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11 September 2007
Amos 5 v 21-27
The Lord says, "I completely hate your feasts; I cannot stand your religious meetings.
If you offer me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I won't accept them.
You bring your best fellowship offerings of fattened cattle, but I will ignore them.
Take the noise of your songs away from me! I won't listen to the music of your harps.
But let justice flow like a river, and let goodness flow like a stream that never stops.
"People of Israel, you did not bring me sacrifices and offerings while you travelled in the desert for forty years.
You have carried with you your king, the god Sakkuth, and Kaiwan your idol, and the star gods you have made.
So I will send you away as captives beyond Damascus," says the Lord, whose name is the God All-Powerful.
How do you think they would have felt hearing those words? How would you feel if someone said those things about your worship?
I guess it was probably a mixture of annoyance and anger. Perhaps some even thought it was ridiculous, after all their worship was elaborate, expensive, and within the traditions and laws. It's not so surprising that they eventually ask him to prophesy elsewhere.
Facing up to the question "What if our worship is not good enough?" is hard and intimidating. It raises one key question in our faith - are we acceptable to God?
Amos reminds Israel of their history, of their desert walking. Back then they were just surviving, there was no extravagant praise, no high tech worship, and they would have been unable to keep practices sacred. Here, where their worship should have been unacceptable Amos suggests the opposite.
In Luke 18 Jesus tells the story of two men, a priest and a tax collector, praying in the temple. Here are their two prayers.
"God, I thank you that I am not like other men - robbers, evildoers, adulterers, or even this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get."
"God have mercy on me a sinner"
Jesus said it was the tax collector who went home acceptable before God. Try reading both prayers out loud. Which do you relate to more?
Written by Beth Keith & Dan Cooper
Amos 5 v 21-27
The Lord says, "I completely hate your feasts; I cannot stand your religious meetings.
If you offer me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I won't accept them.
You bring your best fellowship offerings of fattened cattle, but I will ignore them.
Take the noise of your songs away from me! I won't listen to the music of your harps.
But let justice flow like a river, and let goodness flow like a stream that never stops.
"People of Israel, you did not bring me sacrifices and offerings while you travelled in the desert for forty years.
You have carried with you your king, the god Sakkuth, and Kaiwan your idol, and the star gods you have made.
So I will send you away as captives beyond Damascus," says the Lord, whose name is the God All-Powerful.
How do you think they would have felt hearing those words? How would you feel if someone said those things about your worship?
I guess it was probably a mixture of annoyance and anger. Perhaps some even thought it was ridiculous, after all their worship was elaborate, expensive, and within the traditions and laws. It's not so surprising that they eventually ask him to prophesy elsewhere.
Facing up to the question "What if our worship is not good enough?" is hard and intimidating. It raises one key question in our faith - are we acceptable to God?
Amos reminds Israel of their history, of their desert walking. Back then they were just surviving, there was no extravagant praise, no high tech worship, and they would have been unable to keep practices sacred. Here, where their worship should have been unacceptable Amos suggests the opposite.
In Luke 18 Jesus tells the story of two men, a priest and a tax collector, praying in the temple. Here are their two prayers.
"God, I thank you that I am not like other men - robbers, evildoers, adulterers, or even this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get."
"God have mercy on me a sinner"
Jesus said it was the tax collector who went home acceptable before God. Try reading both prayers out loud. Which do you relate to more?
Written by Beth Keith & Dan Cooper
