Sunday July 12, 2015
7This is what he showed me: the LORD was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand. 8And the LORD said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A plumb line.” Then the LORD said, “See, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel; I will never again pass them by; 9the high places of Isaac shall be made desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste, and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.”
10Then Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, sent to King Jeroboam of Israel, saying, “Amos has conspired against you in the very center of the house of Israel; the land is not able to bear all his words. 11For thus Amos has said, ‘Jeroboam shall die by the sword, and Israel must go into exile away from his land.'” 12And Amaziah said to Amos, “O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, earn your bread there, and prophesy there; 13but never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom.” 14Then Amos answered Amaziah, “I am no prophet, nor a prophet’s son; but I am a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees, 15and the LORD took me from following the flock, and the LORD said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel.’ – Amos 7:7-15
3Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, 4just as he chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before him in love. 5He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. 7In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace 8that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and insight 9he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, 10as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth. 11In Christ we have also obtained an inheritance, having been destined according to the purpose of him who accomplishes all things according to his counsel and will, 12so that we, who were the first to set our hope on Christ, might live for the praise of his glory. 13In him you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; 14this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God’s own people, to the praise of his glory. – Ephesians 1:3-14
17For Herod himself had sent men who arrested John, bound him, and put him in prison on account of Herodias, his brother Philip’s wife, because Herod had married her. 18For John had been telling Herod, “It is not lawful for you to have your brother’s wife.” 19And Herodias had a grudge against him, and wanted to kill him. But she could not, 20for Herod feared John, knowing that he was a righteous and holy man, and he protected him. When he heard him, he was greatly perplexed; and yet he liked to listen to him. 21But an opportunity came when Herod on his birthday gave a banquet for his courtiers and officers and for the leaders of Galilee. 22When his daughter Herodias came in and danced, she pleased Herod and his guests; and the king said to the girl, “Ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it.” 23And he solemnly swore to her, “Whatever you ask me, I will give you, even half of my kingdom.” 24She went out and said to her mother, “What should I ask for?” She replied, “The head of John the baptizer.” 25Immediately she rushed back to the king and requested, “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter.” 26The king was deeply grieved; yet out of regard for his oaths and for the guests, he did not want to refuse her. 27Immediately the king sent a soldier of the guard with orders to bring John’s head. He went and beheaded him in the prison, 28brought his head on a platter, and gave it to the girl. Then the girl gave it to her mother. 29When his disciples heard about it, they came and took his body, and laid it in a tomb. – Mark 6:14-29
In Ephesians, Paul makes reference to a word of truth. But I wonder how we know what a word of truth is. I recently saw a somewhat unscientific but nonetheless disturbing representation of how truthful certain television news outlets were. Some were more truthful than others – I won’t name names – but the disturbing thing is that none of them had a particularly high rate of truth. The best ones, at least in the very small sample size, were just over 50% of their stories being true or mostly true. How are we supposed to know the truth?
Though I haven’t heard as much of this lately, for a time there was a great deal of concern that our society was moving to a place of moral relativism, and people decried what might become of us without a firm moral standard for all people in all times and places. Though no such standard has ever really existed, there was a concern that we would not be able to find the truth. With so many people in so many cultures with so many diverse views on the world, how can we define the truth?
So as we turn to our readings for today, which are admittedly in competition for the most unusual choices in the whole 3-year cycle of the revised common lectionary, we ask what the standard is by which we judge what is true?
Is Herod’s truth real? In some ways we know the truth of this story. People in power use their influence to wine and dine others. People in power find themselves trapped between what they know to be right and what they know to be politically expedient. People in power use violence a little too freely. The story of John the Baptist’s beheading, inserted here as a rare flashback in the gospel narrative, is one kind of truth. Truth about the world as it is. And not just the truth about political leaders but the truth about who we are.
This story reminds us of our own capacity for violence. It reminds us of the ways in which we sometimes naively trust others to makes decisions for us. It reminds us of the ways we do damage to others with words and even sometimes with fists. It reminds us of the capacity we all have within us to violate what we know is right when the opportunity seems like a good one. It reminds us that political movements still literally behead people. Herod and his violence are one truth of our world – the truth of what is.
But what about the truth that the prophet Amos speaks about? It’s a little hard to catch what’s going on here on a first read of this short excerpt, but Amos, the country shepherd, has come to the center of political and religious power to speak out about the injustices against the poor. He has ticked off both the official temple prophet and the king, who are afraid that Amos is upsetting the apple cart. Amos’s message in this particular passage is that God is holding a plumb line to the people of Israel and finding them less than upright.
In Amos’s overall message is another truth: the truth of what could be, the way of justice that God has laid out for God’s people. Caring for the widows, orphans, and strangers. Leaving some grain in the fields to be gleaned by the needy. The forgiveness of debts on regular cycle. The provisions for rest and renewal built in to their lives. This is the way we are to live, Amos reminds Israel and reminds us. And we need Amoses in all times and places to point out the ways we are falling short, to remind us of the truth of what could be.
A word of caution: there are those who misuse this truth by running around holding it up as a way to blame, accuse, abuse, or shame individuals who aren’t living up. Whether it’s moral shaming on hot-button social issues, or political mudslinging about whose policies are worse for the flourishing of society, or simply using it to win an argument, all of us are guilty in one way or another of holding up the truth of what could be as a weapon or using it in judgment of others when we fail to hold ourselves to the same standards. Which is why I’m not sure the truth of what could be is the ultimate final forever truth of God either.
Because there is yet another truth. It’s the truth poured over us in the waters of baptism. Newly-baptized Ellie, like all of us, will soon enough discover the trouble of the world as it is. And she will grow in her baptismal calling to strive for justice and peace in all the earth – to work toward the truth of what could be. She will be a reflection of God’s divine work in the world, and she will fall short of perfection. She, like all of us, will straddle the line between what is and what could be for most of her life.
But what is true for us through baptism is not the world’s plumb line, and not even God’s plumb line of a just and peaceful world, but the plumb line of the cross. The measure of the God’s self-sacrificing love for the world. The truth of the way that God sees us and the way that God loves us. The truth of what Paul expresses in today’s reading from Ephesians: adoption as God’s children through Christ, a plan for the fullness of time to gather up all things in him, marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit as the pledge of our redemption as God’s own people.
This truth is love that sees what is and just how short we fall of what could be and yet remains love for us. It’s as if God holds up the plumb line and seeing how terribly far off we are calls us straight enough. Not excusing us from the hard work of justice and peace, in fact sometimes urging us all the more toward that work, but loving us and calling us children of God in spite of it.
I have a good friend who likes to say, “God draws straight with crooked lines.” That’s what I think today’s texts are all about. People who go astray and who get folded into the saving and redeeming work of Jesus Christ all the more. The powerful waters of baptism hold us up not to the world’s standards or the standards of justice and peace but to the love of God for us. And they propel us on a wild and wonderful journey with this rich and diverse community of faith filled with people from every place under the sun. Thanks be to God for this incredible grace.
-Pastor Steven Wilco
Stewarding the Word 