Amos 7:7-15

Common English Bible

A vision of a plumb line

⁷This is what the Lord showed me: The Lord was standing by a wall, with a plumb line in his hand. ⁸The Lord said to me, “Amos, what do you see?”

“A plumb line,” I said.
Then the Lord said,
“See, I am setting a plumb line
    in the middle of my people Israel.
        I will never again forgive them.
⁹The shrines of Isaac will be made desolate,
            and the holy places of Israel will be laid waste,
            and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.”

Exchange between Amaziah, Jeroboam, and Amos

¹⁰Then Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, reported to Israel’s King Jeroboam, “Amos has plotted against you within the house of Israel. The land isn’t able to cope with everything that he is saying. ¹¹Amos has said, ‘Jeroboam will die by the sword, and Israel will be forced out of its land.’”

¹²Amaziah said to Amos, “You who see things, go, run away to the land of Judah, eat your bread there, and prophesy there; ¹³but never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king’s holy place and his royal house.”

¹⁴Amos answered Amaziah, “I am^[a] not a prophet, nor am I a prophet’s son; but I am a shepherd, and a trimmer of sycamore trees. ¹⁵But the Lord took me from shepherding the flock, and the Lord said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’

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