I hate all your show and pretense— the hypocrisy of your religious festivals and solemn assemblies. I will not accept your burnt offerings and grain offerings. I won’t even notice all your choice peace offerings. Away with your noisy hymns of praise! I will not listen to the music of your harps. Instead, I want to see a mighty flood of justice, an endless river of righteous living. [Amos 5.21-24]
I think most people see this as ancient, irrelevant writing. Many acknowledge "Israel" of the Bible, but fail to see that Israel represents all of those who "follow God" - those who are God's chosen. The words Amos wrote concerning Israel are words for the Church today.
Certainly, if God hated all your show and pretense when Amos wrote his prophecy, He still hates it today. But, how can we know that for sure? It's simple, really - God, Maker of all the universe, uses His creation to reveal his displeasure and judgment:
I brought hunger to every city and famine to every town. [Amos 4.6a]
I kept the rain from falling when your crops needed it the most. I sent rain on one town but withheld it from another. Rain fell on one field, while another field withered away. People staggered from town to town looking for water, but there was never enough. [Amos 4.7-8a]
I struck your farms and vineyards with blight and mildew. Locusts devoured all your fig and olive trees. [Amos 4.9a]
I sent plagues on you like the plagues I sent on Egypt long ago. I killed your young men in war and led all your horses away. The stench of death filled the air! [Amos 4.10a]
I destroyed some of your cities, as I destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. Those of you who survived were like charred sticks pulled from a fire. [Amos 4.11a]
What I left out, but what every one of the passages listed above ends with is the exact same phrase: “But still you would not return to me,” says the LORD.
What we call "nature" and "natural" are, in fact, servants of God. They are tools at His disposal to utilize at will to do His will and carry out His blessings or judgment. We even have the audacity to call these things "acts of God" without for a moment considering why God would act such a way!
In the midst of terrible events, "natural" disasters, and multiplied chaos, the Church today carries on in religious oblivion - still having our meetings, singing our songs... We call it "faith" or "persistence." All the while disasters public and private wreak death, theft and destruction while we haven't the slightest thought of repentance. What's more, we defend ourselves in our judgment. Then worse yet, we declare "Lord, Lord..." with no obvious results - teaching the same lessons and preaching the same sermons with neither signs of real change nor redemption from the judgments, only to meet up again next week to no avail. But, because we claim and sing about "faith" we only damn ourselves further in our pitiful condition.
Please don't misunderstand what is being said here. God wants us to live by faith. We like to use Abraham as an example of unfulfilled faith but fail to see that while Abraham remained faithful to one unfulfilled promise he still lived a life of protection and blessing otherwise! He was rich and he lived a good long life - he was blessed!
Abraham lived in blessing.
And yet, we "claim" to live in that blessing while death, theft, and destruction run rampant and unchecked among us. At what point do we just get real that what we are calling "faith" is just show and pretense because we are not walking in blessing, but curses of every kind?
Harsh? What is said here is not nearly so harsh as to depart this life in futile "faith" only to wake in the fires of hell because of our unrepentant attitude toward all the obvious signs of judgment all around us.
"But Christ..." I'm sorry, Jesus did not give us a free pass from living a life of REAL faith. The faith Jesus demonstrated as a model to us healed the sick, raised, the dead, multiplied food, and walked on water. Where do we get off calling "going to church" or "having a moving worship service" faith when disaster and chaos not only surround us, but exist unchecked in our midst? Where is the repentance when the weather wreaks havoc? Where is the repentance when cancer prevails? Where is the repentance when people are slaughtered all around us? When do we understand our accountability in these things? When do we repent?
To repeat, it's fine to quote Paul and say, "Christ has redeemed us from the curse..." (Galatians 3.13), but let's not be ridiculous hypocrites to claim this scripture all the while suffering curse upon curse in and around our lives! That is pure mockery. Amen?
Paul, in fact, warned Timothy of the very thing discussed here:
They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that! [2 Timothy 3.5]
The obvious problem with the Church today is unrepentance. The obvious signs of this are the curses the Church experiences every day along with the rest of the world. Amos's ancient message should frighten us to the bone inspiring repentance to that same core.
Father, may we quit excusing our cursed lives and start repenting! Help us to get emotion and self-justification out of it and just repent. Forgive me for my hypocrisy to claim faith having nothing to show for it...
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