"Tight lines" is a blessing fishermen offer each other, a wish for lines taut with the weight of good fish. May God grant that the lines written here be taut with His blessings.
Wednesday, 14 July 2010 | |||
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Hungry Ears | |||
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This past Sunday Beth and I went to hear Mendelssohn's "Elijah" at our community concert hall. Just before the orchestra began, the first sound we heard was a ringing phone coming over the sound system. It was a prelude to an announcement such as has become commonplace in movie theatres. "Please silence your cell phones and other electronic devices." And rightly so. How terribly distracting it would be to hear someone's Michael Jackson ringtone right in the middle of "If with all your heart, you truly seek me," or "He watching over Israel, slumbers not, nor sleeps." Recently I've heard about the "Sabbath Manifesto," which grew out of the "National Day of Unplugging," a suggestion that we all abstain from any use of communication technology (cell phone, computer, TV, etc.) for 24 hours. It seems like a good idea to carve out a little quiet and peace in life, and a space for reading, through a weekly sabbath from all electronic devices. One could almost imagine that if God were to speak from heaven or through a modern-day prophet to our world, that the very first word to us all might be what comes at the end of verse 3 in our text, Amos 8:1-12, "Silence!" Chapter 8 of Amos is a bit of a mixture of images and themes, but overall God is addressing a frenzied, hurried way of life that is bent on buying and selling and which ignores and exploits the needy. The first image of a basket of ripe fruit graphically introduces the announcement that God's time is ripe to judge Israel for its frantic, selfish lifestyle. God declaration of displeasure with those who observe the Sabbath while chomping at the bit to be back in business, and then to do business dishonestly, strikes close to home. Look at the oil companies suing the federal government to end the moratorium on offshore drilling and even Obama's own spill study commission saying that the moratorium will cause economic harm. There can be no rest from the need to produce and generate wealth. With computers at home and Blackberries and iPhones in our pockets, many of us can not get away for even a few hours from the need to work and be productive constantly. It's no wonder that even though the Bible is incredibly more available than ever before, even on those portable electronic devices, that even Christians read and understand it less and less. There's just no time. God through Amos clearly addresses Israel in the 8th century B.C. with the words, in verse 11, "The days are coming when I will send a famine through the land--not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord." It's a prediction of the time when in the midst of being overrun by the enemy Assyrians, the people of Israel will anxiously seek a word from God but will not receive it. Yet verses 11 and 12 might also reflect our own time, when overly noisy and busy lives effectively drown out God's voice and create in their own way a famine of the Word. The contrast and model for us appears nicely in the Gospel lesson from Luke 10:38-42, as we see Mary declining to be caught up in the frantic, busy work of Martha, but instead quietly sitting and listening to Jesus. Here I would suggest a moratorium on defending Martha in this text. Yes, work is necessary, and those who work hard are deserving of respect and assistance. And Martha has her own moment of spiritual profundity (see John 11:27). But Mary is the role model many of us need in the present day in order to hear God's Word in the midst of a culture and economy that has us constantly in motion and constantly listening to other sounds and voices. And the irony is that I'm tapping this out on my keyboard and if you read it, it will be via the same electronic media that is starving us of the voice of God. So I suggest your next act be to shut off the computer and get out your Bible. Peace. | |||
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I am the pastor of Valley Covenant Church in Eugene, Oregon. I love to flyfish and hike along the beautiful rivers in our area. I welcome your comments as I share sermon work in progress and occasional other thoughts.
Thank you for visiting this blog. I invite you also to visit my web page.
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