Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Devotion - Monday, December 1

The prophets served as court jesters - walking the line between speaking the painful truth and avoiding getting the King angry enough to silence them (usually by killing them.)  The prophets spoke poetically about the very real problems they saw.

These early days of Advent have me reading Amos.  I would encourage you to read along.  Amos speaks to the Kings, and to the loyal subjects, about the hope and promise God felt in establishing a chosen people.  That hope has been compromised; the promise has not come to every member of the family.

Systemic evil is more difficult to address than individual morality.  Talk of systemic evil does not allow us to say "The preacher is talking to someone else."  I realized this past summer, in response to a sermon I preached, that systemic evil is a subject we do not want to talk about in worship.

Systemic evil involves the structures and rules which protect the way of life of some while diminishing the lives of others.  Systemic evil quickly becomes political (remember that politics refers to the process of negotiating our course of action.  Politics only becomes partisan when we become ideologically blind.)

During the season of Advent, I hope you will examine the ways in which you could be more moral or ethical.  But the magnitude of the Christmas Story (star in the sky; astrologers from the East; angels singing to the shepherds) reminds us that Messiah's arrival is about much more than whether we use four-letter words to express ourselves.

The prophets saw how some were lying on beds of ivory while others were going hungry.  The prophets' words should help us see the realities of our world and time.

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