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Object:
For military families, communication with their loved one in a war zone is a lifeline, an oasis in a desert of anxiety. In fact, several public and private sector initiatives, such as the Freedom Calls Foundation (www.freedomcalls.org), work to provide troops stationed overseas the technology to maintain contact with their families back home. Whether it's through letters, phone calls, text messages, or internet chat or video, many people are working diligently to ensure that soldiers can keep in touch with those they love, because they know that not having that connection would be devastating.
Imagine what it would be like for these people to have no word from their loved ones on the battlefront. They wouldn't know if that person was alive or dead! Now imagine what it was like for the people of Israel, a nation that had known God so closely, who had seen the presence of God in the wilderness in the form of a pillar of cloud and fire, to not hear from their God again for years. Yet that is what Amos prophesied over Israel, that they would have "famine on the land -- not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord" (v. 11). And before Jesus came, that's exactly what happened -- over 400 years of no word from God.
Imagine what it would be like for these people to have no word from their loved ones on the battlefront. They wouldn't know if that person was alive or dead! Now imagine what it was like for the people of Israel, a nation that had known God so closely, who had seen the presence of God in the wilderness in the form of a pillar of cloud and fire, to not hear from their God again for years. Yet that is what Amos prophesied over Israel, that they would have "famine on the land -- not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord" (v. 11). And before Jesus came, that's exactly what happened -- over 400 years of no word from God.
