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Uncomfortable Truths - Tanya Regli
Sermon by Tanya Regli for the seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 10.
Today's readings are:
Amos 7:7-15
Psalm 85:8-13
Ephesians 1:3-14
Mark 6:14-29
Readings may be found at https://www.lectionarypage.net/YearB_RCL/Pentecost/BProp10_RCL.html
Transcript:
When I was 14 I learned how to lay brick. The most important part wasn't sliding the mortar off my trowel onto the brick, it was the plumb line. It's string with a weight at the bottom that uses gravity to get an accurate vertical line so you can keep level. If I didn't stay level it would impact the integrity of the entire house. I constantly had to check the plumb line and redo a brick if it was not level. So, the plumb line in today's reading from Amos, set in the middle of God's people, the nation of Israel, showed that they had turned away from justice and righteousness. Instead living lavishly while oppressing the poor and crushing the needy. I can't help but imagine a plumb line set in the middle of our nation. How would we fare? Would our house be level?
Amos knows the house of Israel was not level. In the chapters before this one, Amos clearly communicates God's anger at Israel, for not being righteous. And, remember, this isn't Amos saying what he thinks - this is God speaking through him. And he clearly made the priests and others in his community very, very upset.
The Israelites didn't listen - but they must have recognized some truth in what he said, or else he would have been cast out or succumbed to the same fate as John the Baptist. Later on in the Old Testament, we learn that Amos actually sets a precedent that saves Jeremiah's life almost 150 years later when Jeremiah also prophesies the destruction of Israel. The priests are reminded "hey,remember that guy Amos that said the same thing? We didn't kill him so we should spare Jeremiah too."
The message of Amos and Jeremiah was preserved and got written down because the destruction of the nation of Israel did happen, and the destruction resulted in the Babylonian Exile. A great trauma taught the Israelites the value of the words of the prophets, bequeathing to us a plumb line of moral and ethical guidance that we, as Christians, can also use in our lives.
That is not to say we should think of Biblical prophecy as something akin to telling the future. Prophecy is more vital; it is God communicating a difficult truth in order to give us an opportunity to change. Sometimes we are able to grasp that difficult truth and make that change. Perhaps it happens over time, or maybe we never hear it and we never change.
After Amos prophesies that God will destroy Israel, the priest Amaziah tells him to go earn a living as a prophet somewhere else. But Amos isn't a prophet, he's a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore trees. Which got me wondering, what exactly is "a dresser of sycamore trees?" It certainly isn't the tree, with dappled trunk, that lines my neighborhood street. Turns out it's a small tree, related to the fig, that requires pinching the stalks to help the fruit ripen. We have lots of measurements and data, like the plumb line. But perhaps along with that plumb line we also need "dressers of sycamores," those that pinch and guide us in our critical thinking so that we can grow and produce fruits of change that yield a more just society driven by the care and love of our neighbor.
That change may entail giving up your power in order that we may share with others.
Amos and John the Baptist certainly provide us with lessons in laying down one's life for God. What if King Herod had sacrificed some of his political power to say no, and defend John the Baptist? What if Amaziah the priest had advocated that King Jeroboam listen to Amos? Or if King Jeroboam had asked to understand and critically reflect on how things could change instead of viewing Amos as a threat?
In the book Holy Resilience: The Bible's Traumatic Origins, David Carr writes that the Babylonian Exile inadvertently "created an unusually highly literate exiled Judean community." One capable of being an "incubator for a set of scriptures that would long outlast" Babylon. Their struggle with the trauma of such a tremendous loss led them to transformation and an ability to finally learn from the words of the prophets. To come to a deeper understanding of righteousness and God's will.
And here we are, hearing those same words of prophets both old and new with an opportunity before us for transformation. We have certainly heard uncomfortable truths during the pandemic and during our recent social crises. Are we listening? Who are the prophets God is sending to us in this moment? What are the uncomfortable truths we need to learn from? Where is that plumb line to guide us? What are the forces that are pinching us and guiding us to grow? And how do we begin the transformation God is calling us to make? Amen.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-701187. All rights reserved.
Video, photographs, and graphics by the Church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. Episcopal Church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, 8000 St. Martin's Lane, Philadelphia, PA 19118. 215.247.7466. https://www.stmartinec.org
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By St. Martin-in-the-FieldsSermon by Tanya Regli for the seventh Sunday after Pentecost, Proper 10.
Today's readings are:
Amos 7:7-15
Psalm 85:8-13
Ephesians 1:3-14
Mark 6:14-29
Readings may be found at https://www.lectionarypage.net/YearB_RCL/Pentecost/BProp10_RCL.html
Transcript:
When I was 14 I learned how to lay brick. The most important part wasn't sliding the mortar off my trowel onto the brick, it was the plumb line. It's string with a weight at the bottom that uses gravity to get an accurate vertical line so you can keep level. If I didn't stay level it would impact the integrity of the entire house. I constantly had to check the plumb line and redo a brick if it was not level. So, the plumb line in today's reading from Amos, set in the middle of God's people, the nation of Israel, showed that they had turned away from justice and righteousness. Instead living lavishly while oppressing the poor and crushing the needy. I can't help but imagine a plumb line set in the middle of our nation. How would we fare? Would our house be level?
Amos knows the house of Israel was not level. In the chapters before this one, Amos clearly communicates God's anger at Israel, for not being righteous. And, remember, this isn't Amos saying what he thinks - this is God speaking through him. And he clearly made the priests and others in his community very, very upset.
The Israelites didn't listen - but they must have recognized some truth in what he said, or else he would have been cast out or succumbed to the same fate as John the Baptist. Later on in the Old Testament, we learn that Amos actually sets a precedent that saves Jeremiah's life almost 150 years later when Jeremiah also prophesies the destruction of Israel. The priests are reminded "hey,remember that guy Amos that said the same thing? We didn't kill him so we should spare Jeremiah too."
The message of Amos and Jeremiah was preserved and got written down because the destruction of the nation of Israel did happen, and the destruction resulted in the Babylonian Exile. A great trauma taught the Israelites the value of the words of the prophets, bequeathing to us a plumb line of moral and ethical guidance that we, as Christians, can also use in our lives.
That is not to say we should think of Biblical prophecy as something akin to telling the future. Prophecy is more vital; it is God communicating a difficult truth in order to give us an opportunity to change. Sometimes we are able to grasp that difficult truth and make that change. Perhaps it happens over time, or maybe we never hear it and we never change.
After Amos prophesies that God will destroy Israel, the priest Amaziah tells him to go earn a living as a prophet somewhere else. But Amos isn't a prophet, he's a herdsman and a dresser of sycamore trees. Which got me wondering, what exactly is "a dresser of sycamore trees?" It certainly isn't the tree, with dappled trunk, that lines my neighborhood street. Turns out it's a small tree, related to the fig, that requires pinching the stalks to help the fruit ripen. We have lots of measurements and data, like the plumb line. But perhaps along with that plumb line we also need "dressers of sycamores," those that pinch and guide us in our critical thinking so that we can grow and produce fruits of change that yield a more just society driven by the care and love of our neighbor.
That change may entail giving up your power in order that we may share with others.
Amos and John the Baptist certainly provide us with lessons in laying down one's life for God. What if King Herod had sacrificed some of his political power to say no, and defend John the Baptist? What if Amaziah the priest had advocated that King Jeroboam listen to Amos? Or if King Jeroboam had asked to understand and critically reflect on how things could change instead of viewing Amos as a threat?
In the book Holy Resilience: The Bible's Traumatic Origins, David Carr writes that the Babylonian Exile inadvertently "created an unusually highly literate exiled Judean community." One capable of being an "incubator for a set of scriptures that would long outlast" Babylon. Their struggle with the trauma of such a tremendous loss led them to transformation and an ability to finally learn from the words of the prophets. To come to a deeper understanding of righteousness and God's will.
And here we are, hearing those same words of prophets both old and new with an opportunity before us for transformation. We have certainly heard uncomfortable truths during the pandemic and during our recent social crises. Are we listening? Who are the prophets God is sending to us in this moment? What are the uncomfortable truths we need to learn from? Where is that plumb line to guide us? What are the forces that are pinching us and guiding us to grow? And how do we begin the transformation God is calling us to make? Amen.
Permission to podcast/stream the music in this service obtained from One License with license #A-701187. All rights reserved.
Video, photographs, and graphics by the Church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields. Episcopal Church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, 8000 St. Martin's Lane, Philadelphia, PA 19118. 215.247.7466. https://www.stmartinec.org