Amos 7: 7--15

           

To Amos himself Amaziah said, >Go away, seer, take yourself off to Judah, earn your living there, and there you can prophesy!  But never again will you prophesy at Bethel, for this is a royal sanctuary, a national temple.= (12-13)  And they would not accept him.  But Jesus said to them, >A prophet is despised only in his own country and in his own house= (Mat. 13: 57).

            "As it was in the beginning,"

Now the earth was a formless void, there was darkness over the deep, with a divine wind sweeping over the waters. (Gen. 1: 2)

            "is now, and ever shall be,"

What was, will be again, what has been done, will be done again, and there is nothing new under the sun! (Eccl. 1: 9)

            strife "without end.  Amen.  Amen."[1]

 

Of course, it is not like that in your Church, is it?  No turmoil, factious rancor, discord, spite, rejection.  Nothing but >Peace!  Peace!= (Jer. 6: 14)  Truly, there is a divine wind sweeping over the waters, raising up great waves that come crashing down upon themselves, spewing up foam and spray, then subside and flatten out beneath the next.  But the divine wind is not in the water.

 

·        But Yahweh took me as I followed the flock, and Yahweh said to me, AGo and prophesy to my people Israel.@  So now listen to what Yahweh says (15-16a). 

 

But they are a stubborn people, as God remarked last week, and will not listen.  Even so, AGo and prophesy to my people@, the Church.  Many will hear.  Some will listen.

 

Psalm 85: 8--13

           

Let me hear what God the LORD will speak, for [YHWH] will speak peace to [the LORD's] people, to [the] faithful, to those who turn to [God] in their hearts.  Surely [YHWH's] salvation is at hand for those who fear [the LORD], that [God's] glory may dwell in our land. (8-9, NRSV)[2]

 

Eph. 1: 3--14

Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all the spiritual blessings of heaven in Christ.  Thus [God] chose us in Christ... to be holy and faultless before him in love, marking us out... to be adopted [children], through Jesus Christ. (3..5a)

·        [T]o the praise of the glory of [God's] grace, [the] free gift to us [is] the Beloved, in whom, through [Jesus'] blood, we gain our freedom, the forgiveness of our sins. (6-7)

And it is in [Christ] that we have received our heritage, marked out beforehand as we were, under the plan of the One who guides all things... by [God's] own will (11).

           

Now you too, in [Christ], have heard the message of the truth and the gospel of your salvation, and having put your trust in it you have been stamped with the seal of the Holy Spirit of the Promise (13).

 

It matters nothing at all which human being put these words on paper; they are the Word of God, and they are true.  It matters nothing at all which human being reads these printed words; they are the Word of God, and they are true.  That which does matter is this, and this alone: you too, in [Christ], have heard the message of the truth and the gospel of your salvation, and [have] put your trust in it.  What matters is that you believe in Jesus.  Then they said to him, >What must we do if we are to carry out God=s work?=  Jesus gave them this answer, >This is carrying out God=s work: you must believe in the one he has sent.= (Jn. 6: 28-29)

 

It matters nothing at all what the agnostic and heretic leaders of the Church Fundamental may proclaim, even though they quote the Scripture to their purpose (following their paradigm).  It is not they who determine whom the sovereign Lord God Almighty shall redeem in Christ.  Rather, they speak as did Amaziah, for they are priest[s] of Bethel[3] (Amos 7: 10), not of God the LORD.

 

Let me hear what God the LORD will speak, for [YHWH] will speak peace to [the LORD's] people, to [the] faithful, to those who turn to [God] in their hearts. 

 

·        God, being rich in faithful love, through the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our sins, brought us to life with Christ-- it is through grace that you have been saved-- and raised us up with [Christ] (Eph. 2: 4-6a).

 

Mark 6: 14--29

           

So, good friend, in Whom do you believe and put your trust?  With whom, in this story, do you most closely associate yourself?  Herod the king?  Herodias, his stolen wife?  Salome, her daughter?  The bodyguard?  Or have you been told-- or made-- to cease to prophesy?

 

Surely [YHWH's] salvation is at hand for those who fear [the LORD], that [God's] glory may dwell in our land.