This evening I sat down and started to do some preliminary reading on the book of Amos to find the scriptures that talk about God being the “arms that carry us”. What I discovered, or rather what I didn’t, shocked me. There is not a single verse in the entire book of Amos that makes any such reference. How can this be? Did the writer of the song He Is miss it on such an epic level? I sat there perplexed with my Jewish study bible in front of me open to the first chapter and grabbed the Perry Stone study bible to see if he had any commentary that could solve this mystery for me. Boy did he bring what I was missing into clear focus.
Amos was not a “professional prophet” or man of God. He was a shepherd and tender of fig trees, but the most striking thing relating to this line is the song, is that his name means…. Wait for it….. TO CARRY!! My spirit started doing handsprings when I read that, and the meaning of his name unlocked so much hidden beneath the surface of the song lyrics.
The book of Amos begins by laying out a series of judgements upon six groups of nations and cities outside the boundaries of Israel, including: Damascus, Philistia, Tyre, Edom, Ammon, and Moab. (Amos 1:3- 2:3) Each of these had mistreated God’s people in some way, including leading them into captivity, and were merciless, even to women and children. In Chapter 2:4-16, the judgment turns and spotlights God’s own people, Judah and Israel. While in Israel, Amos was admonished to leave and go to Judah and prophesy there as to which he replied in Amos 7:14-15, 14 Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah, I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was an herdman, and a gatherer of sycamore fruit: 15 And the Lord took me as I followed the flock, and the Lord said unto me, Go, prophesy unto my people Israel. Amos was called by God, while doing his everyday job to carry God’s word to the people, and He will call us doing the mundane as well.
The Hebrew word for carry is nasa which not only means to bear, carry, lift up, carried and carry away, it takes us into how He is the arms that carry us by also meaning forgive, to be forgiven and honored. Looking at the numeric value of nasa, it comes to a total of 351, and when you look at other words with that value, we find a word that takes this to yet another level. 351 also means to forget! How often do we say we need to “forgive and forget”? God says it and means it.
Isaiah 40:11 says: He is like a shepherd feeding his flock, gathering his lambs with his arm, carrying them against his chest, gently leading the mother sheep. Jesus has taken “to carry” to the extreme. He took upon Himself and carried not only our sins, He carried our judgement! When you read the judgment that God was handing down in those first verses of Amos, it shows how He does not mess around when it comes to sin, and yet, Jesus picked up our transgressions and carried them and let His Father cast down our judgement upon Himself. When we are at our lowest, He will pick us up and carry us. This image is portrayed in the poem Footprints. He will never leave us nor forsake us, and it is when we are going through the hardest times in our lives that He gathers us in his arms and carries us against His chest.
I have come to learn that when something is repeated in the Word three times, we need to take notice and pay attention because it is an important point that He is trying to get across to us. In chapter 5 verses 4, 6, and 14 He drives home an especially important part of His message.
Amos 5:4a: For here is what Adonai says to the house of Isra’el: If you seek Me, you will survive.
Amos 5:6a: If you seek Adonai, you will survive.
Amos 5:14a: Seek good and not evil, so that you will survive.
Three times he says SEEK and three times He says in doing so YOU WILL SURVIVE.
Isaiah 55:6-7 tells us: 6 Seek Adonai while he is available, call on him while he is still nearby. 7 Let the wicked person abandon his way and the evil person his thoughts; let him return to Adonai, and he will have mercy on him; let him return to our God for he will freely forgive. When we seek Him, He will meet us where we are, He will pick us up and carry us, our sins and transgression, will have mercy on us and forgive us and we will survive.
As seen in the other books of the prophets, God does not end His message with gloom and doom, but rather one of promise, healing and restoration. Amos is no different. In the final chapter of the book in 9:11 He tells them: In that day will I raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old. When Jesus picks us up and carries us in His arms, He raises us up, he closes the breaches and wounds in our spirit and will raise up our ruins. Why? 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 tells us why He would restore us to such levels. 16 Don’t you know that you people are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you? 17 So if anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him. For God’s Temple is holy, and you yourselves are that temple.
When we let go and let Jesus carry us, really carry all of us from what we have right down to what we do really wrong, He will restore us from the inside out, bringing us to a place where we can truly worship in spirit and in truth because we are no longer cast down, we are the Temple of the Holy Spirit, carried in the loving arms of our Savior.
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