Amos 5:21 says, I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not smell in your solemn assemblies.  Amos warned the people of Israel that during this time of spiritual darkness that God would despise their feast days and would not smell their burnt offerings.  This warning still applies today. We are advised or commanded in Hebrews to not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, but if we are only assembling out of ritualistic habit and not truly worshipping God, then God is going to despise our assembly.  We cannot gather together to worship God and hate our neighbor and live for material success above all else and still worship God.  Verse twenty-two says, Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts.  While the people of Israel lived in spiritual darkness, they may have felt that offering sacrifices to God would buy His favor, but God said it was not so.  A person may faithfully attend church and give their tithe or more, but this alone does not make them right with God.  If we are simply doing these things for self satisfaction, or thinking that we will buy God's favor by doing them, then God will not accept them.  We must first be right with God before we assemble together and give our tithes and offerings.  Verse twenty-three says, Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols.  Music might have been a part of their worship, but that did not mean God had to hear it.  We today may sing praises to God, but if the words have no real meaning to us, then they are no more than any other song that someone may sing.  Verse twenty-four states, But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.  God told the people of Israel what He wanted from them instead of empty worship.  God wants righteousness to rain down.  We, as followers of Christ, must be righteous in our relationship to everyone.  This does not apply to just our fellow believers, but to all people that we have dealings with.  Verse twenty-five asks, Have ye offered unto me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel?  God asked if during their wilderness wanderings if the people of Israel had offered Him sacrifices.  The answer was no, and yet God was still with them.  God's presence in the lives of His people was based on a relationship and not a ritual, and it still is today.  Verse twenty-six declares, But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and Chiun your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves.  Though the people of Israel had not been required to offer sacrifices to God in the wilderness, they now carried the tabernacle of false gods with them.  Anything that we allow to come between God and us becomes a false god to us, because it takes priority over our relationship with God.  Verse twenty-seven states, Therefore will I cause you to go into captivity beyond Damascus, saith the LORD, whose name is The God of hosts.  God pronounced His  judgment on the people of Israel.  They were to be taken away captive.  If we do not have a personal relationship with God today through faith in Christ, then we will be taken away captive to sin.