II. ACCORDINGLY, ISRAEL SHALL FARE M THE HF.ATHEl'I' DO WHO FORGET Gou. Grouping Israel like to liko with heathen, God's attitude must be the same to both. 'l'hey shall be treated : 1. .As the objects of God's di.,pleasure. He iM angry with the wicked every day. He is angrier with those of them who sin against light and privi- lege. He is angriest with the spiritual renegades whose disaffection is guilty in pro- portion to the strength of the ties it set~ aside. 2. .As the victims of his destroying :iudgments. (Ver. 8.) "And I will destroy it off the face of the earth." Strange words from a Gou visibly in covenant. But the covenant was broken. The theoretically "holy nation " was actually a " sinful kingdom." Israel's character was not the cha- racter to which covenant promises referred. Heathenish in corruption, what but the bolts forged for their pagan kin could fall upon their heads? 3. This in the character of defiant transgressors. (Ver. 10.) "Not because they sinned aforetime, but because they persevered in sin until death n (Jerome, in Pusey). Sin may be forgiven, but impenitence never. The unpardonable sin is unforsaken sin. III. THE JUDGMENT THAT SHALL DESTROY THE WICKED MASS SHALL LEAVE A JUGHTEOUB REMNANT. (Ver. 8.) "Except that I shall not utterly destroy the house of Jacob." God ordains no indiscriminate destruction. His bolts strike his enemies. Of his friends: 1. Not one shall perish. "Not even a little grain falls to the ground." The Divine nature, of which the righteous are partakers, is indestructible. The life of the saint is a living Christ within him (Gal. iL 20). Christ " is alive for evermore" (Rev. i. 18), and says to all in whom he is as their life, "Because I live, ye shall live also." In a mixed community the righteous sometimes die for the fault of the wicked; but their death is precious in God's sight (Ps. cxvi. 15), and "not an hair of their head shall perish." 2. They shall be sifted oot of the mast. (Ver. 9.) In these graphic words the righteous minority are corn, and the corrupt masses the chaff. The nations are the sieve, and the Divine judgments the shaking of it. The result is not destruc- tion of the grain, but separation between it aud the chaff. " In every quarter of the world, and in well-nigh every nation in every quarter, Jews have been found. The whole earth is, as it were, one vast sieve in the hands of God, in which Israel is shaken from one end to the other. . . . '!'he chaff and dust would be blown away by the air; . . . but no solid corn, not one grain, should fall to the earth" (Pusey). So in other cases. God's judgmeots winnow men, discerning clearly between clean anJ unclean. When the storm is over, the seaworthy vessels a.re ea.,y of identification, for they alone survive. 3. Their own sinfulness shall be sifted out of them. "What is here said of all God doth daily in each of the elect. For they are the wheat of God, which, in order to be laid up in the heavenly garner, must be pure from chaff aod dust. To this end he sifts them by afflictions and troubles" (Pusey). Suffering is not purifying per se. But the suffering of the righteous is (Heh. xii. 11; 1 Cor. iv. 17). It sub- dues the flesh, deepens our sense of dependence on God, spiritualizes our thoughts, and tests, and by testing strengthens, faith (1 Pet. i. 7). In the night of suffering come out the stars, guiding, consoling, irradiating the soul. " Then fear not in a world like this, And thou shalt know ere long- Know how sublime a thing it is To suffer and be strong."
Vere. 11, 12.-The rebuilding of the waste places. "God hath not cast &.way his people, which he foreknew," as the cumulative series of woes announced might seem to indicate. As a people they conspire, rebel, and cast him off, and as a people they are scattered, decimated, and disowned. In their corporate character they cannot longer survive. But there were individuals among them who had either remained loyal or come back to their allegiance, and these stood in a different position. Not only would they be spared, but made the nucleus of a new people, and their existence the occasion of a new dispensation. Such is the burden of these verses. The sinners are destroyed, and o. new prosperity blooms for the faithful remnant that survives. The w11ifs of tho national wreck are drawn in safety from the waves, and the desobted land is renovnted for iheir home. I. 'l'uE REBTOilATION OF DAVID'S HOUSE. David's house here is not menily the 181 'i'HE BOOK OF AMOS.