A Famine of Hearing the Words of the LORD

Amos 8:11-12
"Behold the days are coming ",says the Lord GOD,"That I will send a famine on the land, not a famine of bread,nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the LORD.They shall wander from sea to sea,and from north to east;They shall run to and fro,seeking the word of the LORD,but shall not find it.

I come across it all the time these days ;God's people famished ,weak from starvation ;appeasing their hunger with spiritual junk food and bearing the consequences in their lives.
Christians I know, who once were well-fed and strong and vibrant in their faith are now listless and dry and embracing all kinds of sugar-coated lies.Where once they fed on the life-giving meat of the word,now they settle for the pleasant and deadly words of men.

There is a famine in the land.

Amos wrote to the nation of Israel, but church history clearly demonstrates that the truth of this passage has occurred regularly since those days. The middle ages are infamous for men of religion locking up the word of God and doling out starvation rations of sub-scriptural sustenance mixed with the deadly poison of mans traditions...and yet where are we today? Those who once were focused on a heavenly mansion are now infatuated with an earthly "Shack". Men and women who once were seeking their God now are seeking their "purpose"and those who followed the Ancient truths of the Ancient of Days are now studying the philosophical foolishness of "A New Kind of Christianity"

There is a famine in the land.

How have we forgotten that the word of God is the... well WORD of GOD.?
What has gotten in to us that we would settle for the words of men?
Why can't we see the deadly danger of treating the Holy things of God with such flippant folly.
The faith of many is dissipating , the lives of many disintegrating and demonic legions are celebrating as God's church starves herself to death.

There is a famine in the land.

And yet there are those who are seeking ,there are those who are tired of feeding on the dry husks of the pig-pen when they know there is a banquet waiting in the Father's house. Just as in the days of the reformation when God raised up preachers and teachers who turned the eyes of the people back to the Book, today there is a stirring and here and there pockets of resistance to the occupying forces of apostasy ,heresy and apathy.

There is a famine in the land...

But there are also those who are beginning to rouse themselves from their slumber ..they are tired of being tired and are desiring a return to their first love.There are those who are beginning to lay hold of the God of Heaven that He might rain down spiritual blessing on the land .

There is a famine in the land...

But some are heeding the call to return to the green pastures of the great Shepherd.
Some are tired of religiously correct theories and are returning to the life-giving certainties of the immutable word of our God.

For sure there is a famine in the land...

But God who is rich in mercy will respond to the heartfelt cries of His people.
He will raise up shepherds after His own heart.
If we seek Him, we will find Him;probably not prosperity, popularity or purpose, but Him. If we will in worshipful awe open His word for Him,He will in mercy open His word to us.

There is a famine in the land ...
and it's a deadly plague but there is also hope in the land and there are those who are blowing the trumpet in Zion and there are those who are heeding the call, rending their hearts and crying out for an end to the famine in the land.