July 12, 2009
Amos 7:7-15
The Latin word for lead is plumbum. A system of lead pipes is called plumbing. Put a piece of lead weight at the end of a string and you have a plumb line. A plumb line can be used to measure the depth of a well or to make sure a wall or something is perfectly straight. It is often used when laying bricks. If something is plumb, it is straight, true, and honest.
In the Old Testament, there is a prophet named Amos. He had been a farmer and a shepherd, but the Lord God called him to a prophet. Amos 7:7-9,
7This is what [the Lord GOD] showed me: behold, 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, gAmos, what do you see?h And I said, gA plumb line.h Then the Lord said,
gBehold, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel;
I will never again pass by them;
9 the 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.h
The Lord was holding a plumb line and Amos could see that the people of Israel were not straight. They were crooked. Not only the country of Israel, but all the surrounding countries as well were out of plumb. Amos condemned the people for many things: injustice, greed, violence, war, not keeping the Law of God, unbelief and bad faith. At the time of Amos, the kingdom of David had been split, north and south. It was because these two countries of Judah in the south and Israel in the north had not kept the law of God that they were committing sins of injustice and greed. Amos had many visions and revelations which were like parables about how God would condemn the people. In todayfs text, the vision is a plumb line. The plumb line is held up against the Northern Kingdom of Israel. In the Southern Kingdom of Judah, there was only one temple in Jerusalem. But in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, there were many sanctuaries, high places, and in the City of Bethel, there was a temple to rival the temple in Jerusalem. Some of these sanctuaries were mixed with Baal idol worship. But perhaps the biggest problem was even those people who worshiped the True Lord God were crooked in their lives. They did not measure up to the Law of Moses and true faith in God.
Amos spoke the Word of the Lord. The Lord God said that he would abandon the Northern Kingdom, the people would be sent into exile, the temples and sanctuaries would be destroyed, and King Jeroboam would die by the sword. The people and the leaders did not like this Word. The priest of Bethel told him to leave Israel, to go back to his home in Judah and prophecy there. He did return to Judah and he wrote his prophecies in the book of Amos.
The New Testament prophet, John the Baptist was not allowed to escape. He was put in prison after condemning the sin of King Herod who had committed incest by marrying his brother Philipfs wife. Eventually John was beheaded because he spoke the Word of God.
Jesus too was a prophet. He spoke against the religious leaders of his country. He spoke against their greed and injustice. He said they were not straight, but crooked. He said that the greed and injustice were a result of their bad faith toward God. Jesus did not escape their jealousy and anger. Eventually Jesus was crucified. He was killed on the cross.
Do you think the cross of Jesus was straight up and down, perfectly vertical when it was raised on the Mount of Calvary? How would a plumb line look? I think that on that day, things were way out of line. There was the sin of the Jews who put him there; there was also our sin which had put him there. We are so crooked in our lives and faith and love that things are completely distorted. Nothing is straight. We do not always walk the straight and narrow. It was our sin there on the cross also.
Jesus died on the cross and was buried. The creed says that he descended into hell. Jesus took a measure of the depth of death. And then Jesus rose from the dead. He straightened things out between God and people. He forgave our sins. He made a direct line for our prayers. He gave us the Holy Spirit to build our lives in accordance with Godfs blue print, according to the Gospel, according to love.
Another measuring tool that is often used is the level. When the bubble is aligned, we know that things are straight up and down vertically or straight out horizontally. We measure other people. We measure their words and their deeds. We ask if they are really on the level. Are they really honest? We do not have a bubble in a glass tube, but we have the law of the land, the law of God, the Sermon on the Mount, and the Lordfs Prayer. And the measure we use against other people is also used against us.
Have you ever tried to make something level or plumb? You have to give it a bit of a push, a bit of a nudge, a gentle tap, sometimes a bit of filing or a bit of spackling, and finally, hopefully, things will be in alignment. That is the way the Holy Spirit works with us: Nudging us with the Ten Commandments, pulling us with the Gospel, giving us power through the Word and Sacrament, encouraging us through Christian friends. Sometimes we want our friends to get straightened out in their lives. If we used a plumb line, we might think that the best way might be to take that weighted end of the plumb line, the chunk of lead, and hit them over the head. But that is not the Gospel, Christian way. We may have to speak the word of Godfs law to them, but ultimately, it is the work of the Holy Spirit working through the word of Godfs love and grace and forgiveness and hope.
Finally, a bit of Japanese language study: The word for peace in Japanese is heiwa. The Chinese Character is •½˜aBHei means level. Wa means harmony. This is harmony where nothing is out of line. When we have peace with God, we are in harmony with God. We are not out of line. We are on the level with God. God is on the level with us too, he tells the truth in Jesus Christ. Our sin is forgiven. Salvation is the plan of God.
Peace! •½˜aI Heiwa! Amen.
Michael Nearhood, Pastor
Okinawa Lutheran Church
