of David has been re-established, then the Gentiles will come flocking in to share in the blessings that will follow. This passage, from the end of the prophet Amos (9:11–12), follows hard on the heels of a warning about God’s judgment on his own people, a judgment so severe that Israel’s own election is downgraded to be merely one example among many of what God has done with various peoples (9:7). But, once ‘the house of David that has collapsed’ is restored—and James, like all early Christians,