Amos 7:7–15
Psalm 85:8–13
Ephesians 1:3–14
Mark 6:14–29
Year B
I.N.I.
Whatcha doing this summer?
Whatch ya reading lately?
Summertime reading lists usually include romance novels, pulp fiction, or magazines off that rack while lazing on the beach. Included on our family’s summer to do list is to see the latest Harry Potter film release as close to its opening as possible, to see how it captures J. K. Rowling’s depiction of the wizard world and Harry’s battle against “He who will not be named.”
While summer is a great time to kick back, seek diversion from the daily grind or school, the prophet Amos is not what you call an easy read.
If you are reclining while reading Amos, you will find yourself suddenly straightening up.
If you start to laugh at a thought that enters your brain, Amos will stop your smirking and you will find yourself with a straight face.
Amos is a little guy with a big mouth.
His concern is justice, with a capital J, not fairness for “just us” but in particular for those whom it easy to forget, the poor, those who are on the bottom being squashed, those for whom summer does not mean a time of leisure but who struggle for existence each day.
As the mouthpiece of God, Amos scolding is like ice water splashed on your face. This summer reading wastes no time, as chapter one verse 2 reads:
The Lord roars from Zion, and utters his voice from Jerusalem; the pastures of the shepherds wither, and the top of Carmel dries up. (Amos 1:2)
And then the diatribe begins, first indicting the neighbors of Israel, then turning to Israel itself (ooh, is Israel in trouble!)
They hate the one who reproves in the gate, and they abhor the one who speaks the truth. Therefore because you trample on the poor and take from them levies of grain, you have built houses of hewn stone, but you shall not live in them; you have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine. (Amos 5:10-12)
Seek good and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of hosts, will be with you, just as you have said. Hate evil and love good, and establish justice [there’s that J word] in the gate; it may be that the Lord, the God of hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph. (Amos 5:14-16)
Alas, for those who lie on beds of ivory, and lounge on their couches, and eat lambs from the flock, and calves from the stall; who sing idle songs to the sound of the harp, and like David improvise on instruments of music; who drink wine from bowls, and anoint themselves with the finest oils, but are not grieved over the ruin of Joseph! (Amos 6:4-6)
Have you heard enough? Are you rethinking your summer? Would you like me to go away for a few Sundays?
If I could have just a few more minutes, I would like to say that it takes courage to speak truth to power, like little Amos with the big mouth said to king Jeroboam, like John the Baptizer said to Herod, like Rosa Parks who because of her skin color was asked to move to the rear of the bus and instead said “no, my feet are tired.”
Amos risked banishment for his scolding the comfortable.
John risked the loss of his head for being the conscience of King Herod.
Rosa Parks, and others like her risked jail, beatings, and lynching for their demands for justice with a capital J, for all.
I count myself today among the comfortable, who need to be reminded that what I have is not mine to hoard or lord over others. Having it all does not make one either happy or secure, as this year of economic instability has taught us. Peter Gomes, wise Harvard Preacher, offers this sage advice:
The good life, as people are discovering more and more, is simply not good enough. When virtue is divorced from value, everyone suffers, but they suffer most who thought that possession would lead to pleasure and security. They require a new concept of wealth, and there is one ready and waiting for them in the Bible (should this be included in summertime reading?). Wealth is not what you have; wealth is what you have been given that enables you to give to others. This is what the Bible calls “being rich toward God….” (The Good Book, pp 309-310).
Being rich toward God is the value that I think is worth repeating or reading about this summer. The good life or abundant life is really living toward the kingdom that God gives. Here, the banquet is not just a birthday bash that the elite gather around for entertainment’s sake like Herod, but isa feast is laid out for all, rich and poor, elite and oppressed, as the resources for life are shared.
This is the value that Jesus brought and lived and died for. In contrast to Herod’s banquet that served John’s head on a platter, in the next weeks we will be hearing about food for the hungry that Jesus presided over, serving thousands who were straining to hear good news. In Jesus, the wretched poor and the comfortable rich alike saw that God cared about justice with a capital J and mercy with a capital M. Jesus’ way of teaching, scolding, loving, and living also involved risk and ended in death, in a way that paralleled John’s own.
Here in our solemn assembly our weekly meal of bread and wine becomes an abundant feast as we lay down our own idolatries of consumption and greed, as we renounce our amnesia for the poor and hungry, and as we discover as if for the first time the gift of forgiveness and new beginnings offered by our association with Christ, who became poor for our sake.
What are you reading this summer? Would you tell someone that today you dabbled into the prophet Amos, and that it was a kind of biblical thriller?
Would you say that it kept you on your toes and reminded you that justice is for all?
Would you say that you revised your financial goals to include that your ultimate value is to be rich toward God?
Or how about that you ate very well, knowing as if for the first time, forgiveness and new beginnings because of this Sundays assembly’s association with Christ?
I.N.I.
The Rev. Timothy J. Keyl, Pastor
Christ the King Lutheran Church
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