Phew! Amos

My daily Bible readings in the past week took me reeling through the book of Amos. The prophet's judgement on the people of God is lacerating. The notes comment how Jesus confronted those who were rich in possessions but poor in compassion...much in Amos mirrors the modern world, especially the affluent church. Are we content to sing 'idle songs' (Amos 6:5) while the foundations crack?

The gospel of God's redeeming love in Jesus is packed with good news. I think of the songs we sang in church last Sunday., full of praise and affirmation that God is for us and not against us. And it's amazingly true, 'There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus..' (Rom 8:1).Profoundly glorious justification truth. Yet, as the Amos bible notes say: 'God is not fooled. He is the master of the universe, but his pained concern is local: the poor are crushed at the gate and the innocent denied justice. Worship not flowing into justice is not worship at all. God is righteous, not religious. He desires living relationship not performance.'

Put bluntly, ethics matter to God. For us, Christly behaviour matters to our Lord - personally and in our Christian communities. What a challenge this brings when culture shrieks a different morality.

One verse in Amos is particularly chilling (8:11) that a famine is coming not of bread or water 'but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord'.  People will search for it but they will not find it. Divine silence. I remember hearing the distinguished homiletician Fred Craddock say that too much contemporary preaching is about God, too little is proclaiming God. For proclaiming God's word straight not only (as the saying goes) comforts the distressed but also discomforts the comfortable. Sometimes there's rebuke from a loving Father! That's difficult to preach and very difficult to hear.