#DailyDevotion Don’t Be One Of Those People Who Will Say, “I Could Have Been Saved!”

Amos 4 ⁶ “And so I also gave you —nothing for your teeth to bite in all your cities and no food in all your places. But you didn’t return to Me,” says the LORD. ⁷ “Yes, I stopped the rain from falling on you three months before the harvest. And I made it rain on one town and one field got rain, and another field got none and dried up. ⁸ And so two or three towns staggered to another to drink water and couldn’t get enough. But you didn’t return to Me,” says the LORD. ⁹ “I struck you down with a scorching wind and mildew. The gnawing grasshopper consumed your many gardens, your vineyards, your fig trees, and your olive trees. But you didn’t return to Me,” says the LORD. 

¹⁰ “I sent plagues among you, like those in Egypt. I killed your young men with a sword and captured your horses. And so I made the stench of your camps come up to your nostrils. But you didn’t return to Me,” says the LORD. ¹¹ “I laid you waste as God laid waste Sodom and Gomorrah. And you were like a brand snatched from fire. But you didn’t return to Me,” says the LORD. ¹² “That is why I do this to you, Israel. Because I do this to you, Israel, prepare to meet your God!” ¹³ Remember, He formed the hills and made the wind: He tells man what He’s thinking; He makes the dawn dark and walks on the high places of the earth — the LORD, the God of armies, is His name.

I really think we need to pay attention to this. I don’t think a lot of commentary on each of the details is necessary. What do we have here? We have what we might dismiss in verses 6-10 as just acts of nature. The insurance companies know better. They are acts of God. But that is seemingly too much for us to handle. If it happens to those people over there, then we may think and say, “Well those people are so bad, they deserve this punishment from God.” If it happens to us, we may either try to dismiss it as Mother Nature or we may think God is being unjust because we are really not all that bad. We don’t deserve to be treated this way. We might think those around us deserve it, but not us.

We see this similar trend in Revelation 16, “⁹When they were badly burned, they blasphemed the name of God, Who controlled these plagues, and they did not repent to give Him glory.” All the disasters, the wars, etc., are given to us so that we repent of our sins and return to the LORD of Armies, Jesus Christ. This means you, no matter how good you may think you are, no matter how much faith you may think you have, God brings these things into our lives so we may examine ourselves, confess our sins, repent of our sins and put our faith in Jesus Christ for our salvation. Jesus says as much in Luke 13, “²Do you think, because this happened to them, those Galileans must have been worse sinners than all the other Galileans? ³I tell you, no. And if you don’t repent, you will all perish as they did.”

He tells the Israelites to prepare to meet their God. This is not going to be pretty. He has let them know and us know He is the Almighty and the Creator. He can even make the dawn dark. He knows what we are thinking. He is Omnipotent and Omniscient. Are you prepared to meet your God? You have been warned by God through nature and through war judgment is coming. He has called you to meet Him in repentance and faith so you may meet Him with joy. If you will not turn from your sins and embrace Jesus, you will meet Him in fear and terror.

Almighty God, merciful Father, grant us Your Holy Spirit, so we may recognize our sins, repent of them and embrace Jesus as our Savior. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.