The Pulpit Commentary — Amos — Section 121

what is sure to come, and when it comes be in expectation of it. "Be ye also ready;" "Watch therefore." Dy the confluence of these streams of action is made the river of a life " tbroughly furnished." Ver. 6.-The dry eye of the d,estroyer. "But they are not grieved for the hurt of Joseph." Of the many aspects of Israel's sin, this is among the most repulsive. It is bad enough to sin against our brother, and by our wrong-doing to blight his life; but it makes the crime hideous to look, uncaring and callous, on the desolation we ourselves have wrought. I. ONE :MAN'S SUFFERING IS A FIT OCCASION OF ANOTHER MAN'S SORROW. Men are brothers (Acts xvii. 26), and owe a mutual regard for each other's concerns (Phil. ii. 4). Suffering is evil, and the proper relation toward those enduring it is sympathy (1 John iii. 17). God pities the afflicted, and compassion in him is the reason and measure of its dutifulness in us (Matt. ix. 36; Luke L 33--37). We cannot disregard the suffer- ings of men without sinning against God and against our own humanity. II. THE GREAT OBSTACLE TO SYllll"ATllY IS THE SELFISHNESS OF SIN, This leads to atheism on the one hand, and misanthropy on the other. The first man showed this tendency, the second that. Adam failed in regard for God, Cain in regard for his brother. But both transgressions arose out of the one sinful character of selfishness. Adam violated God's command because he preferred his own way; Cain destroyed Abel's life because be thought less of it than of his own wounded self-love. And all men, in proportion as they are sinful, are selfish, inconsiderate, and misanthropic. Love is of God, and rules where God dwells. Where God dwells not we have men "hateful and hating one another." Selfishness and disregard of others' happiness is ihe very mark and token of a corrupt nature. III. SELFISID,'ESS IS WORST IN KIND WREN MANIFESTED TOW.A.RD OUB OWN KINDRED, In addition to the philanthropy which has its basis in the brotherhood of the race, is the stronger affection which arises out of nearer ties. "Our neighbour," "our own," "those of our own household.," are, in an ascending scale, the prescribed and natural objects of our love and care (Matt. xix. 19; 1 Tim. v. 8). In proportion to the closeness of our relation to an individual is the normal strength of the tie between us, and so the guilt of disregarding it. The disregard of Israel for Israelites was selfishness of & peculiarly heartless kind. It was the sin of brother against brethren, and involved the violation of blood ties sacred by every law. IV. '.l'RE GREATEST DEGREE OF SELFISHNESS 18 THAT IN REGARD TO THE SUFFERINGS OF OTRERB, I!IFLICTED OR BROUGHT ABOUT BY OURSELVES. In Israel, the men who disregarded the judgments decimating the nation were the men whose wickedness had brought them on. They were indifferent, in fact, about sufferings of which they were themselves the authors. .A..nd they have their counterparts in the world still. The drunkard who ruins his own family, the libertine who ruins the family of his neighbour, are the only men in the community who "care for none of these things." The explanation is that special sin produces special hardness of heart, and the man whose wickedness involves society in misery is the man who, by the very fact, is constituted most incapable of feeling it. Vers. B-11.-Wrath revealing itself in joogment. The squaring of a sinner's account with God is of necessity a bitter experience. It is the last fact in a wide induction, and completes our knowledge of what sin really is. The best and only adequate view of this is reached when a man reads it in the light of its punishment. We are enabled to perform this office for Israel's crying and incredible wickedness here. I. THE WORD THAT CANNOT BE BROKEN. Accommodating himself to our mode of conceiving things, God condescends to give assurance of his faithfulness in three degrees of assertion. The word that cannot be broken is: 1. What God says. "Thy Word is truth." God can neither err uor lie. He does when he promises (Numb. ::.xiii. 19). He does as much as he promises, He does exactly the thing he promises. The fact of his truth lies at the foundation of all religion and all knowledge. Because he is true, we not only believe his tcetimony absolutely, but we believe absolutelr the testimony of our own consciousness as being his gift. 2. What God swears. . In itself Lis word is as good as his oath. But to our apprehension there may be a difference. Oil, VL 1-14.] THE BOOK OF AMOS. 121