The Pulpit Commentary — Amos — Section 164

hundred and twenty years' warniniz. They absorbed themselves in their work and pleasure, and knew not till the Flood came (Matt. xxiv. 38). So with the Sodomites, warned by Lot (Gen. xix. 14); and the inhabitants of Jerusalem at its capture, warned by Christ (Matt.. xxiv. 33). Warning is thrown away on unbelief, and its end is nlways a surprise. In this case the sun would set at noon. 'l'he end would come nntimely. In the midst of days and prosperity Israel would be cut off. There would be no anticipation, no fear, no suspicion even, of such an event. So with the ungodly nt last. The judgment will surprise them and look untimely, but only because their incredulity will be unconquerable. IV. RETRIBUTION CLOSELY ADJUS'l'ED TO THE CIBCUMSTANOES OF THE CRIMINAL, (Ver. 10.) Sinners are smitten in their joys. The covetous in their possessions, the luxurious in their luxuries, the revellers in their revelries. When sackcloth and e.shes are substituted for "ivory couches," and baldness for hair fragrant with the chief oint- ments, when howls rend the throats till lately melodious in song, the stroke is identified as that of One who never "beats the air." The fly of judgment, selecting infallibly the ~ore spot of the sufferer, reveals its mission as from God himself. The Joys in which the sinner is smitten are, moreover, those ,nost closely connected with his sins. God's stroke is as obviously righteous as appropriate. Falling on the sins that provoke them, God's judgments are self-interpreting. Israel's luxurious appliances were simply plunder, the wages of iniquity, sometimes even the price of blood. Hence God 11ingles them out for special attack, and will plague Israel rigorously in every pleasure that has its root in sin. V. Tm: FINALITY OF Gon's BETBIBUTIVE ACT. The rule is that judgrnent is more severe in proportion as it is long delayed. 1. It makes an end. The sun goes down, and ends the day of life. After that nothing can come but night-the night of death. Dcstrnction for sinners of Israel, destruction for all such sinners while the world stands, is the Divine provision. When the last measure of retribution iH executed, the last shred of the sinner's good bas been torn away. 2. That end unspeakably bitter. The wine-cup of God's fury is necessarily a. bitter draught. There is wounded dignity in it, and wasted mercy, and outraged love, and all ingredients which are gall and worm- wood in the mouth. They are digging for themselves Marah-pools no branch can sweeten, who "heap np wrath against the day of wrath," etc. 3. That bitterr,ess the bitterness of utter desolation. "And make it like mourning for an only one." That is bitter mourning indeed. The loss of an only one is total loss, including our alL It is irreparable loss, for the dead cannot come back. It is loss not physical merely, nor sentimental merely, but loss wringing the heart-strings, and leaving us with the very jewel of life torn from its setting. Such is the mourning in which unforgiven sin is expiated at last. It is heart-agony, unrelieved, unmitigated, and never to end. "Son, remember; " "There shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth; " " Their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched." Ver. 9.-.A sunset at noon. This language is at once prophetic and :figurative. lt predicts an event in the moral world under the figure of an analogous event in tho physical world. The symbolical event is not a.n eclipse of the sun, which the language does not suit, but his going down at midday; and the event symbolized is clearly death in the midst of young life. Israel was rich and prosperous and young. To all outward seeming she was just in the meridian of her life. But her sun would never reach the west. Her end would be premature, sudden, a.nd tragic. As if the sun dropped in an instant beneath the horizon from mid-sky, and the radiancy of noon gave place in that instant to the darkness of night; so Israel's day would darken suddenly, and the night of death fall in a sky all lit with the golden glow of noon. • I. THERE IS TO MEN A NATURAL TERM OF EXIS'.1.'ENOE, WHICH IS THEIR DAY. There is a natural life-term to all earthly creatures. This varies endlessly for each, between limits so far apart as a millennium and a day. There are chelonim that lengthen ont their slow existence to centuries, and there are insects that sport out their little life in au afternoon. Intermediate between these widely distant limits is man with his thrt:e score years and ten (Ps. xc. 10). This period is his day. Beyond it few may Lupt, and none expect, to live. To reach it even there must be normal conditions of life within and around. This is not a long time at best. Let the utmost diligence be llll, Vlll, 1-14.] 'NIE IlOOK OF AMOS. 1GG