Amos 9:7-10 Are you not as children of the Ethiopians to me, O children of Israel? said the LORD… 1. These verses strike at the root of all Israel's fancied security. They were the people of God, whom He had brought from Egypt and planted in Canaan, whose whole life had been passed under His peculiar guardian care. They thought that God would never execute final judgment on them, because He had so often spared them and blessed them. But sin dissolved this union at last. 2. The reason why this union was dissolved is given in the following verse. They are the "sinful kingdom." God's purpose had failed. No union between God and man can stand in the presence of sin — repeated and unrepented sin. 3. The effect of this separation between God and His people. They were destroyed off the face of the earth; every sinner perished by the sword. (1) No relations are more blessed than those which exist between God and His people. His covenant is established with them, and it is a covenant of life and blessing. Providential help in all the forms that man may need: grace and truth to save the soul and to prepare for that home into which nothing unclean can enter. These are God's gifts to His people. (2) Sin is the only power which can sever this union. In the face of all persecution and trouble the good man can say with St. Paul: " I am persuaded, that neither death nor life, nor angels," etc. (3) The results of the separation for us will be more fatal than for Israel. (J. Telford, B. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Are ye not as children of the Ethiopians unto me, O children of Israel? saith the LORD. Have not I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt? and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir? |
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