Will America Return to God — E.A. Johnston

Amos and the Remedial Judgments of God

Amos was a fiery prophet raised up by God at a strategic time in Israel's history. He was a very unpopular preacher who rebuked Israel for her grievous sins and disobedience to a holy God. The Jews disregarded the prophet of God and the remedial judgments from God to their hurt and destruction.

In their material prosperity, the people of God had forgotten God. The book of Amos, friends, is a book about the remedial judgments of God on a strained people of God. And that's the subject of my message today.

And it is also my title, Will America Return to God? My text can be found in the book of Amos. You can turn in your Bibles there now, friends. And I want us to see a principle found here in the book of Amos in regard to the people of God.

Unheeded Remedial Judgments Become More Severe

And that principle is this. The remedial judgments of God unheeded become the increased judgments of God. Out of love and mercy, God brings a remedial judgment upon a backslidden people to draw them back to him.

But if the people fail to turn back to God in repentance, then God will increase the severity of the remedial judgments with the hope that these harsh reflections will eventually turn the hearts of the people back to God.

But man is a sinner who can be hardened in his sins. And at times it takes a lot to get our attention. The book of Amos begins with a remedial judgment from God. Look at the last sentence of verse 1. Two years before the earthquake.

Earthquakes as Warnings of Divine Judgment

Natural calamities are judgments from an offended creator who's been provoked by sin. Why ministers today fail to recognize this is baffling to me. Pastors of former generations were wiser and preached revival sermons to turn the hearts of the people back to God.

Listen to a sermon, friends, preached by a leading pastor in Boston in 1755 when an earthquake shook that city, making the bells in the church towers ring. The title of his sermon was Earthquakes, the Works of God and Tokens of His Justice Pleasure, being a discourse on that subject wherein is given a particular description of this awful event of Providence made public at this time on occasion of the late dreadful earthquake which happened on the 18th of November, 1755.

The text of the sermon was Psalm 187. Then the earth shook and trembled. The foundations also of the hills moved and were shaken because he was wroth. Do you think, friends, that the Almighty today is wroth at our provoking Him with our grievous sins?

God sends an earthquake to Israel and then two years later He sends them His thundering prophet Amos to call the people back to God. But they pay no attention to His warnings. In chapter 4 we see the result of a stubborn people resisting God.

The Escalation of Judgment in Amos 4

Look at chapter 4, friends, in Amos and see how God sends increased judgments upon them, increased in their severity. Look at Amos 4, 6. And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all your cities, and want of bread in all your places.

Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord? Judgment number one was that God sent a famine in the land. In His mercy He sent them a famine, to draw their dependents away from their material prosperity, back to Him.

But it goes unheeded. Look at the increased judgment in verse 7, and it is more severe. And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest. And I caused it to rain on one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city.

One peace was rained upon, and the peace whereupon it rained not withered. Listen, friends. Man can go a week without food, but man cannot live long without water. Do the wayward Jews turn back to Him and repent, and seek His face?

No. Yet have ye not returned unto me? Now look at how a remedial judgment increases to a higher level of severity, as seen in verse 9. I have smitten you with blasting and mildew, when your gardens and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased.

The palm were warm, devoured them. Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord? God is a jealous God, friends. God sent a financial collapse. Listen, a global depression is on the horizon, and the good times are quickly to end.

Many will be completely wiped out financially. But yet again, as seen with the disobedient Jews, the remedial judgments of God, when unheeded, become the increased judgments of God. Look how severe number four judgment is, as seen in verse 10.

I have sent among you the pestilence after the manor of Egypt. Your young men have I slain with the sword, and taken away your horses. And I have made the stink of your camps to come up unto your nostrils.

Yet ye have not returned unto me, saith the Lord. This was a very severe judgment for when you take the young men out of a community. That community has little future. But I want us to see, friends, what I consider to be the worst judgment that God can bring upon a people.

The Withdrawal of God's Presence

Look at chapter 7 and verse 8, which reads, And the Lord said unto me, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A plumb line. Then said the Lord, Behold, I will set a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel, and I will not again pass by them any more.

This, friends, speaks of the judgment of the withdrawn presence of God. We as a nation have experienced more natural calamities in the last several decades than I can remember. Has this nation turned back to the God of the Bible?

No. Yet have ye not returned unto me, saith the Lord. Our churches have become houses of entertainment, because that's the only means we'll bring people in the doors. God has left us to our own devices.

I believe the Methodist minister, Samuel Chadwick of Cliff College, said it best. When a church is run on the same lines as a circus, there may be crowds, but there is no shekinah. Our young people today don't know what it's like to experience the power of God in a meeting, for we as a people are experiencing the withdrawn presence of God.

Because of our grievous sins and our refusal to heed the remedial judgments of God upon the land, and to repent and to return to the God of the Bible, I'm afraid we can't point our fingers at the Jews in the days of Amos, because we are under the same judgments.

Revival as the Nation's Hope

And in his absence, all we can do as a church is to substitute activities and entertainment. The only thing that will keep us from total destruction is a heaven-sent revival. Oh, why, oh, why, oh, why haven't we turned our sanctuaries into Bethels of repentance?

Seeking the face of an offended sovereign in humility and tears is a great mystery that must astound the watching angels in heaven as they stare at us sinners and wonder, as they look back to God and cover their faces with their wings and cry loudly one to another, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.

The whole earth is full of his glory. Will America turn back to God? Heaven help us if we don't. Let us pray.