A WORD FOR TODAY, July 10, 2024
Peggy Hoppes
We pray you have been blessed by this daily devotion. If you received it from a friend, you can see other devotions and studies by visiting our website at www.awordfortoday.org.
Blessings. Peg
A WORD FOR TODAY, July 10, 2024
Lectionary Scriptures for July 14, 2024, Eighth Sunday after Pentecost: Amos 7:7-15; Psalm 85:(1-7) 8-13; Ephesians 1:3-14; Mark 6:14-29
“Surely his salvation is near those who fear him, that glory may dwell in our land.” Psalm 85:9, WEB
One of my favorite villages in England was a place called Lavenham. Lavenham is a delightful little town, with picturesque buildings and an interesting history. It is known as the crookedest town in England, and it lives up to its reputation. You can almost imagine that Dr. Seuss was the architect. Lavenham was built so fast and with so little care taken for foundations that over the years the homes have settled into something almost too silly to be real. They are crooked and misshapen, though somehow still standing.
It was at the height of its importance during Tudor England as a place that produced wool. The buildings were built quickly to house the workers necessary to produce the cloth. They were built in the typical half-timber style that was popular during that time, with walls made of large timber beams that stood vertically with small horizontal crosspieces that were covered in a plaster made with horsehair. It is funny to look at modern American examples of “Tudor” houses, because they are built with solid walls and then pretty boards are nailed to the outside as a decorative enhancement, nothing like a real Tudor building.
While wandering through this quaint village, I wondered how the residents could even live in some of those buildings. There is one whose main floor beam is at a very steep incline. Though I could not see the inside, I wondered if the furniture constantly slid to the lower side of the room. After reading today’s Old Testament lesson, I can almost imagine God as a building inspector standing in the middle of Lavenham with his plumb line, shaking His head at how topsy-turvy the buildings have become.
A plumb line is a very simple tool, used for millennia, to find the vertical line. It is especially helpful for building walls because it helps to keep the walls straight. A plumb line is simply a weight tied to the end of a string. The string is held at the top of the vertical and the weight is allowed to swing free until it stops. At that point, the line points directly to the center of the earth. All lines established from the plumb line will be parallel and the wall will be straight. If a builder tries to line up a stack of bricks using only his own eyes, it is likely that some of the levels will be slightly askew, making the whole wall lean. It only takes a tiny fraction of an inch on each level of brick for the wall to eventually topple. Every wall is dependent on every other wall. Everything inside is dependent on the walls being straight. The windows and doors will not fit properly if the walls lean. A leaning wall will not stand very long. Isn’t it amazing that a cheap, simple tool can be so important?
Israel was no longer the nation God had built. They had settled into lives in and of the world; they were worshipping the gods of their neighbors and bowing down to the wrong ruler. Bethel was a high holy place, the place of the royal cults. Elijah and Elisha had both tried to turn God’s people toward the LORD but had failed. Amos was also given the word of the LORD to take to the people of Israel.
The king of Israel was surrounded by teachers and prophets that were well educated and highly respected in their positions, particularly by the king. Amos, however, was a nobody. Amos had words for the king that the king and the people did not want to hear. Their time was short. They’d disobeyed the Lord and He was about to take matters into His own hands. They were not in line with His Word. The Lord promised to send a plumb line to measure His people, to see how well they stood. The Lord could have chosen a powerful man, an educated man, a gifted man. Instead, He chose Amos, who tells us that he takes care of sheep and sycamore trees. What did he know about politics? What did he know about religion? What did he know about the future?
I had a friend who wanted to attend Bible study, but she was concerned about the teachers available. She didn’t believe that someone who was not ordained could properly lead or teach a study in God’s Word. Unfortunately, most pastors do not have the time to prepare and teach studies on a regular basis, particularly on Sunday morning. They rely on gifted teachers to provide opportunities as they lead worship and preach. My friend had plenty of options, classes that were interesting and beneficial, but she was concerned about their lack of training.
I agree that we need to be very careful about who we accept as our mentors and teachers of the faith. We need to make sure the words that the teacher is speaking lines up with the Word of God. Walk into any bookstore and you’ll find hundreds of books from authors claiming to have authority from God to guide people in the faith, many of which are written by false or questionable teachers. I am very careful when I recommend a book to the students in my class because I can see the falsehoods, but many are not familiar enough with the scriptures to know when something has been twisted.
I learned this lesson a few years ago when I recommended a book to a friend. She was very excited when she saw me after reading the book and had accepted what she read as equal to scriptures, even though it was only roughly based on the narrative of Christ and founded on one man’s vision of Jesus’ story. It was an interesting book, and unique perspective on the passion of Jesus, but it wasn’t scripture. Some reviewers even called it fiction. I shared another story with her that was similar in genre but interpreted the story of Jesus completely opposite of the first book. I reminded her that the foundation of our faith is not the books or visions of human beings, but the Word of God as found in the Bible.
The problem is that we need to be familiar enough with the scriptures so that we can discern between truth and the twist. The twist is what got us into the trouble in the first place. The serpent questioned Adam and Eve’s understanding of God’s words. “Did God really say...?” he asked. Eve then answered with her own thoughts on the matter, not with God’s true word. She was fooled into believing what the serpent wanted her to believe. False teachers can do the same. Satan even tested Jesus with that kind of twist during His wilderness wandering. “If you are the Son of God...” he said and then twisted the scriptures to meet the temptation. Jesus answered with the truth.
My friend was right to be concerned; she was not familiar enough with the Bible to be certain that she would avoid falling for the twists. However, she was foolish to think that only the ordained can be her teacher, because there are false teachers willing to twist God’s Word to make it fit their own agenda or ideology even among ministers.
How did Amos have the authority to speak God’s Word? He was just a simple shepherd, but that’s exactly why he was chosen to take this message to the king and God’s people. It was a message he really didn’t want to take. As a matter of fact, Amos argued with God about his calling, convincing God to relent from two previous visions. Finally, the Lord showed Amos a plumb line, which symbolized how Israel was out of whack. A leaning wall must be destroyed and rebuilt. Amos was that plumb line; he was the one sent to the people to warn them of what is to come.
Amos lived in the age of Jeroboam whose ideas were firmly ensconced in Israel. The high places had altars to other gods and were a part of the daily life of the people in Beth-el. The king supported the other gods, and the priest served them. Amaziah was not a prophet after God’s own heart but after his own power and position. He claimed that Amos was raising a conspiracy, but when the king did not do anything, he accused Amos of being a charlatan. Amos’s words were not easy to hear. His words threatened the end of their cozy regime.
Amos answered the exaggeration, the accusation and the condemnation with the truth. He did not go for the money or for the power as the other prophets would do. He went to Beth-el, the king’s sanctuary, to tell God’s people the truth. The message seems graceless; it was a message of destruction. Yet, the skewed wall had to go, it was separating God from His people. The plumb line would bring destruction of the wall that was in God’s way: the hard hearts of His people. God was about to destroy that which stood between He and His people.
The response to Amos’s prophecy is typical. “Don’t rock our boat, don’t say such horrible things about the king’s haven.” Amaziah told the king about the things Amos was saying and warned him that it wouldn’t be helpful for the people to hear about the king’s death and their exile. Then he told Amos to go prophesy somewhere else.
You can almost hear Amos laughing at the words of Amaziah. He answered, “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet’s son; but I was a herdsman, and a farmer of sycamore figs; and Yahweh took me from following the flock, and Yahweh said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’” Amos didn’t have a choice about his audience or his message; God sent him to speak the truth. He couldn’t say whatever sounded good. Unfortunately, many of the false prophets gave the king warm fuzzies so that he’d feel good, and the people would feel secure. Amos had to tell them all that they were wrong. Amos was the plumb line showing God’s people that they were not lining up to God’s Word.
I can understand my friend’s reluctance to attend a study with someone she was not certain would teach god’s Word. It is so easy to get confused when there are conflicting ideas. Who should the king listen to - Amaziah or Amos? Amaziah made the king feel good and Amos threatened his life. We would rather hear the warm fuzzies any day, but we all need to hear the truth.
God’s Word acts as a plumb line for our lives, although most of us would rather just use our best judgment to make things straight. Unfortunately, we are no better at walking that straight line than we are at building a brick wall. We will veer our own way because we always think we know best. We don’t want to hear what God has to say, especially if it is different than our point of view.
John the Baptist did what God sent him to do. He preached to the people and called them to repentance. He told them they were sinners. He baptized the people for forgiveness of their sin. He is not the type you might expect to be speaking God’s Word. He lived a most unusual life; he was not concerned about the normal cares of the world. He ate odd food, wore strange clothing, and lived in the desert. I can imagine that John was like the odd transient who wanders the streets of the city mumbling to himself, engaging people who catch his eye with frightening images of doom. He was probably not the charismatic type, drawing people to himself because of the words he spoke or the impression he made. The description of John makes us uncomfortable because his appearance and ministry seem so frightening.
People flocked to him, though. And they listened. And they were baptized, but many were not being baptized because they believed what they heard. When John called the gathering crowds a brood of vipers, he knew that they were just following today’s trend. They were doing it because it was the in thing to do. After all, if the king is listening to John, he must have something to say. If a little water will make everything alright, why not get wet? This happens today, too, as people buy the latest, greatest book by the author that promises to give us all the answers. It is amazing how often those books are counted as equal to scripture,
Herodias, the villainess in this story, knows that John is far more dangerous than he appears. She knows that the word he is speaking is true, and she does not want him to be heard. She knows that her husband is listening. His heart was not yet changed, but her life would be ruined if the Word took root. Changes in his heart could mean changes for all of Israel; after all, he was the king. Would John’s preaching bring the wrath of Rome on their heads? Would she be set aside because their marriage came from sin? It is no wonder that she hated John. She knew the truth of what he was saying.
John’s story is ugly. He was not what we would describe as a superstar. He was rough, wild, and probably not beautiful. He preached wrath. He talked about sin. In his story, the truth is ugly. The truth is also ugly in Amos’s story. He warned the people that their sacred places would be destroyed and that the king would die by the sword. He also warned that the people would be sent into exile. No wonder Amos did not want to be a prophet. We do not see John rejecting his calling, but I doubt he enjoyed being a prophet of doom.
I certainly don’t want to be either Amos or John.
Despite the ugliness of the words from John and Amos, however, there is peace in them. How much better is our life when we live within the grace of God? John and Amos called God’s people back into a relationship. The destruction was meant to break the divide between God and His people. Exile might seem harsh, but during that time God’s people remembered and returned to Him. John’s words might have seemed harsh, but he was preparing the people for God’s grace to truly change the world. There is peace on the other side of repentance, because there we stand once again in the presence of God.
We deserve to hear the words of Amos and John because we are no different than the people in their days. If God held a plumb line to our lives, He would find us crooked. Unfortunately, the bricks of our life our not always placed along the plumb line of God’s Word. We make decisions based on our own agenda or opinion. We follow our hearts rather than the reality of God’s Word. We ignore the ugly truth and seek after the warm fuzzies that make us feel good. Sometimes we simply do what we think we have to do for our own selfish reasons. There are times when we do whatever we can to get our way, even if we have to sacrifice something or someone along the way. We throw tantrums, tell little white lies, manipulate the circumstances, and flaunt emotion. We make people feel guilty or try to convince them that our way is the only way and that if they disagree then there must be something wrong. We even hang salvation on our own human desires. This is why it is vital to constantly rely on the Holy Spirit and the scriptures to keep us on the right path. This is why it is important to find teachers who stand firm on God’s Word; not people who live up to our standards, but who are called and gifted to speak the truth.
God is able to use the weak to accomplish great things. He is able to use even us. We might be crooked, but in His kingdom it doesn’t matter. Christian faith is not about us. It isn't about our desires. It isn’t even about our needs. It is about God’s faithfulness. He made promises that He will keep. The stories of Amos and John remind us that life in God’s kingdom is hard. Yet, there is peace in that harshness, in the ugliness we experience. Despite the ugliness, we live in hope, knowing that God is faithful. We live in peace knowing that God can and will accomplish amazing things even when it does not seem possible to us.
God’s grace seems hard to find in the texts this week. Amos’s message has no promise of forgiveness or salvation. They don't listen to him and try to send him away. John is imprisoned and beheaded for speaking God's Word. It really is not a pleasant thing to be a prophet for God. The only mention of Jesus in today’s Gospel lesson is an assumption by Herod that He was someone else.
The Psalmist has an answer to the question about God’s grace. “Surely his salvation is near those who fear him, that glory may dwell in our land.” Israel had no fear of God. Jeroboam was more concerned about his false gods and his special city. Amaziah was afraid of Jeroboam and the people weren’t interested in bad news. Herod was more afraid of his wife, her daughter, the opinion of his guests, and his superstitions than God. And then he feared Jesus was a ghost. None of them cared what the prophets had to say. John came to point toward Jesus, and once John was in prison Jesus began to preach the kingdom of God to all who would hear.
The Psalm offers hope in the midst of these disturbing stories. God’s grace is there for those who will listen, “I will hear what God, Yahweh, will speak, for he will speak peace to his people, his saints; but let them not turn again to folly.”
Then the psalmist wrote, “Mercy and truth meet together. Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. Truth springs out of the earth. Righteousness has looked down from heaven.” I love the image in these two verses and how they describe our Lord Jesus. The fullness of all the good things in heaven and earth - mercy, truth, righteousness and peace - come together in Him. Some translations use the phrase “love and faithfulness meet together.” This is what Paul meant in Ephesians 1:10 when he wrote, “...to sum up all things in Christ, the things in the heavens and the things on the earth, in him.” Jesus is where heaven and earth meet, where love and faithfulness meet together. In Him all good things come together for the sake of those who listen. Jesus is God’s glory come to earth; He came to minister to the people, save them from themselves, and give them peace.
We are adopted as sons in the kingdom that Jesus preached, so Paul assures us that we are seen as holy and blameless in the eyes of God. We are given with every spiritual blessing through Jesus so that our lives will glorify God. We are saved, forgiven by the blood of Christ when we hear the words of those who speak the Word of God into our lives. Paul brings it all together with another promise: “In him you also, having heard the word of the truth, the Good News of your salvation - in whom, having also believed, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is a pledge of our inheritance, to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of his glory.” This is the truth that will set us free to be all God is calling us to do, even when it seems ugly.
Truth is beautiful, even if the words do not seem so, because truth leads us to a right relationship with God. It is in that relationship that we truly find peace.
We have been adopted as sons and daughters of the King, given everything we need to do His work in the world. It won’t be easy; we might end up suffering for His sake. But we can do all things for His glory because we know that God has promised forgiveness and eternal life. And we know He is faithful. So, let us always live in the truth, repent when we fail, and stand with God even when it seems we must stand against the rest of the world to do so.
If God held his plumb line against each of us this day, He would easily find fault, so much so that it might seem like our lives and future are hopeless. The fate of the Israelites that refused to listen seemed hopeless; God offered no forgiveness through Amos. The fate of Herod seemed hopeless; he could not imagine forgiveness from John after beheading him.
We are blessed, though, because God’s plumb line for us is Jesus. He sees us through Jesus-colored glasses, and therefore does not see our crooked walls when we dwell in Christ. We are sealed with the Holy Spirit and guaranteed the inheritance He has promised. The Holy Spirit works constantly in our lives, conforming us to be like Jesus. In Christ we know God’s mercy and truth, for it has been revealed in the One who brought heaven and earth together, the one who redeemed us by His blood and made us sons and heirs to the Kingdom of God.
We may not want to be like John the Baptist or Amos. We may not want to speak those words of repentance and prophecy death and destruction. We would rather sing with the psalmist about peace. But grace is found in the truth of God’s word, and whatever words He puts in our mouth will be filled with grace and hope and peace. In those words, will be a promise of salvation to all who hear and respond in faith. And then God’s glory will shine throughout the land.
A WORD FOR TODAY is posted five days a week – Monday through Friday. The devotional on Wednesday takes a look at the scripture from the Revised Common Lectionary for the upcoming Sunday. A WORD FOR TODAY is posted on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pages/A-Word-for-Today-Devotional/339428839418276. Like the page to receive the devotion through Facebook. For information and to access our archives, visit http://www.awordfortoday.org
|