“For thus says the Lord to the house of Israel. Seek me and live.”
– Amos 5:4
Those four words at the end of Amos 5:4, hide them in your heart. This is the word of God to His people. Seek me and live. Life is in seeking God. You want to live? You want to experience life to the full? Seek God. It’s exactly what Jesus says. Seek first the kingdom of heaven and His righteousness and all these things will be added to you as well. Seek God.
This Verse Encourages the Pursuit of God
Life is not found in seeking the pleasures, pursuits, and plaudits of this world. No, life is in seeking God.
“Your face, Oh Lord, I will seek,” the Psalmist cries. And so God says here in Amos 5, “I want you to have life. I want you to experience life to the full.” But it is not found in seeking possessions. So, it is not in seeking praise from men. It is not in seeking position in this world. It is not found in seeking the pursuits of this world. “Life is found in seeking me,” God says. Rise in the morning and seek God.
Amos 5:4 Calls for Hearts Turned to God
All day long, may the posture of your heart be to seek God. Seek God. When you lay your head on your pillow at night, seek God. Turn your attention, your affections toward God continually and live. Oh God, we do that right now. We seek you in prayer. Right now, we seek you, we want to know you more, we want to worship you more, we want to love you more. God, we want to understand your word more. We want to walk in your ways more. We want you, oh God. And we want you more than we want possessions, more than we want position, more than we want comfort, more than we want our ways, more than we want anything in this world, anyone in this world. We seek you. And we trust that as we seek you, we will live.
Amos 5:4 Prays for Abundant, Full Lives set In God
God, we pray for life. We pray for true, deep, abundant, full life. May this be true of our lives that we sought you and we experienced life to the full. Not just now but forever and ever and ever. God, we pray. We pray for this in our own lives, we pray that you would use our lives to draw others to seek you. God, we pray that you would use our lives to draw the nations to seek you. We pray for the Jambi in Indonesia. God, as we’re praying for these different people groups in Indonesia, just over and over and over again, see that there is 0.0% belief in the gospel, meaning you. Potentially no or maybe a few people believe in you, seeking Jesus out of all the one million Jambi in Indonesia.
God, change that. They can’t live without you, they can’t live without you. God, please draw the Jambi to yourself. Please, send workers to make the good news of your seeking out to them known to them, that they might seek you and live, they might know and seek you, Jesus. God, we pray for the Jambi in Indonesia.
We pray for people right around us today. Help us to point them to seeking you and help us to show what it looks like in our lives to seek you and live today. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
