Where then is your king, that he may save you in all your cities? Where are your rulers for whom you asked, saying, “Give me a king and princes”?

Wake up, you drunkards, and weep! Wail, all you wine drinkers, because the sweet wine has been taken away from you.

Archers will not hold their ground; fast runners will not save their lives, nor will those who ride horses.

If an alarm sounds in a city, do people not fear? If disaster overtakes a city, is the Lord not responsible?

Therefore,” says the sovereign Lord, “an enemy will encircle the land. He will take away your power; your fortresses will be looted.”

I will destroy both the winter and summer houses. The houses filled with ivory will be ruined, the great houses will be swept away.” The Lord is speaking!

The sovereign Lord confirms this oath by his own holy character: “Certainly the time is approaching when you will be carried away in baskets, every last one of you in fishermen’s pots.

He showed me this: I saw the sovereign One standing by a tin wall holding tin in his hand.

Amaziah then said to Amos, “Leave, you visionary! Run away to the land of Judah! Earn your living and prophesy there!

You should not have stood at the fork in the road to slaughter those trying to escape. You should not have captured their refugees when they suffered adversity.

Therefore you will have to say farewell to Moresheth Gath. The residents of Achzib will be as disappointing as a dried up well to the kings of Israel.

‘Don’t preach with such impassioned rhetoric,’ they say excitedly. ‘These prophets should not preach of such things; we will not be overtaken by humiliation.’

But I am full of the courage that the Lord’s Spirit gives, and have a strong commitment to justice. This enables me to confront Jacob with its rebellion, and Israel with its sin.

“In that day,” says the Lord, “I will gather the lame, and assemble the outcasts whom I injured.

Jerusalem, why are you now shouting so loudly? Has your king disappeared? Has your wise leader been destroyed? Is this why pain grips you as if you were a woman in labor?

But they do not know what the Lord is planning; they do not understand his strategy. He has gathered them like stalks of grain to be threshed at the threshing floor.

For the Lord will restore the majesty of Jacob, as well as the majesty of Israel, though their enemies have plundered them and have destroyed their fields.

Nineveh was like a pool of water throughout her days, but now her people are running away; she cries out: “Stop! Stop!” – but no one turns back.

Your warriors will be like women in your midst; the gates of your land will be wide open to your enemies; fire will consume the bars of your gates.

Look, I am about to empower the Babylonians, that ruthless and greedy nation. They sweep across the surface of the earth, seizing dwelling places that do not belong to them.