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Amos 7

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1 This is what the Lord God let me see: and I saw that, when the growth of the late grass was starting, he made locusts; it was the late growth after the king's cutting was done.

2 And it came about that after they had taken all the grass of the land, I said, O Lord God, have mercy: how will Jacob be able to keep his place? for he is small.

3 The Lord, changing his purpose about this, said, It will not be.

4 This is what the Lord let me see: and I saw that the Lord God sent for a great fire to be the instrument of his punishment; and, after burning up the great deep, it was about to put an end to the Lord's heritage.

5 Then said I, O Lord God, let there be an end: how will Jacob be able to keep his place? for he is small.

6 The Lord, changing his purpose about this, said, And this will not be.

7 This is what he let me see: and I saw the Lord stationed by a wall made straight by a weighted line, and he had a weighted line in his hand.

8 And the Lord said to me, Amos, what do you see? And I said, A weighted line. Then the Lord said, see, I will let down a weighted line among my people Israel; never again will my eyes be shut to their sin:

9 And the high places of Isaac will be unpeopled, and the holy places of Israel will be made waste; and I will come up against the family of Jeroboam with the sword.

10 Then Amaziah, the priest of Beth-el, sent to Jeroboam, king of Israel, saying, Amos has made designs against you among the people of Israel: the land is troubled by his words.

11 For Amos has said, Jeroboam will be put to the sword, and Israel will certainly be taken away as a prisoner out of his land.

12 And Amaziah said to Amos, O seer, go in flight into the land of Judah, and there get your living by working as a prophet:

13 But be a prophet no longer at Beth-el: for it is the holy place of the king, and the king's house.

14 Then Amos in answer said to Amaziah, I am no prophet, or one of the sons of the prophets; I am a herdman and one who takes care of sycamore-trees:

15 And the Lord took me from the flock, and the Lord said to me, Go, be a prophet to my people Israel.

16 Now then, give ear to the word of the Lord: You say, Be no prophet to Israel, and say not a word against the people of Isaac.

17 So this is what the Lord has said: Your wife will be a loose woman in the town, and your sons and your daughters will be put to the sword, and your land will be cut up into parts by a line; and you yourself will come to your end in an unclean land, and Israel will certainly be taken away a prisoner out of his land.

   

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The Word

  
A detail from the Winchester Bible, this shows God putting words in the mouth of Jeremiah.

Consider the beautiful but cryptic statements of John 1:1:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."

God's love has always been and will always be infinite and perfect. That means the expression of God's love -- His truth -- has also always been and will always be infinite and perfect.

The Lord has shared this truth with us in various ways since the beginning of humanity. The earliest people received truth directly, flowing into the inner parts of their minds from heaven. Later, people understood it through nature seeing the Lord's love expressed in mountains, trees, rivers, and the sun, moon and stars. By using natural language as a container for spiritual language, the Lord expressed truth within the Bible inside its stories, laws and prophecies. When humanity reached its lowest point, God took on a human form and walked among us as Jesus. In this way, the Lord brought us Divine truths in an accessible and tangible way. By accepting and loving the Lord as Jesus we can open ourselves to His love.

Finally, the Heavenly Doctrine received through the pen of Emanuel Swedenborg are themselves a container for Divine Truth, both in speaking plainly about heaven and by unlocking the truth as it is contained in the Bible.

The Word itself is Divine Truth; the Lord's expression of love has and never will change.