What Would Amos Say?

Amos is an angry guy.

As you read the book that bears his name, it seems almost as if his calling to be a prophet has taken him utterly by surprise. A Judean, he travels north to the kingdom of Israel to ply his new trade, and you get the sense that he is unprepared for what he finds there. It is a time of economic plenty and conspicuous consumption, but the riches the elites enjoy have not trickled down to the have-nots, and the contrast between the two sparks Amos’s anger.

“Because you trample on the poor and take from them levies of grain, you have built houses of hewn stone, but you shall not live in them; you have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine,” he rails in verse 11. You may be rich, he says, but nothing is permanent in this world, and the time will come when you will find yourself in the bread line. You have enjoyed your wealth and the luxury it brings, but it won’t be long before the chickens come home to roost, because you have not been generous to the poor ones in your midst.

There’s more to Amos’s indictment. He accuses the wealthy of deceit: “They hate the one who reproves in the gate, and they abhor the one who speaks the truth” (v. 10). (The gate of the town was used as a sort of courthouse in ancient Israel.) He says they game the system and act corruptly: “You…afflict the righteous, [you] take a bribe and push aside the needy in the gate” (v. 12). Speaking for God, Amos declares, “I know how many are your transgressions and how great are your sins” (v. 12). They may prosper for a time, but their iniquity is not hidden from God.

Amos is an angry guy. And I feel a lot like Amos in this moment of our national life.

We too live in a time of great wealth and abundance. Unfortunately, that abundance is not shared equally. A handful of obscenely rich people flaunt their wealth—mansions, private islands, super yachts—to the extent that the top 10% of people in the US control 60% of the national wealth. The next 40% hold 34% of the wealth. That leaves half the population—over 170 million people—to divvy up a mere 6% of the pie. And estimates from the bipartisan Congressional Budget Office predict that the tax and spending cuts in the recently passed “Big Beautiful Bill” will add approximately $12,000 to the portfolios of the richest Americans while costing the poorest more than $1,000 a year. Not to mention the devastation caused by the almost inevitable cuts to Medicaid and SNAP that are coming. We are moving in the wrong direction if we have any aspirations to honor the God who watches over the poor. What would Amos say?

I imagine he would say the same thing to us that he says to the Israelites of his time: “Seek good and not evil, that you may live, and so the Lord, the God of hosts, will be with you, just as you have said. Hate evil and love good, and establish justice in the gate; it may be that the Lord, the God of hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph” (vv. 14–15). It may be that if we do the same things God will be gracious to the remnant of America as well.