<\/strong><\/strong>Today\u2019s readings abound in possibilities, including the possibility that we will suffer serious consequences if we deviate from God\u2019s vision of Shalom.\u00a0 According to the readings from Psalms and Amos, there is both a promise and threat in our relationship with God.\u00a0 Openness to God\u2019s vision opens us to lively and transformative energies and contributes to the healing the world.\u00a0 Closing off to God\u2019s vision dilutes and weakens the divine energy available to us.\u00a0 We may consider ourselves spiritual, religious, or both but be heading away from God\u2019s vision for our lives and our world.<\/p>\nAmos has harsh words to say to the upper classes of his nation.\u00a0 His vision of divine retribution seems all too human, too anthropomorphic, and yet it nevertheless gives us pause in light of our own role in planetary destruction.\u00a0 God will wreak vengeance on those who turn away from justice.\u00a0 Sadly, much of the nation\u2019s waywardness is intentional.\u00a0 The lenders and proprietors know exactly what they are doing when they fix the scales, foreclose on farms, and drive farmers and their dependents into poverty and servitude.\u00a0 Their greed deadens them to the pain they are causing.\u00a0 Perhaps, they justify it with phrases such as \u201cnothing personal,\u201d \u201cjust business,\u201d or \u201cif I don\u2019t do it someone else will.\u201d There is a cost to such waywardness: worldly success, based on the sufferings of others, will boomerang back on the perpetrators, eventually destroying their souls as well as their largesse.<\/p>\n
Amos speaks of a famine of hearing the word of God.\u00a0 Persons will seek God.\u00a0 They will attend workshops and retreats, donate to congregations, attend services, and learn spiritual practices, but remain spiritual famished.\u00a0 Authentic faith involves seeking justice as well as attending worship services and supporting your church.\u00a0 Without justice seeking, even the most beautiful worship centers and religious services are shams.<\/p>\n
Recently, I saw a sign in a Cape Cod art boutique announcing \u201chonk, if you create good.\u201d\u00a0 This is a newcomer to a series of bumper sticker conversations, initiated by \u201chonk, if you love Jesus\u201d and then inspiring \u201cif you love Jesus, seek justice; any fool can honk!\u201d\u00a0 Amos would align himself with the first and third maxims: faithfulness to God involves creating good, and creating good involves seeking justice for vulnerable people.<\/p>\n
The words of Amos and Psalm 52 are unsettling to affluent churchgoers and spiritual seekers.\u00a0 Many of us don\u2019t intentionally contribute to the impoverishment of others.\u00a0 Still, we are part of a system which rewards wealth and punishes poverty.\u00a0 While the prophet would surely support effective and efficient governmental practices, the prophetic vision challenges any governmental, economic, or institutional practice that benefits the wealthy at the expense of the most vulnerable members of society.\u00a0 Our current penchant for reducing programs for children, unemployed persons, and single parents living on the economic bubble would scandalize Amos and should scandalize us as well.\u00a0 In contrast to many of today\u2019s political leaders, Amos would likely support tax breaks and reductions for upper middle class and wealthy persons only if<\/em> poor and vulnerable are first supported and have reached a modest, but reasonable, standard of living, housing, health care, and education.\u00a0 The needs of the poor come before tax benefits for wealthy corporations or individuals.\u00a0 Amos would be revolted by impersonal foreclosures and plant closings that benefit stockholders while leaving communities in chaos.<\/p>\nSimilar to Proverbs 8 and John 1, the reading from Colossians 1 joins cosmology and Christology.\u00a0 Christ is global as well as personal.\u00a0 Christ is the principle of creativity, novelty, and evolution.\u00a0 The cosmic Christ joins natural causation, moral order, and spiritual maturity as intimately connected in the creative process.\u00a0 Christ\u2019s presence in our lives, to take a page from John Wesley, joins prevenient and sanctifying grace.\u00a0 God in Christ is ever-present as the power of personal and communal transformation, enabling us to experience God\u2019s glories in our lives as a result of our ongoing resonance with God\u2019s vision.<\/p>\n
The story of Mary and Martha describes the contemplative and active aspects of faith.\u00a0 Martha gets the short end of the gospel straw in the gospel passage, but without her Jesus would not been fed.\u00a0 The problem is that her action adds to the anxiety she and others experience.\u00a0 It gets in the way of an enjoyable evening among friends.\u00a0 She is distracted about many things.\u00a0 In contrast, Mary is totally focused on Jesus.\u00a0 This is her, and perhaps Martha\u2019s, calling in the present moment.\u00a0 Martha is so fixated on details of dinner that she, like many hosts and hostesses, forgets the reason for the meal altogether.<\/p>\n
The gifts of Mary and Martha are both necessary to authentic spirituality.\u00a0 Without the spirit of Martha, Mary\u2019s spirituality can become naval gazing and irrelevant to the needs of the world.\u00a0 Without the spirit of Mary, Martha\u2019s agency becomes anxious and polarizing.\u00a0 Holistic spirituality involves action and contemplation, social concern and personal spirituality.<\/p>\n
Pastor and congregation alike need to take Amos and Psalm 52 seriously and balance them with the more philosophical and contemplative passages from Colossians and Luke. Together they remind us that we need both yin and yang, prayer and protest, to energize our vocations as God\u2019s companions in saving the world locally and globally.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Adventurous Lectionary \u2013 Pentecost 9 \u2013 July 21, 2013 Texts: Amos 8:1-12; Psalm 52; Colossians 1:15-28; Luke 10:38-42 Today\u2019s readings abound in possibilities, including the possibility that we will suffer serious consequences if we deviate from God\u2019s vision of Shalom.\u00a0 According to the readings from Psalms and Amos, there is both a promise and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":213,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[82,56,74,73,35],"class_list":["post-700","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bible-study","tag-christianity","tag-lectionary","tag-sacred-texts","tag-spirituality"],"yoast_head":"\n
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