They lie down beside every altar on garments taken in pledge. In the house of their god they drink wine taken as fines. – Amos 2:8

Today’s Scripture Reading (June 19, 2013): Amos 2

I believe that the leaders of the church will answer someday for the way that we have handled the money that people have entrusted to us. Our culture has an incredible negative image of the church often because of the horror stories that have emerged over the last few decades of what we have done with people’s money. Stories of the air conditioned dog houses of ministry leaders have penetrated to the heart of many people’s image of the church. And the insane luxuries that some ministry executives have called their right were purchased from the offerings of people living on fixed incomes and concerned for the world in which they lived.

Amos speaks to the nation that he lives in and loves, and he says that they are under judgment for the way that they are handling the money (in the form of the possessions of the people –specifically the possessions of the poor) entrusted to them. Specifically, Amos seems to be connecting the current religious experience in 

Israel with the command of God in Exodus which specifically states that “If you take your neighbor’s cloak as a pledge, return it by sunset, because that cloak is the only covering your neighbor has. What else can they sleep in? When they cry out to me, I will hear, for I am compassionate” (Exodus 22:26-27.) Amos was watching the church and the idolatry of the priests that were taking the cloaks from the people (as a pledge of payment) and then they were laying these same cloaks down beside the altar and then eating on top of them. At this point in history, people would recline beside a table and eat the food. And in this case, the priests were using the altar of God as if it was a common dinner table, and they were taking the cloaks of people and lying them down on the ground while they were eating – apparently they were afraid that they might get the floor of the temple dirty and so they protected the floor with the cloaks that they had taken in as a pledge. And if they were using them to eat on, they were not returning the cloaks so that the people would have something to keep them warm at night. And the cry of the people had gone up to God and then back down to Amos. Amos had heard the concern of God, and now the shepherd was about to call out the religious structure of the nation.

This might have been the reason why Amos was given the task rather than someone from within the established church. The church had been compromised and it needed to be someone from outside the church that confronted the church with the message.

As hurt as I am by some of the things that people like Bill Maher or Richard Dawkins might say about the church, I am willing to admit that they might have a message from God that I need to hear. And we deserve a lot of the criticism that the world holds for us. It is up to us to hear the message and make the change.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Amos 3