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July 20, 2021
God's Love for His Wayward People (Walk Thru the Bible Week 25)
The Kingdom of Israel under King Jeroboam II was extremely wealthy, strong, and expansive. It looked great from the outside, but inside idolatry was taking over and society was decaying. The prophets Hosea and Amos list the sins of the people and attempt to bring them to repentance. Hosea describes them as an adulterous wife who God intends to heal of her waywardness and love freely once again.
This episode complements the daily readings from our Walk Thru the Bible reading plan for July 19-25, covering 2 Kings 14-15; Hosea; Amos; Isaiah 1-6.
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Transcript
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Welcome to Walk Through the Bible, Susan Michael's 12-month journey through the most exciting
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book on the planet.
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It will transform your life one page at a time.
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Be sure to subscribe for future episodes that will ignite your faith and bring your Bible
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to life.
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Now, let's join our host, Susan Michael.
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Well, hey there and welcome back.
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This is Walk Through the Bible Week 25.
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This week we are reading in our daily Bible pages 762-803 or what's dated June 18-24
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in the daily Bible.
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I have entitled this week, God's Love for His Wayward People.
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What an encouraging word this is for all of us, even though it's a very painful history.
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It's a painful story, but that at the end of the day is what it's all about.
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So now this week we are going to be reading about two prophets that prophesied during
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the reign of Jeroboam II.
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As I explained last week, the reign of Jeroboam II was like the highlight of the northern
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kingdom of Israel.
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They were very strong, very wealthy, very prosperous on the outside, doing great during
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Jeroboam's reign, but on the inside they were very sick.
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And this is why the prophets then began to cry out about the sins and the idolatry of
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the people of the north.
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Now after the death of Jeroboam II, which we'll talk about after we go through these
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prophets this week, but after the death of Jeroboam II, the northern kingdom of Israel
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fell into a twenty year period of very serious, very fast decline coming to their very end
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when the Assyrian Empire invaded.
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So we're getting towards the end of our history of the northern kingdom of Israel, but very
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much this week in the midst of it here in this reign of Jeroboam II.
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So now let's talk about the first prophet, Hosea.
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Hosea is the only writing prophet that lived in the northern kingdom of Israel.
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And so he prophesied during the kingdom of Jeroboam II and afterwards during that twenty
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years of decline.
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And this would also be during the southern kingdom of Judah, during the king of Uzziah
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and all the way through to Hezekiah.
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So he preached for about twenty five years.
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His writings in his book are not chronological.
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So that makes it a little hard on our chronological read through because they're more thematic.
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And parts may reflect the chaos that was going on in the northern kingdom after the
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death of Jeroboam II.
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So you know, at this point in our story it's been a hundred and fifty years that God has
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been waiting for the northern kingdom of Israel to get their act together and put away the
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idolatry and they still haven't.
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It's been a hundred and fifty years.
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And King Jeroboam II is one of the worst kings.
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He grew very apathetic.
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He allowed idol worship to run amok and he opened the doorway for the Israelites to cheat
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still.
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Sex was crazy.
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Murder was crazy.
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All of this is an outcome of paganism.
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You have to understand.
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If they were living according to the laws of the God of Israel, this wouldn't be taking
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place.
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Paganism allowed for certain things that then just opened the door in society.
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So you know, the people were growing cold and distant.
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They'd forgotten about the God of Israel, the God of their first love, the God who had
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married them in the desert.
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They probably didn't even know about the laws and the commandments of Moses.
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Everyone was just really taking over.
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So Hosea teaches that God does not forget Israel even in their self-destruction.
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And he teaches us that love is the strongest force of all over sin.
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He reminds us that Israel is the bride of the Lord and he does it in a very unique way.
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According to the way it reads, God instructs him to go and marry a prostitute.
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And then his life, the life of the prophet, is going to live out this life that God is
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living with an unfaithful wife of Israel.
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So I want to read to you some sections beginning here with Hosea 2, verse 13.
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It says, I will punish her for the days she burned incense to the bails.
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She decked herself with rings and jewelry and went after her lovers.
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But me she forgot, declares the Lord.
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You see, he takes it very personally.
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Verse 14, therefore I am not going to allure her.
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Therefore I am now going to allure her.
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I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her.
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Verse 15, there she will respond as in the days of her youth, as in the days when she
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came out of Egypt.
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In that day, declares the Lord, you will call me my husband and will no longer call me my
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master.
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Then skipping down to chapter 4, verses 12, talking about how idolatry is adultery in
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the Lord's eyes.
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So starting here with the last half of the verse 12, my people consult a wooden idol and
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a diviner's rod speaks to them.
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A spirit of prostitution leads them astray.
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They are unfaithful to their God.
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They sacrifice on the mountaintops and burn offerings on the hills.
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So he is describing their idolatry here and how he sees it as adultery.
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Then going down to chapter 6, verse 1, where Israel begins to repent, says, Come, let us
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return to the Lord.
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Verse 4, what can I do with you Ephraim?
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What can I do with you Judah?
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Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears.
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So God is saying here, I hear your words of return, but it's just going to disappear immediately.
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What am I going to do with you?
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You're like the dew in the morning, it's gone as soon as the sun comes out.
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So then down to chapter 11, verse 1, about God's love for Israel.
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When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.
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But the more they were called, the more they went away from me.
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They sacrificed to the Baals and they burned incense to images.
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And then verse 5, he knows it's going to come to this.
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The Assyrian will rule over him.
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God is predicting here through the prophet.
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A serious coming.
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And they're just going to rule over you.
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So chapter 14, verse 1, where God promises forgiveness now to his people.
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Return Israel to the Lord your God.
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Your sins have been your downfall.
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I will heal their waywardness and love them freely, for my anger has turned away from
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them.
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And then the book ends here with verse 9.
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Who is wise?
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Let them realize these things.
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Who is discerning?
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Let them understand.
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The ways of the Lord are right.
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The righteous walk in them.
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But the rebellious stumble in them.
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So we just read here a beautiful but painful story of how that Israel's idolatry was seen
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as adultery to their God.
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They had married him in the wilderness.
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He had made promises to them.
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They'd made promises to him.
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And so his heart is broken.
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And even when they began to repent, he said, what am I going to do?
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Because I know it's flitting like the morning dew.
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But then he pronounces to them, you know, a serious going to come rule over you.
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That's their judgment.
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But he always promises return.
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And at the end, the book ends with sort of like a subnote here, a footnote here.
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Like after everything you've read, who is wise?
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Realize these things.
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Understand these things.
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The way of the Lord is right.
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So that's the prophet Hosea.
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And then this week we read the prophet Amos.
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Now let me tell you about Amos.
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Amos is a shepherd from the south of Israel, the kingdom of Judah.
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He was a farmer, a fig tree farmer and a shepherd.
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And so he prophesied during the time of Jeroboam II in the north and of Uzziah in the south.
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He was king of Judah.
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And Amos was called of God specifically to go to the northern kingdom to Bethel and announce
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warnings.
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Now remember, Bethel is one of the two places that Jeroboam set up with the adulterated worship
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of God.
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So they had the golden calves there and they had this mix of worship.
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And so God tells him to go there.
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So he goes to Bethel and he stands there in the middle of Bethel and he calls out these
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condemnations and rebukes.
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And he explains in the book that one of the priests there kicked him out.
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One of the priests there went to the king and said, hey, this is what Amos is saying
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about you.
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And they kicked him out of Bethel.
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So Amos accuses Israel of breaking their covenant with God and highlights how their idolatry
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led to injustice and the neglect of the poor.
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So if you can picture this, Amos is probably a poor, simple shepherd and fig tree farmer.
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And he really has a heart for the everyday person.
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And so he really preaches about and against the oppression of the poor and the injustices.
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Remember now under Jeroboam II, the northern kingdom of Israel and the south to a degree
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are very prosperous.
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The northern kingdom is very wealthy and they have developed a whole upper class that's
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very wealthy and very pagan.
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And this is what Amos is taking issue with.
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He says, God is greed by the evils he sees in the people of Israel.
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But through his mercy that God is willing to give them another chance.
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And he rages against the lavish lives of the rich about the oppression of the poor, about
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poverty, about injustice.
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And it's interesting in 315 he refers to the houses of ivory.
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And remember last week I talked about they were bringing the ivory from Aram and the
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palace was full of it.
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They had ivory carvings on the walls.
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They have found so much ivory in the ruins of the palace there in Samaria.
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This absolutely has been proven archeologically.
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And Amos here talks about it.
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So now I just want to read to you from the last chapter of Amos chapter 9 starting with
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verse 7.
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Because it's a very interesting concept here after decrying all the sins of Israel then
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he begins to talk about how God loves the surrounding peoples and how that says here
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in verse 7, God is a God of all peoples.
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Surely the eyes of the sovereign Lord are on the sinful kingdom.
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I will destroy it from the face of the earth but you will not totally destroy the descendants
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of Jacob declares the Lord.
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So the Lord is saying here that the sinful kingdom is going to be destroyed but not all
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the descendants of Jacob.
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The people are going to live.
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Now in verse 9, for I will give the command and I will shake the people of Israel among
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all the nations as grain is shaken in a sieve and not a pebble will reach the ground.
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Verse 11, in that day I will restore David's fallen tabernacle.
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Now remember the house of David is in Judah.
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So he's saying here I'm going to restore the dynasty of David.
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David's fallen, it's the word Sukkot which means tabernacle and your NIV translated it
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shelter.
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I really prefer the New King James version that says tabernacle.
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I will restore David's fallen tabernacle.
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I will repair its broken walls and restore its ruins and rebuild it as it used to be
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so that they may possess the remnant of Edom and the nations that bear my name.
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The Gentiles who are called by my name says the Lord who will do these things.
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The days are coming declares the Lord when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowmen
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and the planter by the one treading grapes.
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New wine will drip from the mountains and flow from all the hills and I will bring my
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people Israel from exile.
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They will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them.
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They will plant vineyards and drink their wine and they will make gardens and eat their
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fruit.
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I will plant Israel in their own land never again to be uprooted from the land I have
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given them says the Lord your God.
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Now I want to back up and I want to explain this what we just read.
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He said in that day I am going to restore the fallen house tabernacle of David and we will
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rebuild it so that they can possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that are called
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after my name.
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So God has a heart for the Gentiles that are called after his name.
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We can read this in its historical context and think that that means the land of Edom
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and these lands next to the land that used to be under the Solomon's empire and all.
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When I read this I see in it something far more prophetic about God's going to raise
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up the house of David, the government of David, the dynasty of David again and he is going
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to join to it the Gentiles that are called after his name.
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Well who are the Gentiles that are called after his name?
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You and me, the body of Jesus.
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We are called after the name of the Lord and there is some kind of a future coming together
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here that the prophet Amos prophesied to.
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It's really quite mind blowing.
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And then he describes how that when they are restored to their land it's prosperous, it's
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a choice, it's the wine, the grapes, the hills, it's beautiful.
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The land comes back to life once its people are back in it and they are walking with their
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God.
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They are walking with their life to the land itself and he says, and they will rebuild
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the ruined cities and live in them.
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They will plant vineyards and drink their wine.
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They will make gardens and eat their fruit.
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I will plant Israel in their own land never again to be uprooted.
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So remember that.
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The people of Israel did return to the land after the Assyrian invasion but they were
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uprooted again.
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But today they are back in the land.
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And I believe now is when this word is going to be true.
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They are never to be uprooted again because God is about to do something amazing that
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brings all of this to a close.
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All of history is going to come to a close.
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They will never be uprooted from their land again.
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I believe that we are in the days of Amos 9.
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So now let's pick up our story.
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As I said, these two prophets began prophesying during Jeroboan II but after he died the northern
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kingdom just went into a spiral down really quickly.
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It got really bad.
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Their final king was Hosea and they were overtaken by the Assyrians.
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Down in the south, though, during this time of Jeroboan II, we had a king Uzziah.
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It is very interesting that during Uzziah's kingdom there was a major earthquake.
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And how do we know that?
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Well it was mentioned in Amos 11.
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It actually says, these are the words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa.
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The vision he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake when Uzziah was king
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of Judah and Jeroboan, son of Jehoash, was king of Israel.
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The same earthquake is mentioned also by the prophet Zechariah, which we will get to that
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in a later week, but Zechariah 14.5 refers to the earthquake in the days of Uzziah.
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According to archaeologists, they believe that the earthquake then was as high as an
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8.0 on the Richter scale.
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So that is a very, very bad earthquake.
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But it doesn't get much of a mention in our narrative, which is interesting.
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Uzziah reigned for 52 years, so his reign was a time of great stability for Judah and
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a time of prosperity.
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And it says of Uzziah in our narrative that actually he did right before the Lord and
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he sought the Lord.
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But it also says that the high places were not removed.
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So these ancient places of pagan worship were not removed even by Uzziah who was seeking
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the Lord and who has actually a favorable report here in our narrative.
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Uzziah was very powerful and he subdued the Philistines and the Arabs and the Ammonites.
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He had a very powerful army and Uzziah is mentioned in the writings of Tiglath Pileser,
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the third of the growing Assyrian Empire.
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And he describes how that in the very early years of Uzziah's reign that he led a rebellion
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against the Assyrians.
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And this is in their archives.
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Now Uzziah, who was a great king, you know, and this is a problem, these good kings even
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like Solomon, they kind of get full of themselves.
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And what does he do?
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He goes into the temple and he begins doing things that only the priesthood should do.
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And it kind of showed his arrogance.
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He's King Uzziah.
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He can do whatever he wants to.
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So he went into the temple and he overstepped his bounds and God had to judge him.
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And he didn't strike him down, but he struck him with a skin disease, which is called leprosy,
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in the translation.
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And so he can no longer reign and his son Jotham ends up co-raining with Uzziah until Uzziah
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dies and then Jotham is the sole king of the southern kingdom.
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So now during this time, we have another prophet that begins to preach.
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And this prophet, his book is so long and he preaches for so many years that we're actually
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going to cover him for the next three weeks.
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So all I'm going to do today is give you just a little bit of introduction to the great
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writing prophet Isaiah as we will be talking about him much more in the coming weeks.
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So Isaiah lived in Judah and he prophesied in Jerusalem under King Uzziah and his son
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Jotham and then his successor Ahaz and also Hezekiah.
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He saw Assyria come down and take the north and he was warning the north of what was coming.
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And then he began to warn Judah.
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And Judah now is in a very precarious situation, you understand.
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Assyria is about to also take Judah.
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And so Judah has to decide, do we go to Egypt for safety?
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What do we do?
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And so Isaiah is speaking into this to King Uzziah exactly what to do.
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And he warns him, don't go to Egypt.
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And so now the book of Isaiah is just an amazing book.
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Isaiah is like a mini Bible.
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And I don't know if you've ever thought about this, but Isaiah has 66 chapters and your
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Bible has 66 books in it.
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And Isaiah, the first 39 chapters of Isaiah are completely different in tone and everything
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to chapters 40 through 66.
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So the first 39 chapters of the book of Isaiah can be compared to the 39 books of the Old
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Testament.
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There is where they're dealing with sin and judgment and what God is beckoning his people
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and warning his people.
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That is the 39 books of the Old Testament, the 39 chapters of Isaiah.
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Then in Isaiah 40, all of a sudden it completely changed tone.
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And it says, Comfort ye, my people, says the Lord, speak tenderly to Jerusalem.
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And then it begins to proclaim God's love to his people and how he's going to restore
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them.
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And we can compare then the next 27 chapters of Isaiah to the 27 books of the New Testament,
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which open up with the heralding of the coming of Jesus as a baby and his life and how God
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is dealing with the world sort of in a different way.
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So I mean, that in itself is absolutely phenomenal.
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I know someone, a colleague of mine, actually, he used to work with us.
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And Isaiah, the book of Isaiah was a major influencer in his life.
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And he tells the story of how that one night he walked down to the Western Wall there in
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Jerusalem, he was really struggling with the Lord over some things, and he just sat there
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and all night long just read the entire book of Isaiah.
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So it really turned around his life.
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And so he teaches a lot out of Isaiah.
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And I heard him say this, so I'm quoting him, that Isaiah is, the book of Isaiah is a bit
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like an orchestra.
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It's like a symphony.
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And if you can imagine, it's not a good sound chronological read.
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It's like you've got your winds and you've got your strings and you've got your percussion
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and you hear the wind instruments and then you hear the percussion and then you hear
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the strings and then you're back at the winds.
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So you're dealing with all of these waves of warning and of judgment and of restoration
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and of hope.
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And it keeps kind of going back and forth.
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And so I love this picture of the orchestra.
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It really helps me deal with these writings of the prophetic books because they're not
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chronological.
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A lot of them are thematic and you are.
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You're just hearing these different refrains over and over.
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But wow, are they powerful?
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You know the book, Isaiah, the name of the book after the prophet, his name means that
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God is our salvation.
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And what a beautiful name for this book.
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So this week we began to read more about Judah's sin and a little bit more of an emphasis on
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Judah because the North is declining rapidly.
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It's not all over yet.
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We'll get there next week.
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But now we have the book of Chronicles written by the priest, kicks in.
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They've got a lot more detail on what's going on in the southern kingdom of Judah.
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And we have the prophet Isaiah and so much that we can glean from him about the southern
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kingdom of Judah.
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So that's what we begin reading into by the end of this week.
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And then next week we will be more into the book of Isaiah.
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And I have a very special guest.
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I'm not going to announce today who it is, but either next week or the week after, we're
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going to do a going deeper segment on the book of Isaiah with a very special guest.
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There's so much we can talk about with this lovely book.
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And so enjoy reading it and we'll see you back here next week.
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And until then, God bless.
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We hope you have enjoyed this episode of Out of Zion with Susan Michael.
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Be sure to subscribe to Out of Zion now on Apple Podcasts, cpnshows.com, YouTube, or
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wherever you like to listen and learn.
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00:28:43,200 --> 00:29:01,160
Out of Zion with Susan Michael is a production of ICEJ USA All Rights Reserved.
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Welcome to Walk Through the Bible, Susan Michael's 12-month journey through the most exciting
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00:00:06,180 --> 00:00:07,680
book on the planet.
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00:00:07,680 --> 00:00:10,680
It will transform your life one page at a time.
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Be sure to subscribe for future episodes that will ignite your faith and bring your Bible
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00:00:15,140 --> 00:00:16,140
to life.
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Now, let's join our host, Susan Michael.
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Well, hey there and welcome back.
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This is Walk Through the Bible Week 25.
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This week we are reading in our daily Bible pages 762-803 or what's dated June 18-24
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in the daily Bible.
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I have entitled this week, God's Love for His Wayward People.
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What an encouraging word this is for all of us, even though it's a very painful history.
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It's a painful story, but that at the end of the day is what it's all about.
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So now this week we are going to be reading about two prophets that prophesied during
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the reign of Jeroboam II.
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As I explained last week, the reign of Jeroboam II was like the highlight of the northern
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kingdom of Israel.
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They were very strong, very wealthy, very prosperous on the outside, doing great during
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Jeroboam's reign, but on the inside they were very sick.
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And this is why the prophets then began to cry out about the sins and the idolatry of
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the people of the north.
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Now after the death of Jeroboam II, which we'll talk about after we go through these
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prophets this week, but after the death of Jeroboam II, the northern kingdom of Israel
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fell into a twenty year period of very serious, very fast decline coming to their very end
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when the Assyrian Empire invaded.
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So we're getting towards the end of our history of the northern kingdom of Israel, but very
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much this week in the midst of it here in this reign of Jeroboam II.
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So now let's talk about the first prophet, Hosea.
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Hosea is the only writing prophet that lived in the northern kingdom of Israel.
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And so he prophesied during the kingdom of Jeroboam II and afterwards during that twenty
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years of decline.
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And this would also be during the southern kingdom of Judah, during the king of Uzziah
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and all the way through to Hezekiah.
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So he preached for about twenty five years.
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His writings in his book are not chronological.
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So that makes it a little hard on our chronological read through because they're more thematic.
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And parts may reflect the chaos that was going on in the northern kingdom after the
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death of Jeroboam II.
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So you know, at this point in our story it's been a hundred and fifty years that God has
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been waiting for the northern kingdom of Israel to get their act together and put away the
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idolatry and they still haven't.
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It's been a hundred and fifty years.
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And King Jeroboam II is one of the worst kings.
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He grew very apathetic.
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He allowed idol worship to run amok and he opened the doorway for the Israelites to cheat
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still.
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Sex was crazy.
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Murder was crazy.
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All of this is an outcome of paganism.
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You have to understand.
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If they were living according to the laws of the God of Israel, this wouldn't be taking
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place.
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Paganism allowed for certain things that then just opened the door in society.
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So you know, the people were growing cold and distant.
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They'd forgotten about the God of Israel, the God of their first love, the God who had
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married them in the desert.
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They probably didn't even know about the laws and the commandments of Moses.
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Everyone was just really taking over.
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So Hosea teaches that God does not forget Israel even in their self-destruction.
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And he teaches us that love is the strongest force of all over sin.
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He reminds us that Israel is the bride of the Lord and he does it in a very unique way.
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According to the way it reads, God instructs him to go and marry a prostitute.
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And then his life, the life of the prophet, is going to live out this life that God is
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living with an unfaithful wife of Israel.
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So I want to read to you some sections beginning here with Hosea 2, verse 13.
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It says, I will punish her for the days she burned incense to the bails.
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She decked herself with rings and jewelry and went after her lovers.
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But me she forgot, declares the Lord.
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You see, he takes it very personally.
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Verse 14, therefore I am not going to allure her.
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Therefore I am now going to allure her.
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I will lead her into the wilderness and speak tenderly to her.
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Verse 15, there she will respond as in the days of her youth, as in the days when she
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came out of Egypt.
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In that day, declares the Lord, you will call me my husband and will no longer call me my
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master.
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Then skipping down to chapter 4, verses 12, talking about how idolatry is adultery in
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the Lord's eyes.
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So starting here with the last half of the verse 12, my people consult a wooden idol and
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a diviner's rod speaks to them.
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A spirit of prostitution leads them astray.
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They are unfaithful to their God.
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They sacrifice on the mountaintops and burn offerings on the hills.
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So he is describing their idolatry here and how he sees it as adultery.
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Then going down to chapter 6, verse 1, where Israel begins to repent, says, Come, let us
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return to the Lord.
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Verse 4, what can I do with you Ephraim?
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What can I do with you Judah?
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Your love is like the morning mist, like the early dew that disappears.
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So God is saying here, I hear your words of return, but it's just going to disappear immediately.
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What am I going to do with you?
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You're like the dew in the morning, it's gone as soon as the sun comes out.
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So then down to chapter 11, verse 1, about God's love for Israel.
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When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.
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But the more they were called, the more they went away from me.
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They sacrificed to the Baals and they burned incense to images.
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And then verse 5, he knows it's going to come to this.
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The Assyrian will rule over him.
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God is predicting here through the prophet.
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A serious coming.
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And they're just going to rule over you.
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So chapter 14, verse 1, where God promises forgiveness now to his people.
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Return Israel to the Lord your God.
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Your sins have been your downfall.
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I will heal their waywardness and love them freely, for my anger has turned away from
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them.
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And then the book ends here with verse 9.
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Who is wise?
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Let them realize these things.
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Who is discerning?
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Let them understand.
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The ways of the Lord are right.
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The righteous walk in them.
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But the rebellious stumble in them.
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So we just read here a beautiful but painful story of how that Israel's idolatry was seen
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as adultery to their God.
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They had married him in the wilderness.
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He had made promises to them.
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They'd made promises to him.
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And so his heart is broken.
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And even when they began to repent, he said, what am I going to do?
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Because I know it's flitting like the morning dew.
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But then he pronounces to them, you know, a serious going to come rule over you.
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That's their judgment.
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But he always promises return.
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And at the end, the book ends with sort of like a subnote here, a footnote here.
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Like after everything you've read, who is wise?
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Realize these things.
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Understand these things.
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The way of the Lord is right.
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So that's the prophet Hosea.
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And then this week we read the prophet Amos.
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Now let me tell you about Amos.
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Amos is a shepherd from the south of Israel, the kingdom of Judah.
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He was a farmer, a fig tree farmer and a shepherd.
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And so he prophesied during the time of Jeroboam II in the north and of Uzziah in the south.
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He was king of Judah.
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And Amos was called of God specifically to go to the northern kingdom to Bethel and announce
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warnings.
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Now remember, Bethel is one of the two places that Jeroboam set up with the adulterated worship
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of God.
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So they had the golden calves there and they had this mix of worship.
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And so God tells him to go there.
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So he goes to Bethel and he stands there in the middle of Bethel and he calls out these
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condemnations and rebukes.
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And he explains in the book that one of the priests there kicked him out.
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One of the priests there went to the king and said, hey, this is what Amos is saying
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about you.
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And they kicked him out of Bethel.
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So Amos accuses Israel of breaking their covenant with God and highlights how their idolatry
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led to injustice and the neglect of the poor.
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So if you can picture this, Amos is probably a poor, simple shepherd and fig tree farmer.
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And he really has a heart for the everyday person.
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And so he really preaches about and against the oppression of the poor and the injustices.
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Remember now under Jeroboam II, the northern kingdom of Israel and the south to a degree
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are very prosperous.
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The northern kingdom is very wealthy and they have developed a whole upper class that's
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very wealthy and very pagan.
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And this is what Amos is taking issue with.
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He says, God is greed by the evils he sees in the people of Israel.
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But through his mercy that God is willing to give them another chance.
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And he rages against the lavish lives of the rich about the oppression of the poor, about
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poverty, about injustice.
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And it's interesting in 315 he refers to the houses of ivory.
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And remember last week I talked about they were bringing the ivory from Aram and the
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palace was full of it.
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They had ivory carvings on the walls.
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They have found so much ivory in the ruins of the palace there in Samaria.
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This absolutely has been proven archeologically.
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And Amos here talks about it.
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So now I just want to read to you from the last chapter of Amos chapter 9 starting with
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verse 7.
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Because it's a very interesting concept here after decrying all the sins of Israel then
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he begins to talk about how God loves the surrounding peoples and how that says here
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in verse 7, God is a God of all peoples.
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Surely the eyes of the sovereign Lord are on the sinful kingdom.
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I will destroy it from the face of the earth but you will not totally destroy the descendants
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of Jacob declares the Lord.
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So the Lord is saying here that the sinful kingdom is going to be destroyed but not all
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the descendants of Jacob.
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The people are going to live.
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Now in verse 9, for I will give the command and I will shake the people of Israel among
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all the nations as grain is shaken in a sieve and not a pebble will reach the ground.
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Verse 11, in that day I will restore David's fallen tabernacle.
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Now remember the house of David is in Judah.
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So he's saying here I'm going to restore the dynasty of David.
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David's fallen, it's the word Sukkot which means tabernacle and your NIV translated it
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shelter.
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I really prefer the New King James version that says tabernacle.
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I will restore David's fallen tabernacle.
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I will repair its broken walls and restore its ruins and rebuild it as it used to be
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so that they may possess the remnant of Edom and the nations that bear my name.
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The Gentiles who are called by my name says the Lord who will do these things.
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The days are coming declares the Lord when the reaper will be overtaken by the plowmen
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and the planter by the one treading grapes.
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New wine will drip from the mountains and flow from all the hills and I will bring my
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people Israel from exile.
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They will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them.
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They will plant vineyards and drink their wine and they will make gardens and eat their
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fruit.
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I will plant Israel in their own land never again to be uprooted from the land I have
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given them says the Lord your God.
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Now I want to back up and I want to explain this what we just read.
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He said in that day I am going to restore the fallen house tabernacle of David and we will
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rebuild it so that they can possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations that are called
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after my name.
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So God has a heart for the Gentiles that are called after his name.
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We can read this in its historical context and think that that means the land of Edom
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and these lands next to the land that used to be under the Solomon's empire and all.
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When I read this I see in it something far more prophetic about God's going to raise
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up the house of David, the government of David, the dynasty of David again and he is going
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to join to it the Gentiles that are called after his name.
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Well who are the Gentiles that are called after his name?
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You and me, the body of Jesus.
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We are called after the name of the Lord and there is some kind of a future coming together
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here that the prophet Amos prophesied to.
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It's really quite mind blowing.
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And then he describes how that when they are restored to their land it's prosperous, it's
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a choice, it's the wine, the grapes, the hills, it's beautiful.
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The land comes back to life once its people are back in it and they are walking with their
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God.
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They are walking with their life to the land itself and he says, and they will rebuild
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the ruined cities and live in them.
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They will plant vineyards and drink their wine.
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They will make gardens and eat their fruit.
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I will plant Israel in their own land never again to be uprooted.
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So remember that.
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The people of Israel did return to the land after the Assyrian invasion but they were
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uprooted again.
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But today they are back in the land.
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And I believe now is when this word is going to be true.
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They are never to be uprooted again because God is about to do something amazing that
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brings all of this to a close.
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All of history is going to come to a close.
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They will never be uprooted from their land again.
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I believe that we are in the days of Amos 9.
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So now let's pick up our story.
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As I said, these two prophets began prophesying during Jeroboan II but after he died the northern
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kingdom just went into a spiral down really quickly.
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It got really bad.
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Their final king was Hosea and they were overtaken by the Assyrians.
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Down in the south, though, during this time of Jeroboan II, we had a king Uzziah.
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It is very interesting that during Uzziah's kingdom there was a major earthquake.
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And how do we know that?
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Well it was mentioned in Amos 11.
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It actually says, these are the words of Amos, one of the shepherds of Tekoa.
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The vision he saw concerning Israel two years before the earthquake when Uzziah was king
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of Judah and Jeroboan, son of Jehoash, was king of Israel.
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The same earthquake is mentioned also by the prophet Zechariah, which we will get to that
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in a later week, but Zechariah 14.5 refers to the earthquake in the days of Uzziah.
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According to archaeologists, they believe that the earthquake then was as high as an
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8.0 on the Richter scale.
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So that is a very, very bad earthquake.
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But it doesn't get much of a mention in our narrative, which is interesting.
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Uzziah reigned for 52 years, so his reign was a time of great stability for Judah and
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a time of prosperity.
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And it says of Uzziah in our narrative that actually he did right before the Lord and
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he sought the Lord.
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But it also says that the high places were not removed.
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So these ancient places of pagan worship were not removed even by Uzziah who was seeking
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the Lord and who has actually a favorable report here in our narrative.
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Uzziah was very powerful and he subdued the Philistines and the Arabs and the Ammonites.
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He had a very powerful army and Uzziah is mentioned in the writings of Tiglath Pileser,
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the third of the growing Assyrian Empire.
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And he describes how that in the very early years of Uzziah's reign that he led a rebellion
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against the Assyrians.
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And this is in their archives.
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Now Uzziah, who was a great king, you know, and this is a problem, these good kings even
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like Solomon, they kind of get full of themselves.
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And what does he do?
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He goes into the temple and he begins doing things that only the priesthood should do.
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And it kind of showed his arrogance.
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He's King Uzziah.
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He can do whatever he wants to.
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So he went into the temple and he overstepped his bounds and God had to judge him.
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And he didn't strike him down, but he struck him with a skin disease, which is called leprosy,
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in the translation.
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And so he can no longer reign and his son Jotham ends up co-raining with Uzziah until Uzziah
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dies and then Jotham is the sole king of the southern kingdom.
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So now during this time, we have another prophet that begins to preach.
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And this prophet, his book is so long and he preaches for so many years that we're actually
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going to cover him for the next three weeks.
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So all I'm going to do today is give you just a little bit of introduction to the great
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writing prophet Isaiah as we will be talking about him much more in the coming weeks.
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So Isaiah lived in Judah and he prophesied in Jerusalem under King Uzziah and his son
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Jotham and then his successor Ahaz and also Hezekiah.
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He saw Assyria come down and take the north and he was warning the north of what was coming.
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And then he began to warn Judah.
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And Judah now is in a very precarious situation, you understand.
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Assyria is about to also take Judah.
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And so Judah has to decide, do we go to Egypt for safety?
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What do we do?
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And so Isaiah is speaking into this to King Uzziah exactly what to do.
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And he warns him, don't go to Egypt.
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And so now the book of Isaiah is just an amazing book.
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Isaiah is like a mini Bible.
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And I don't know if you've ever thought about this, but Isaiah has 66 chapters and your
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Bible has 66 books in it.
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And Isaiah, the first 39 chapters of Isaiah are completely different in tone and everything
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to chapters 40 through 66.
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So the first 39 chapters of the book of Isaiah can be compared to the 39 books of the Old
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Testament.
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There is where they're dealing with sin and judgment and what God is beckoning his people
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and warning his people.
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That is the 39 books of the Old Testament, the 39 chapters of Isaiah.
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Then in Isaiah 40, all of a sudden it completely changed tone.
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And it says, Comfort ye, my people, says the Lord, speak tenderly to Jerusalem.
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And then it begins to proclaim God's love to his people and how he's going to restore
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them.
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And we can compare then the next 27 chapters of Isaiah to the 27 books of the New Testament,
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which open up with the heralding of the coming of Jesus as a baby and his life and how God
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is dealing with the world sort of in a different way.
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So I mean, that in itself is absolutely phenomenal.
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I know someone, a colleague of mine, actually, he used to work with us.
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And Isaiah, the book of Isaiah was a major influencer in his life.
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And he tells the story of how that one night he walked down to the Western Wall there in
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Jerusalem, he was really struggling with the Lord over some things, and he just sat there
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and all night long just read the entire book of Isaiah.
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So it really turned around his life.
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And so he teaches a lot out of Isaiah.
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And I heard him say this, so I'm quoting him, that Isaiah is, the book of Isaiah is a bit
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like an orchestra.
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It's like a symphony.
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And if you can imagine, it's not a good sound chronological read.
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It's like you've got your winds and you've got your strings and you've got your percussion
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and you hear the wind instruments and then you hear the percussion and then you hear
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the strings and then you're back at the winds.
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So you're dealing with all of these waves of warning and of judgment and of restoration
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and of hope.
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And it keeps kind of going back and forth.
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And so I love this picture of the orchestra.
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It really helps me deal with these writings of the prophetic books because they're not
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chronological.
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A lot of them are thematic and you are.
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You're just hearing these different refrains over and over.
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But wow, are they powerful?
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You know the book, Isaiah, the name of the book after the prophet, his name means that
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God is our salvation.
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And what a beautiful name for this book.
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So this week we began to read more about Judah's sin and a little bit more of an emphasis on
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Judah because the North is declining rapidly.
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It's not all over yet.
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We'll get there next week.
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But now we have the book of Chronicles written by the priest, kicks in.
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They've got a lot more detail on what's going on in the southern kingdom of Judah.
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And we have the prophet Isaiah and so much that we can glean from him about the southern
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kingdom of Judah.
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So that's what we begin reading into by the end of this week.
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And then next week we will be more into the book of Isaiah.
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And I have a very special guest.
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I'm not going to announce today who it is, but either next week or the week after, we're
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going to do a going deeper segment on the book of Isaiah with a very special guest.
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There's so much we can talk about with this lovely book.
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And so enjoy reading it and we'll see you back here next week.
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And until then, God bless.
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We hope you have enjoyed this episode of Out of Zion with Susan Michael.
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Be sure to subscribe to Out of Zion now on Apple Podcasts, cpnshows.com, YouTube, or
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wherever you like to listen and learn.
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Out of Zion with Susan Michael is a production of ICEJ USA All Rights Reserved.
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