There was another prophet who lived a little later than Amos. Perhaps as a youth he heard Amos speak. This was Hosea, who probably came from Gilead east of the Jordan. This man saw even deeper into the truth of religion than Amos, and his messages wonderfully completed and rounded out the great true words which the older prophet had so bravely spoken. THE GOOD AND THE EVIL IN THE OLD SACRIFICES The old religion of sacrifices was by no means wholly evil. When a family in those days sat down to a happy feast and gave some of everything in gratitude to Jehovah, God really was there, not in the sacred rock, but in their love for one another and for him. When they poured out libations and burned fat on the altar, God was indeed glad, not because of the smell of the smoke or because he enjoyed drinking the blood, but because his children were grateful. =Wrong ideas of God.=--On the other hand, these sacrifices, when misunderstood, tended to give people a wrong idea of God as one who was greedy for food and gifts. There was the greater danger of this wrong idea because of the character of the priests who were supposed to represent Jehovah. Many of them were very greedy indeed. The story of Eli's sons in 1 Samuel 2. 12-17 is an illustration. The priests were supposed to receive for their own personal support a part of all the gifts which were brought to the shrine. But the sons of Eli made it the rule that whatever came out of the meat kettle on a three-pronged fork stuck in by the priest should belong to him. Very often, it is plain, the priest got everything. And naturally the people came to think of Jehovah as like his priests--as a Being who cared only for gifts. =A worship based on greed.=--The worship of such a god, or of a god who was thought of as being of such a character, would, of course, be very far from the love and adoration which we Christians are taught to offer to our Father, and was really far from the kind of worship advocated by devout Hebrews. It would be a sort of bargain-hunting worship: the people to bring gifts of the fat of lambs and libations of blood and wine, and the god to give them in return good crops of wheat and oil, and figs and grapes, and an abundance of silver and gold. If Jehovah would give these things, then worship Jehovah. If other gods and Baals would give more than Jehovah, worship them. In short these sacrifices, as Hosea saw, were a kind of worship, and no worship is a mere formality, but is a vast influence for good or for ill. Because of these wrong ideas the sacrifices had come to be more and more an influence for evil. And you cannot have a righteous and happy human family in which men are just and kind to each other, without a true worship, growing out of a true idea of God. HOSEA'S EXPERIENCE AND MESSAGE