The idea that God’s patience will come to an end is one that we know to be true but generally ignore. For example, we can easily become very casual as we listen to the Bible. Here God is speaking to us but we think, There will always be another chance to make things right with God in the future. Sure I can respond with repentance now, but I can do the same next week. The Bible is not going to go away. First I have got to get my home sorted, make sure there is enough money to go around, and enjoy all the things this life has to offer. There will always be another day for religion, another chance to repent.
In response to that attitude Amos would ask the question: how can you know that? How can you know when God’s patience will end? Amos 8:11–14 encourages us not to presume on God’s patience. In some of the most frightening words of the book, he says that there will come a day when the people of Israel will look for a Word from God, they will seek to be reconciled to him—perhaps even asking for mercy—but they will not find it. It will be too late. They rejected God’s Word when it came to them and now God’s Word has been taken away.
You cannot be sure that there will be another chance for you to seek the Lord and live. If you are presuming on God’s patience, do you know when his patience will run out? Do you know the day and the hour when it will be your last chance to hear God’s Word and respond? How do you know it is not today? How do you know it is not tomorrow?
And this warning is not just applicable to non-Christians; it firstly comes to those of us who profess to be part of God’s people. God has been talking to us about justice, about our conduct on the Lord’s Day, our worship services, our business practices, and our sexual ethics. Maybe we hear what God is saying but we choose not to respond this week. We know we must repent and make changes but now is not a good time. We will leave it for next month or next year, there will be another chance to respond.
Again, how do we know that? If you have been hardening your heart for a while now, it could be the last day today that God ever talks to you about these things. By his Spirit, he is telling us through the words of Amos now: do not harden your heart. Do not hear God’s Word only to reject it for later. Do not show contempt for the riches of God’s kindness and his patience, because a day will come when God’s patience runs out, and neither you nor me are in control of when that time is, only God.
11 “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord GOD, “when 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.