Reading Assignment:
–The Bible: Amos, Chapters 2-9; and Isaiah, Chapters 1, 2 and 11
–Armstrong, pp. 101-119

In reading Amos and Isaiah, ask yourselves:
Exactly what are the sins and who are the sinners they denounce (or that God
denounces through them)?
What is the punishment God will wreak upon them if they do not reform?
What must the Hebrews do to avoid such punishment?
What is the long-term goal of history, the glorious hope that God holds out
even if He has to punish the Hebrews in the short term?
What is the purpose of the punishment?

Writing Assignment: Eight Questions
The Book of Amos
1) Chapter 2, verses 4-9: What are some of the crimes or transgressions of the
kingdoms of Judah and Israel that God denounces here (through Amos?s
preaching)?
2) Chapter 5, verses 7-12: What crimes are being denounced here? Who is
committing them?
3) Chapter 5, verses 14-15: What is God commanding the Hebrews to do if they
want to avoid destruction of the kingdom of Israel?
4)Chapter 5, verses 21-27: What are some of the old-fashioned, materialistic,
superficial expressions of religious devotion that God no longer wants from the
Hebrews? What is the profound moral transformation that He does wants them to
make instead? What does He threaten to do to them (at the end of verse 27) if
they do make the changes in their way of life that He calls for?
5) Chapter 6, verses 4-7: Describe the elite’s lifestyle in the kingdom of
Israel that that Amos condemns here.
6) Chapter 9, verses 8-15: Here God assumes there is no realistic hope that the
elites of Israel will become better people and thus He will have to fulfill his
threat and wipe their kingdom ?off the face of the earth.? And yet He does not
give up on the Hebrews. What is the longer-term hope that He holds out to them
even after the kingdom of Israel is destroyed?

The Book of Isaiah
7) Chapter 1, verses 11-17. Can you sum up Isaiah?s message here in 2-3
sentences? It is obviously very similar to Amos? message in Chapter 5, verses
21-27. But can you see any differences?
8) Chapter 2, verses 1-4, and Chapter 11 (entire chapter). Isaiah in these key
passages of Chapter 2 and throughout Chapter 11 holds out a longer-term hope of
earthly salvation, and offers a vision of what life will then be like. After
destroying the kingdoms of Israel and Judah for their sinfulness, God will
eventually bring back a remnant of the Hebrews to their homeland and will raise
up a Messiah (descendant of King David) who will create a perfect kingdom that
will be a model for all humanity. Even nature will be transformed. Try to
describe that perfect kingdom, that state of salvation, in your own words.