The message of the Old Testament prophet Amos is particularly relevant to us as Americans. His ministry to the ten tribes of Northern Israel was conducted in an environment much like ours at present.  For example, it was a time of great prosperity and religious fervency, but also a time of religious hypocrisy, moral perversity, and social inequity. It was a time of national security in which Israel never felt safer within her borders.  In the words of Charles Dickens, as he typified the conditions of France at the time of the Revolution: “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.”  That is much like the condition we are living in America - the best of times and the worst of times.

The message of Amos, though humbling and frightening, is also a message filled with hope. The Prophet does not just point out the flaws and failures of his country, but directs them toward biblical solutions.  His message stands as a continual rebuke to formalism, materialism, sensualism, and relativism.  He calls for repentance, a commitment to obedience, and a compassionate working out of our faith in daily life which will produce genuine productivity.

If Amos were delivering his message to America, he would center it around five main thoughts.  First of all, Amos would point out to America, as he did to his own beloved country:

The Nations Foundational Shift

The nation of Israel is charged with a shift in world views.  As he points out this foundational shift in their philosophy of life and government, the first thing he calls to their attention is that they have forgotten their godly heritage. Amos 2:10,11: “I brought you up out of Egypt, I led you forty years in the desert to give you the land of the Amorites. I also raised up prophets from among your sons and Nazarites from among your young men. Is this not true, people of Israel, declares the Lord.”

Amos 3:2: “You only have I chosen of all the families (that is, families of nations) of the earth, therefore I will punish you for all of your sins.” The nation of Israel had a unique position. God has known them, that is, he has chosen them, covenanted with them, and conversed with them as His acquaintance. God was saying to His chosen people: "I have taken no other people to be my own people. I have approved of you, loved you, fed, sustained, and defended you; but because you have forsaken me, have become idolatrous and polluted, therefore will I punish you. And the punishment shall be in proportion to the privileges you have enjoyed, and the grace you have abused."

Amos 6:4-6: “You lie on beds of ivory and lounge on your couches. You dine on choice lambs and fattened calves. You strum away on your harps like David and improvise on musical instruments. You drink wine by the bowlful and use the finest lotions, but you do not grieve over the ruin of Joseph.” They were experiencing unparalleled prosperity. Yet a very subtle, but radical, shift had taken place in their life and worldview. They had left their godly heritage.

Like ancient Israel, America was founded by God-fearing men who left us a godly heritage.  When we talk in terms of the founding of America, we are not referring to the year 1776.  This country was in existence as a nation 200 years before independence from England was won. When one examines our early history, their is incontrovertible proof of a godly heritage.

On July 4, 1821, John Quincy Adams declared: “The highest glory of the American Revolution was this.  It connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity.”

Noah Webster, speaking in 1833, said, “The religion which has introduced civil liberty is the religion of Christ and His Apostles and to this we owe our free constitution of government.”

In 1820 Daniel Webster was chosen orator for the epic celebrations in Plymouth, Massachusetts, commemorating the Pilgrims' bicentennial landing.  He eloquently uttered:  “More than all a government and country whereto commenced with the very first foundations laid under the divine right of the Christian religion. ...Our fathers were brought here by their high veneration for the Christian religion.  They journeyed by its light, labored in its hope, and sought to incorporate its principles with the elements of their society and to diffuse its influence through all their institutions, civil, political, as well as literary.  Let us cherish these sentiments and extend this influence still more and widely in the full conviction that it is the happiest society which partakes in the highest degree of the mild and peaceable spirit of Christianity.”

In 1892, in the case of The Church of the Holy Trinity versus the United States, the Supreme Court declared: “Our laws and our institutions must necessarily be based upon and embody the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind.  It is impossible that it should be otherwise and in this extent and to this sense our civilization and our institutions are emphatically Christian.  This is a religious people.  This is historically true.  From the discovery of this continent to the present hour, there is a single voice making this affirmation. We find everywhere a clear recognition of the same truth.  These and many other matters which might be noticed add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation.”

In 1931, Justice George Sutherland reviewed the 1892 opinion and reaffirmed the finding that, “We are a Christian people...acknowledging with reverence the duty of obedience to the will of God.”

Writing on the First Amendment, Justice Joseph Story commented: “Probably at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, and of the first amendment to it... the general if not the universal sentiment in America was that Christianity ought to receive encouragement by the state so far as was not discouraged with the private rights of conscience and the freedom of religious worship. Any attempt to level all religions, and to make it a matter of state policy to hold all in utter indifference, would have created universal disapprobation, if not universal indignation....”

Up to the time of the drafting of the Constitution and beyond, state laws forbade anyone from holding office unless he was a Christian. As late as 1864, the Maryland Constitution required that a citizen desiring a public office must have declared “belief in the Christian religion or of the existence of God and in a future state of rewards and punishment.” In New Hampshire, a requirement that senators and representatives should be of the Protestant religion remained in force until 1877.

We have a godly heritage. One must be considered and enemy of Christ as well as America, who attempts to denude and deny us our Christian heritage. Someone said, “Those who demean their heritage, deny their future.” Who among us can deny that there has been a radical foundational shift. We have forgotten our godly heritage!

The nation of Israel had not only forgotten their godly heritage, but they followed after ungodly humanism (Amos 5:26). Humanism is not a modern worldview. The belief that man is the sum, substance and center of all things; that he is the final authority, the master of his fate, the author of his own destiny, the maker of all laws, and not answerable to anyone, is as old as the human race itself.

In Amos 5:26, we read, “You have lifted up the shrine of your king, the pedestal of your idols, the star of your god, which you made for yourselves.” Handmade, homemade and self-made gods were the results of Israel's embracing humanism.  Reduced to its least common denominator, humanism is the worship of self -- the belief that man is ultimate.  The people of Amos' day underwent a change of loyalties due to their change of lords. When a nation experiences a change of lords or religious faith, there will inevitably follow a change of the laws that govern them. The burning issue of Amos' day was that of authority or Lordship. Whose laws were to govern the nation? All laws are but reflections of the religious faith of the people who comprise that nation.  Just as was true in the times of Amos the prophet, likewise the question of all questions in this hour in America is, “Who is in charge?”  Who is lord and sovereign?  Is it men? Is the government God or is there a God in Heaven who rules over the affairs of men, personally, intimately, actively, presently, pervasively, and continually?

It is obvious that there has been a change of loyalties in this country. The shift has occurred very subtly and slowly, but very successfully.  We have been unloosed from the moorings of our godly heritage. We have changed lords and loyalties and the result is we are seeing it reflected in our laws. This is well documented as early as 1876 by Princeton Seminaries eminent professor, Charles Hodge, when he wrote, “When Protestant Christians came to this country they possessed and subdued the land, They worshipped God, and His Son Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world, and acknowledged the Scriptures to be the rule of their faith and practice. The introduced their religion into their families, their schools, and their colleges. They abstained from all ordinary business on the Lord's Day, and devoted it to religion. They built churches, erected school-houses, and taught their children to read the Bible and to receive and obey it as the Word of God. They formed themselves as Christians into municipal and state organizations. They acknowledged God in their legislative assemblies. They prescribed oaths to be taken in His name. They closed their courts, their places of business, their legislatures, and all places under the public control, on the Lord's Day. They declared Christianity to be part of the common law of the land.

In the process of time, thousands have come among us, who are neither Protestants nor Christians...All are welcomed; all are admitted to equal rights and privileges. All are allowed to acquire property, and to vote in every election, made eligible to all offices, and invested with equal influence in all public affairs. All are allowed to worship as they please are not worship at all, if they see fit. No man is molested for his religion or for his want of religion. No man is required to profess any form of faith, or to join any religious association. More than this cannot be reasonable demanded. More, however is demanded. The infidel demands that the government should be conducted on the principle that Christianity is false. The atheist demands that it be conducted on the assumption that there is no God, and the positivist on the principle that men are not free agents. The sufficient answer to all this is that it cannot possibly be done.:

R. J. Rushdoony, pointed out the myth of neutral or value free law: “Behind every law system there is a god.  If the source of law is the individual, you make up your own rules, then you are the god of that system.  If the god of that system is the courts, then they are the source of law and there is none higher in their opinion.  If there is no higher law than man, then man is his own god.”

One frequently encounters statements like: “Well, you can't legislate morality.”  This statement overlooks the truth that every law is the imposing of someone's values and concepts of morality upon someone else. The question is whose laws, whose morality, and whose values are going to employed in the writing of our laws?  Religious and political pluralism is possible only during a brief transitional period. The intermediate period may appear to be a desirable and workable situation but it is only a temporary lull in the ideological and spiritual warfare. One, and only one faith, will eventually dominate all others.

Pluralism refers to a diversity of religions, worldviews, and ideologies existing at one time in a society. It presupposes that all religions are equally valid or invalid. Jesus is, at least in the public arena, to be put on the same level with Buddha, Mohammed, Krishna, and all other masters or gurus of different religious persuasions.

What we Americans fail to understand is that the present, temporary ability of various philosophical and religious beliefs to live together in a comparative harmony that we call pluralism, could and did arise only in a society where there was a considerable unity of opinion on basic values: which is exactly what existed in the early history of our country.

Douglas Groothius, in his book, “The Unmasking of the New Age”,  states concerning the myth of pluralism, “...that while the Christian majority of America's early history did not suppress divergent views, it did not at least until the present century, accord divergent views the right to suppress it and to eradicate it from all expressions in public law and life. As things now stand, pluralism means that the majority tradition, (Christianity) which could contribute to the shaping of the public policy with the least damage to the largest number of citizens, is precisely the one that must not be expressed.”

We naive Christians forget that we have been dropped into a spiritual and ideological war zone in which all the participants are locked into a life and death conflict. Dorothy Sayer spelled out this fact coldly and clearly: “Christendom and heathendom now stand face to face... The people who say that this is a war of economics or of power-politics, are only dabbling about on the surface of things. ...At the bottom is a violent an irreconcilable quarrel about the nature of God and the nature of man and the ultimate nature of the universe; it is a war of dogma (dogma is a system of belief).”

Dare anyone assert that our government is neutral toward religion when it bans the Bible and prayer from the classroom while permitting Hinduism to be taught through Transcendental Meditation and Yoga practices. It outlaws the teaching of creation while mandating the teaching of evolution which is one of the primary tenets of many faiths including Unitarianism, Zen Buddhism, Satanism, Hinduism, religious and secular humanism and many more.

Now back to Amos. Here are the steps that a nation takes when it experiences a shift in its principles of government.

First, there is religious syncretism.

Religious syncretism is a leveling of all faith. All religions are supposedly equal. In Amos 5:26 the people are charged with apostasy, which is a willful and deliberate rejection of the person of God and a turning to self-made gods whose power is demonic in nature.

When men turn from the true God, the end result is a turning to occultism, Satanism and demonism in a quest for power.

In chapter 6:1, we see the people had become apathetic. “Woe to you who are at ease( or complacent and apathetic) in Zion.” Zion here represents the people of God and the place of God's manifest presence.

In spite of their apathy and apostasy, attendance at the religious services had never been better. However chapter 8:1 reveals the attitude that prevailed in the hearts of those who were in regular attendance.  “When will the new moon be over that we may sell grain and the Sabbath be ended that we may market wheat, skimping the measure, boosting the price, cheating with dishonest scales, buying the poor with silver and the needy for a pair of sandals, selling even the sweepings with the wheat?” Religious fervency was nothing more than a mask for their hypocrisy.

There was apathy, apostasy, and an amalgamation of all religions which resulted in an attack upon the those who held to the true faith.  Amos 7:12,  “Amaziah said to Amos the prophet, “Get out you seer,( you prophet or preacher.)  Go back to the land of Judah.  Earn your bread there and do your prophesying there. Don't prophesy anymore at Bethel because this is the king's sanctuary and the temple of the kingdom.”  In other words, “Get out.  We don't want to hear what you have to say.”

Religious syncretism degenerates into moral relativism.

In the days of Amos, the rich were oppressing the poor, the courts were controlled by bribes, and political leaders were emphasizing military might over godliness as a means of security. Money-making and personal covetousness ruled all: the men lived for their offices (8:5), the women lived for excitement (4:1), and the rulers lived for frivolity (6:1-6).

The results of a recent national survey concluded that “this study is a disturbing portrait of a nation without a common morality...Americans are making their own rules and laws."  Among other findings, the survey discovered that:

One fifth of the nation's children have lost their virginity by the age of 13.

Nearly one third of all married Americans have had an affair.

Only one in three people lists “love” as the reason they married.

Same sex marriage is becoming the law of the land.

For a large sum of money 25 percent of Americans would abandon their families, and for the same amount 7 percent would kill a stranger.

Moral relativism leads inevitably to extreme materialism.

Amos 3:15: “I will tear down the winter house along with the summer house; the houses adorned with ivory will be destroyed, and the mansions will be demolished.” A great number of the Israelites were so wealthy they had a winter and summer home. The fact that their homes were inlaid with ivory reveals that they were mansions.

Why are the laws at the present so different from the laws upon which America was founded? Why are they becoming so anti-Christian? The reason is because we have changed lords and loyalties. This shift is manifested in a religious syncretism, moral relativism, and extreme materialism.

Originally, the theological position of the government in America was not in anyway religiously neutral. Instead it was pro-God, pro-Christianity, pro-Bible, pro-morality, pro-family, and pro-church.  An atheist could live in America during the first 275 years of our history and believe in atheism. But he could not implement his beliefs into government policy. He could leave a prayer meeting. He didn't have to attend one. However, he could not get laws passed to stop one.  He didn't have to use the coins that had “In God We Trust” stamped on them but he could not force the government to remove it from the coins because of a supposed violation of the separation of church and state. While he did not have to believe the Bible, he still was required to take his oath for public office on it.  While he could close his eyes and refuse to look at the Bible verses on public buildings, he could not remove them.

Yet today in America, government is anti-Christ, anti-God, anti-church, anti-Bible, pro-atheistic secular humanism. These are the foundations upon which laws are made and administered. None of today's policies are religiously neutral. They are all theological positions. Present government is pro-death (not pro-choice), in respect to the unborn. It is pro-homosexuality and thus anti-family.  It is pro-evolution and thus anti-God.

Godless communism, Christ-less socialism, atheistic liberalism and conversativism are all given precedence over Christianity. Eastern mysticism, demonism, and new-age syncretism have become the new god-makers.  God is expunged from our history, barred from the classroom, banned from the public arenas, and blasted and blasphemed on every media outlet. His name is taken in vain; His Son is tempted and tarred with vices; His word is voided; His church is no longer venerated. His servants are persecuted; His people are ridiculed and caricatured. One is not permitted to stand in a public arena and be critical of the Jews without being labeled anti-Semitic. To dare be critical of any minority will result in your being labeled a racist. Yet one can ridicule, caricature, and joke about anything and everything that Christians hold sacred and it is not labeled anti-Christ or Christian but is considered the exercising one's First Amendment right's of freedom of speech.

If Amos were allowed to speak to America as he did to ancient Israel, his second word would point out:

The Nation's Flagrant Sins

A. They lived for pleasure

Amos 2:6-8: “For three sins of Israel, even for four I will not turn back my wrath. They sell the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals; they trample on the heads of the poor upon the dust of the ground, deny justice to the oppressed; father and son use the same girl and so profane My Holy Name; they lie down beside every altar on garments taken in pleasure. In the house of their god they drink wine taken as fines.” The people of Amos' day lived for personal pleasure and the accumulation of material treasures.  They were totally self- centered.

Dennis Peacocke aptly summed up the results of self-centered living: “When our lives center on personal pleasure and convenience and when our life goal is to discover every nook and cranny of our on wonderful little selves, Tyranny emerges. Preoccupation with “self” will turn everybody and everything else into objects whose only worth is in their ability to satisfy our selfish urges. ... In the world of self-actualization and self-centered universes, self is “God” and the law of this “God” is exploitation, personal “rights”, and exploitation of others.”

B. They cheated the poor - Amos 5:11-12, "Therefore because you trample on the poor and you exact taxes of grain from him, you have built houses of hewn stone, but you shall not dwell in them; you have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine. For I know how many are your transgressions and how great are your sins— you who afflict the righteous, who take a bribe, and turn aside the needy in the gate."

C. They hated the truthful -- Amos 5:10, “You hate the one who reproves in court and despise him who tells the truth.” They hated a person that would stand up and tell the truth.  They didn't want him to testify in their judicial system.

D. They silenced the wise - Amos 5:13, “Therefore the prudent man keeps quiet in such times for the times are evil.”

Like Israel of old, America has become a nation full of actors who play at life and in life. They play church. They play like there is no payday for, nor consequences of sin. This country is rollicking in luxuries, reveling in excesses, rollicking in pleasure, revolting in morals and rotting in sin. What can we expect of a society which passions are riderless horses? In which there is a desolation of decency. In which love has become a jungle of emotion, lust is exalted to lordship, sin elevated to sovereignty, Satan is worshipped as a saint, and man is magnified above his Maker. Our minds have been distorted by perverted education, faulty information, depraved imagination, drugged hallucination, drunken stupefaction, sexual deviation, and political manipulation.

Righteousness exalts a nation but sin is a reproach to any individual or group of individuals who together comprise a nation.  Although Almighty God may seem to wink at sin; although He may seem to have forgotten to turn the wheels of judgment; we need to be reminded that appearances are deceiving. Though His wheels of judgment may move almost imperceptibly and ever so slowly, they are ever moving and grind exceedingly fine. God is presently, actively and intimately involved in judging and enforcing sanctions against nations who deliberately rebel against Him.

The Nations False Security

A. Israel trusted in their Religious Activity - Amos 5:21-23, ""I hate, I despise your feasts, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the peace offerings of your fattened animals, I will not look upon them. Take away from me the noise of your songs; to the melody of your harps I will not listen."

B. Israel trusted in their Military Capability - 6:1b, "...and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria,"

Due to the fact that their religious activity was fervent (never mind that it was hypocritical) and their military was strong, they felt secure in their position among the nations.

Amos would say to America, “Remember where your strength lies.” Where does it lie?  Does it lie in our hard-working people?; in our harbors or wide open, fertile fields?; in the fact that we have bombs, bullets, missiles, and the finest of soldiers?  The strength of this country is not in the military,  nor is it in our vast resources.  The strength of this country, or any country for that matter,  rests in the character of its citizens.  Rus Walton correctly stated: “Super states may be built by governments, by tyrants and politburos. But, truly great nations - God-based, God-centered societies that free men's souls and send their spirits soaring - are built by righteous people.” Strength comes from truth and righteousness. Truth and righteousness come from a right relationship with the True and Living God.

For the most part, today's American believes that our strength is in and our trust should be in big government.  We believe that government somehow has the unlimited capacity that only God possesses.  When people reject the Lordship of Christ's rule, they place their hope in an earthly ruler whom they expect to satisfy their wants. The people begin to see the nations problems as being political in nature rather than ethical, so they believe that they can steal by the ballot box what they are unwilling to work for.  This disastrous idea has resulted in government of the people, by the people and for the people, becoming government over the people in the name of the people.

The Nation's Fatal Sentence

Amos 4:12, “Therefore this is what I will do to you Israel and because I will do this to you, prepare to meet your God, oh, Israel.” Judgment came to this prosperous nation in spite of her ivory palaces in which the finest of wine was always flowing; in spite of her powerful military; in spite of her fervent religious activity. The Assyrians invaded under the guidance of God and destroyed their cities, taking multitudes prisoner. They marched the prisoners back to Assyria in the manner declared by Amos. In order to keep them on the move and motivate them to keep up, they took giant hooks and hooked the prisoners, men, women, and children in the lip or in the chest and tied all the prisoners together via a rope through these hooks.

I believe that this great land of ours is already under the judgment of God. The following signs are indicative of judgment upon our nation. Our economy is in shambles. We have gone in a brief space from the greatest creditor nation to the greatest debtor nation in human history. Our foreign policy is in disarray.  One Arab said, “America is a poor friend and a weak enemy.” Our criminal justice system is a disgrace. Our educational system is a disaster. Most teachers believe that it is a jungle and they are prepared for jungle warfare because numbers of them get killed every year. Vandalism costs in excess of a billion dollars a year just to replace all the things that are vandalized on the school properties. Our families are disintegrating - one out of every two marriages ends in divorce. Murder has been legalized in the form of abortion.  Over 50 million babies have died from abortions since the Roe v. Wade, Supreme Court decision in 1973. Pornography is proliferating, drugs are transforming us into a nation of dope addicts. Sexually transmitted disease threatens to destabilize and devastate our population and sink the health care industry. Homosexuality is considered an acceptable alternative lifestyle and same sex marriages is a giant step in the direction of total destruction of the family.

The Faithful Solution

David Chilton wrote: “Amos never appealed to socialism or statism for the answers. He never said that it was wrong to make a profit, or unjust to have possessions. He did not try t incite envy by comparing the incomes of the rich and the poor and then assuming that the wealth of the rich was unjust. He did not ask that foreign aid be sent to those heathen nations that were about to become impoverished through God's judgment on their godliness. Neither did he request state intervention into the market. Instead he named their sins: extortion, partiality in court, falsifying weights and measures, debasing the currency, disobedience to the Poor Laws, false advertising, fornication, religious syncretism and hypocrisy, etc.” He confronted them with God's Law and called them to repentance.

Amos 5:4,14,15,24: The direction given, but unheeded by Israel was,  “Seek Me.” In other words, don't seek the answer in political and religious institutions, venerable traditions, religious rituals, or military might. “Seek God!” This means “REPENT”! The essence of repentance is not in things done or not done but in an attitude toward a person and that person is God!  Then he says in verse 14:  “Seek good and evil.  Hate evil and love good.”  In verse 24 he says, “Let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never failing stream.”

What is the answer for America?  SEEK GOD!  The future of this country will not be determined by government, politicians, educators or scientists. The future of this country rests at the feet of the people of God - the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. As the church goes, so goes the nation. We must return to the faith of our fathers. We must get on our knees in humility, in prayer, in contrition, confession and repentance. We must forsake our sins! We must go back to the Cross! We must go back to the Incarnate Son of God Who was cursed, condemned, crucified for man the creature's sin.  The crisis is acute; the danger is imminent; and time is running out!  Something miraculous must happen in the hearts and souls of Americans before it is too late.

The choice is clear.  It's repent or perish, revival or ruin, Christ or chaos. “Seek ye me, says the Lord!”

The religious and economic history of England provides a good illustration of God's mercy and of the power of the gospel to recover a nation from the brink of destruction. Early in the eighteenth century, a high?society lady once joked that Parliament was “preparing a bill to have 'not' taken out of the Commandments and inserted in the Creed.” This was not far from the truth. By all descriptions of the period, it was characterized by rampant ungodliness and almost complete disregard for biblical standards in every area of life.  J. C. Ryle wrote:  “Christianity seemed to lie as one dead ... There was darkness in high places and  darkness in low places ? darkness in the court, the camp, the Parliament, and the bar ? darkness in country, and darkness in town ? darkness among rich and darkness among poor ? a gross, thick, religious and moral darkness ? a darkness that might be felt.”

The government and the courts were corrupt; open bribery was a continual practice, and the poor were flagrantly oppressed ? which is not to say that the poor were any better morally. Crime was abundant, and the attempt of the authorities to suppress it (by making 160 offenses punishable by death) was to no avail.  Whole districts were sunk in abject heathenism, completely ignorant of the most basic principles of the gospel.  And what were the churches doing?  Says Ryle: “They existed, but they could hardly be said to have lived. They did nothing; they were sound asleep.” In short, England was well down the road which, for a nation just across the Channel, climaxed in the orgy of horror known as the French Revolution. Yet, within a few years, the situation changed entirely. Thousands were converted to vital Christianity; the slave trade was abolished (in a manner vastly different from the Unitarian?inspired abolitionist movement in America); widows, orphans and poor were cared for; hospitals were established; missionary and tract societies flourished.  What made the difference?  To a great extent the change can be traced to the labors of George Whitfield, John and Charles Wesley and their companions, who spearheaded one of the most far?reaching evangelistic movements in history.  England heard and believed the gospel of Jesus Christ, and began to obey the laws of God.  This flowed out into every aspect of culture, including economics and politics.

There is no reason to believe that the same thing cannot happen in America if God's people, called by His name, will humble themselves, turn from their wicked ways, pray, and seek his face. God have mercy upon America.