Upon beds of ivory . . .

(new article tomorrow for certain)

 In Amos 6 the message to the southern kingdom of Judah is, “You see what’s happened in the northern kingdom; now you guys down south--you guys are just lazy, enjoying yourselves, fat and happy. Got your own religion, got your activities. You think everything’s wonderful and you’re not paying attention, because what’s happened up there, you’re doing the same thing they’re doing and judgment’s going to come.”

Talking to the leaders of Israel, verse 1 reads, [1] Woe to them that are at ease in Zion, and trust in the mountain of Samaria, which are named chief of the nations, to whom the house of Israel came!

“They trusted that there would be a protection they’d have from the Assyrians because of the land of Ephraim there,” explains Richard Jordan.

Verse 2: [2] Pass ye unto Calneh, and see; and from thence go ye to Hamath the great: then go down to Gath of the Philistines: be they better than these kingdoms? or their border greater than your border?

“All those places that he mentions there had been wiped out and God says, ‘Go look at these places and see what I did to them. The Assyrian took them, runs them. You think you’re better than they are? Forget it.’

Verse 3: [3] Ye that put far away the evil day, and cause the seat of violence to come near;

“The ‘evil day’ is ‘the day of the Lord’ back in Amos 5:17-19 that looks forward to the last days of the Antichrist.

“When it says ‘ye that put it away,’ what they’re doing there is putting it out of their mind. Not paying any attention to that kind of a thing. They’re just at ease, doing their thing. They’re not going to be interested in it and they’re just going to ignore it, as it were, and that’s going to cause the seat of violence to come.

“The ‘seat of violence’ is going to be the captivity, but it’s also going to be the Antichrist, so you’re seeing both these things kind of working together.

Verse 4: [4] That lie upon beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall;

“You talk about luxury. They’re in the midst of luxury and leisure. They’re not the watchman on the wall; they’ve let their guard down. We’ve studied how they used religion to get rich. Paul said, ‘I’ve profited in the Jews’ religion.’

“The leaders of the nation, instead of leading the nation in godliness, had led them in just making it a profiteering kind of thing and they lie in beds of ivory and stretch themselves upon their couches.

“You’ve seen pictures perhaps of that era where you have a couch you recline on and a bed to lay on. It’s not talking about a bed in a bedroom; it’s talking about the couches and leisurely stretching out. The bed posts and frame are made of ivory.

Amos 3:15: [15] And I will smite the winter house with the summer house; and the houses of ivory shall perish, and the great houses shall have an end, saith the LORD.

“That’s talking about luxury and it’s a reference back to I Kings 7 when Solomon built his house and he built the ivory palace and ivory throne. It was the wealth and the opulence and the glory of it.

“Back in Solomon’s day silver was considered like dirt, rocks. Everything was made out of gold. It was the accumulation of wealth and the leisure that that would bring and when leisure comes in, people forget God.

"It’s, ‘We don’t need God; we’re interested in other things.’ It’s when difficult times come that people start thinking about God. An old preacher Down South used to say, ‘When the money runs out people get real basic,’ and that’s a dying truth.

“The leaders accumulated their wealth illegally. Amos 3:10: [10] For they know not to do right, saith the LORD, who store up violence and robbery in their palaces.
[11] Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD; An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled.
[12] Thus saith the LORD; As the shepherd taketh out of the mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear; so shall the children of Israel be taken out that dwell in Samaria in the corner of a bed, and in Damascus in a couch.

“They’d used the government and the system. They were having a battle back and forth and the issue was the rich were getting richer and the poor were getting poorer, and the more they did it the richer they got, the more leisure they had, the more they oppressed the poor.

“I don’t care what system you’re using (capitalism, socialism, fascism, etc.), the guy in the middle is going to be the one who pays the bills. The rich and poor have a very small tax burden and the people in the middle don’t have a way to get out of the tax burden.

“Here are the people who are designed to be the chief of all the nations, God’s nation in the earth, the ones the others come to, and He says, ‘Here’s some advice. Go out and look at all these other nations—Calneh, Gath—what happened to them? They got destroyed.’

“The verse says they ‘eat the lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall.’ I mean, you’re going and picking the plumbs right out of the middle. You’re getting the fatted ones; you’re getting the best, eating the heart out of everything.

Verse 5: [5] That chant to the sound of the viol, and invent to themselves instruments of musick, like David;
[6] That drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief ointments: but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph.

“He says, ‘You guys Down South, you see what’s happening up north and it doesn’t bother you at all. You’re not grieved for it.’

“Now the afflictions of Joseph, if you go to Genesis 35, what did Joseph’s brothers do to him? They sold him into slavery; into captivity. The northern kingdom is fixing to be sold into captivity and the southern kingdom sees it and they’re just so caught up in their own selves they don’t grieve.

Verse 7: [7] Therefore now shall they go captive with the first that go captive, and the banquet of them that stretched themselves shall be removed.

“He’s not just going to give up Israel, the northern kingdom. There’s going to be a captivity of the southern kingdom and Amos is warning ALL of the tribes of Israel, ‘Captivity’s coming.’ He told them in chapter 5 if they were to hate evil and love the good, and establish judgment in the gate, it may be that the Lord God would be gracious.

“He’ll produce a remnant if they believe and there always was that Believing Remnant. Elijah thought he was the only one who didn’t bow a knee to Baal in his generation and God said, ‘No, I’ve got thousands who haven’t bowed a knee to Baal or kissed Baal and worshipped him.’

“Elijah was the big guy on the scene, in the headlines in the newspaper, on CNN, FOX News and MSNBC. He was making the news and making the rounds, confronting Ahab and Jezebel and all the prophets of Baal and yet he thought he was all by himself.

“I think about that and think, ‘Wow, if there’s thousands of you out here in Israel, how come he didn’t know anything about you?!’ They’re all keeping their heads down; they’re all underground. Because if they stuck their head up, it’s Candy Crunch time. Whack-a-mole. And they lose their life. Elijah was out front but they were there; the ministry had an impact.

“The problem is they weren’t caring anything about that. They weren’t going to repent; they weren’t going to call evil evil and love good. That’s how they got the leisure they had.

Amos 6: [7] Therefore now shall they go captive with the first that go captive, and the banquet of them that stretched themselves shall be removed.
[8] The Lord GOD hath sworn by himself, saith the LORD the God of hosts, I abhor the excellency of Jacob, and hate his palaces: therefore will I deliver up the city with all that is therein.
[9] And it shall come to pass, if there remain ten men in one house, that they shall die.

“Verse 7 is a reference to the captivity back in Amos 5:7 but it’s also called the day of the Lord in Amos 5:18: [18] Woe unto you that desire the day of the LORD! to what end is it for you? the day of the LORD is darkness, and not light.
[19] As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him; or went into the house, and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him.

“The captivity begins the day of the Lord’s wrath on the nation. When God puts Israel in that 5^th Course of judgment that is the day of the Lord beginning and that’s the day of violence. They guy of violence who comes in on Judah here, the seat of violence, will be Nebuchadnezzar.

“In Jeremiah 52, Jeremiah looks toward Nebuchadnezzar coming in and gives you the historical record to the seat of violence.

[9] Then they took the king, and carried him up unto the king of Babylon to Riblah in the land of Hamath; where he gave judgment upon him.
[10] And the king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes: he slew also all the princes of Judah in Riblah.
[11] Then he put out the eyes of Zedekiah; and the king of Babylon bound him in chains, and carried him to Babylon, and put him in prison till the day of his death.

“Zedekiah is the last king of Israel and his boys are murdered right in front of him. The last thing he saw was his boys being tortured and slain in front of him. He has his eyes taken out, then he’s put in chains, hauled off down to Babylon, put in jail and left to languish there until he dies.

“Now that’s violence! You see stuff going on in the Middle East with Isis and what they’re doing is nothing new to them. That culture, the Persians, has been doing that for 2-4,000 years. That’s who the Babylonians are. They’re brutal; just murderous.

“That’s that stuff in Genesis 6 about the violence. That thing in Ezekiel 28 about Satan and the violence that comes in the train of his idea. The Lie program always produces evil and the evil that Romans 13 says the powers-that-be are established to stop is that violence that comes from that corrupted system.

“Here’s going to come a man of sin, the son of perdition, who will be the personification of that system and it’s called the ‘seat of violence.’ The place where violence rules from. Babylon is a foretaste of the prophetic guy they’re talking about.

Psalm 94: [1] O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.
[2] Lift up thyself, thou judge of the earth: render a reward to the proud.
[3] LORD, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?
[4] How long shall they utter and speak hard things? and all the workers of iniquity boast themselves?
[5] They break in pieces thy people, O LORD, and afflict thine heritage.
[6] They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.
[7] Yet they say, The LORD shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it.

The Believing Remnant is crying out, ‘Lord, you see all the violence, all the trashing that’s being done against us. And because you don’t do anything, the wicked say, [There’s no God to see it. Our god reigns.]’

Verse 20: [20] Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frameth mischief by a law?
[21] They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.
[22] But the LORD is my defence; and my God is the rock of my refuge.
[23] And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off in their own wickedness; yea, the LORD our God shall cut them off.

“Who sets up a law? You see they’ve taken over the governmental system and they’re using the government and the powers of the state, mixed with their religion . . . that’s the reason our Founding Fathers understood some of these things. I’ve tried to say to you, your ancestors understood that Baal worship stuff and that’s the reason you have a First Amendment.

“Our forefathers understood the dangers of allowing the state to be controlled by a religious institution. That’s what Catholicism is. The pope wears two keys—one for the kingdom of heaven and one for the kingdom of God--and for time immemorial to the time of the Reformation, the pope in Rome ran the governments and the kingdoms of Europe. He would today if he could get away with it.

“The Vatican is a state. They have an ambassador to the U.N. President Ronald Reagan, of all people, appointed an ambassador from the U.S. to the Vatican. You see there’s a political side and a religious side?”