be only a kind of nebulous fluid; but Lord Rosse, having scanned it with his powerful telescope, ascertained that it is another gorgeous universe, so far away, that to an ordinary glass it only appears as a dim streak, yet having heights, and depths, and lengths, and breadths, of creative power and diversity surpassing all that we behold in the whole canopy of the starry heavens. But even if this daring assertion should be proved to be incorrect, and all those worlds to be no more than a conjecture, we should scarcely be conscious that aught had been subtracted from our idea of the magnitude and multiplicity of Jehovah's works; for there are other streaks and misty appearances on the sky which are known by indubitable evidence to be gatherings of stars, huge in bulk and veiled in dazzling splendour. And here is another great motive to seek the Lord. The power evinced in "the seven stars and Orion," and the other orbs they represent, is power wielded for the advantage of those who respond to the Divine command, "Seek ye My face." And when terrors shake our souls, when our heart and flesh fail, what consolation we shall have in the thought that the Hand which measured out the heavens is over us, and around us, to keep us from ill. "Will He plead against me with His great power? No; but He would, put strength in me." III. Seek Him because of His BENEFICENT ACTIVITIES. And turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night: that calleth for the waves of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth." How beautiful is morning, as it comes with golden sandals and rosy veil through the gates of the east! Beautiful on the silent peaks of the Himalayan mountains, beautiful on the green heights of Ceylon, beautiful on the icy pinnacles of the Alps, beautiful on the broad mass of the Grampians, beautiful on the isles of the Caribbean Sea. How it is welcomed as the apparition of a smiling friend; welcomed by the Arab as it gleams on his tent; by the mariner as it turns his sails to cloth of gold; by the sentinel as it gleams on the steel of his weapons. How beautiful is night! How soft and soothing the shadows with which it enwraps the earth! What images of peace it suggests to the mind! The bird spreading its wings over its nestlings, the sheep gathered in the fold, the child in its cot, and wearied labour calmly renewing its energies for another day. That calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the earth." How beautiful the silent processes by which the rain is distilled on the thirsty ground! Think of the oceans — those mighty reservoirs of the Most High. Think of the clouds drawn from them — now white as the snows which crown a mountain's forehead; now gorgeous, as if woven of a thousand rainbows; now black as a funeral pall. Think of the rain, how it falls; not in a sudden and overpowering splash; not in a flood, tearing the leaves from the trees and the young shoots from the soil, but in a succession" of gentle drops. Is not. this,, gracious. Being, whose hand is in the pleasing changes of day and night, and in ram from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness," One with whom it is desirable to live in filial relationship? IV. Seek Him because of His NAME. "The Lord is His name." Now we come to the teachings of the written Word in reference to the Supreme Being. Glance at some of those ideas which the ancient saints attached to the Divine name. Jehovah-jireh — the Lord will provide. Jehovah-nissi — Jehovah my banner. This was the name which Moses gave to the altar he built as a memorial of Israel's victory over Amalek. What a banner! A Divine perfection for every fold, radiant with the heraldry of eternal truth, and bearing a name bright as if every syllable had been wrought out in a constellation of suns. This banner is for us if we seek the Lord. Jehovah shalom — the Lord is my peace. The angel said to awestricken, affrighted Gideon, "Peace be unto thee." Jehovah-Tsidkenu — the Lord our righteousness. This title is specially connected with the manifestation of God in Christ Jesus. "And be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith." In one part of the heavens there is a constellation known as the Southern Cross; and when Humboldt was in South America, he often heard the guides who con ducted him over the savannahs of Venezuela cry out, as they looked up to that constellation, "Midnight is past — the cross begins to bend." Thank God the cross bends over us, and our midnight is past — the midnight of our fear, the mid-night of our bondage. (J. Marrat.) Parallel Verses KJV: Seek him that maketh the seven stars and Orion, and turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night: that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth: The LORD is his name: |
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