The Pulpit Commentary — Amos — Section 71

says vaguely "Thus," and stops short, that imagination may fill up the blank. His- 11i!ence is charged with deeper meaning than any words could carry, IV. ONE FINAL APPEAL BEFORE THB STROKE FALLS. "Prepare," eto. -1. Look for a meeling with God. It is inevitable. It is at hand, The fact must be faced, No good, but harm, e&n come out of the attempt to escape or blink it (2 Cor. v. 10; Ps. cnxix. 7-12). 2. Prepare for it. This is a word of hope. Meeting with God i8 inevitable; but it need not necessarily be injurious. Preps.ration for it is possible~ being enjoined, and would avail something if it were made. "God never in this life· bids people or individuals prepare to meet him without a purpose of good to those who do prepare" (Pusey). 3. Do this because of i"mpending judgmenls. "Because I wi!L do this unto thee." We might suppose that if God was going to destroy, the prepara- tion to meet him would be too late. But that does not follow. When Nineveh was wicked God expressed his purpose to destroy it, but when.it became penitent he spared it. Hezekiah, prayerless in the particular matter, was bidden prepare to die; but Hezekiah, praying for more life, was spared fifteen years (Isa. xxxviii. 1, 6). What God will do to us, so far as it comes withiu our cognizance, is conditioned by what we- will do to him. Until the judgment has actually fallen, the threat of it is a mess~cre- of mercy. A sentence of destruction itself is a call to repentance, and so has wov;D into it a thread of hope. " Because I will do this unto thee, prepare." Ver. 11.-Burning, yet not turning. From Moses to Amos was about seven hundrea years. It is a long time with men and the works of men. But it is little in the two eternities through which the purposes of God. extend. There were:prophecies which it had taken all this period to mature; courses of treatment for the cure of sin pursued through all the interval, and whose last measure had not yet been taken. One of, these, finds record here. A new event looks out at us in the guise of an .ancient prophecy (Deut. :u:iL 22-24). What seven centuries before had been conceived ,in the womb of time is here" delivered upon the mellowing of occasion." ) I. Gon's JUDGMENTB A FIRE. "Plucked out of the burning." A commentai} on this figure is the association by Isaiah of "the spirit of judgment" and " the spirit of burning" (Isa. iv. 4). Like a fire: 1. Judgments are painful. 'l'he sensation of burni.I.g is about the most painful we know. Too severe for capital punishment, too cmel even for prisoners of war, death by burning has been generally. reserve.d for the martyred saints. This intensest form of physical pain is a fitting symbol of the e.fiects of God's inflictions. Wbat he sends is the greatest of its kind. If it be, pleasure it is ideal--a pleasure at his right hand for evermore. If it be pain H is phenomenal-a torment whose smoke ascendeth up for ever and ever. 2. They are con~ swrning. What .fire feeds on it destroys. Where the flames have passed no organiCc matter remains. So with God's judgments. They are the mills of God which "grind! exceeding smalL" That on which they mnst fall I' they destroy and. consume -unto the end." They are nothing U not adequate to their purpose, 3,, They are purifying,. By burning out what is inflammable they leave what is incombustible behind, unmixed: an.d pure. Thill idea. of refining is often associated with the fires, of judgment (Zech. :xiii. 9; Mal. iii. 2, 3). They seize on the dross of evil, .and burn it out of the. mass, When their work is done there is only the fine gold of a pure nature in the crucible. 4. They are irresi"ible. Fuel, in contact with fire, can do nothing but bum. If the: flame is to be quenched it must be done by some extra agency. 'l'o be as "tow" or "stubble" in the flames (Isa. i. 31; Neh. i. 10) is the strongest .possible figure for helpleuness under the avenging stroke of God. Men cannot prevent it, ca)l.Ilot avoid; it, cannot arrest it, cannot in any degree reduce its force. When he works "who, shall let it"? When his day burns as an oven, who shall withstand the fire (Isa.; xliii. 13; Mai. iv. 1)? II. SINNERS ABE THE BBANDS oN wBICB IT FEEDB, "Ye were as a firebrand." Thertt are certai-n steps which lead up to burning, whether literal 01· figurative._ The brand. was: 1. Withered. It is not on the sappy growing branch that the.fire seizes. ~efore. in the natural course, it reaches the flameB, a preliminary .process, has been finlBhed. l.t8 leaf yellows and falls, its bark shrivels, its 11ap dries up. 'l'hen it is mere tinder., and fit for nolhing but the fire. So sin withers and kills the branches of the tree of human character. It dries up the sap of spiritual life, and BO turns sere the led OH, IV, 1-13.) THE BOOK OF AMOS. 71