The Rev. Virginia W. Nagel
Ephphatha Parish of the Deaf
Episcopal Diocese of Central NY
Hate what is evil,
love what is right,
and see that justice prevails...
These words end our reading from Amos today, and they are the theme or text for today's lessons.
I suppose a good many people will listen to the reading from Amos and then to the reading from the Gospel and decide that today's central idea would be "to obey God's law." It's true that Amos is scolding the people of his time for their failure to obey the law. And it's also true that the rich young man who came up to Jesus asking how to be saved, claimed that he had obeyed all the law from his youth up. But that's surface talk. Today we are going to dig a bit below the surface and see what these two readings have to do with the idea of justice.
Almost everything in the Bible can be traced to two basic principles. The first is: Know who God is. The second is: Know who YOU are. Once we have these two things clear in our minds, all the rest of the Bible makes perfect sense. The trouble, of course, is that we tend to overlook or forget these two things: who God is and who we are. And that, of course, is why it is so important for all of us to read and understand our Bible.
God is the creator. He made the universe, including our world and everything in it, right down to the smallest mosquito, germ, or seed. And, of course, he made us. He still makes people. We all know that parents cannot start a child growing in its mother's body just because they want to. It only works if mother, father and God work together on the project. So: God is the Creator. We are his creatures, made by him.
If you make something, it is yours, unless, of course, you give it away. God hasn't given us away, and so we still belong to God.
If something belongs to you, you have the right to control it and use it according to your plans and purposes. Therefore God has the right to control us, and to make plans for the world and for society, and those plans include us. Now, God has given us free will, but he most certainly has NOT given us away! We are still his creatures, his children...beloved children, but HIS. In order to keep everything (including us) in the world working
harmoniously and smoothly, God gave us his Law. Probably the part of God's Law that most people know best would be the Ten Commandments, but most of the Bible is full of explanations of the Law and examples of how to live according to that Law, and explanations of special circumstances that might change the way we live the Law. And when we obey God's Law, we are pleasing to God.
Basically, justice means hating evil and trying to avoid doing anything wrong, and at the same time, loving what is good, and trying to do good. It really does not have much to do with the way the government works in most countries. All of us have a pretty good "gut feeling" for what justice really means. People are entitled to have what they need to live in a decent, safe and healthy manner: food, clothing, shelter. They are entitled to get fair treatment from other people. Helpless people need to be cared for, whether they are infants, small children, elderly widows, orphans, or someone who has been hurt or wrongly treated or who is too sick to look after themselves. The young, the weak, the elderly and the ignorant need to be looked after. That's justice.
Understand: we are entitled to what we need, not necessarily what we want . Winning the lottery isn't something we need to have a decent life. Winning a beauty contest isn't necessary to our existence. But things like a living wage, help for abused people, education for life, a safe and weatherproof place to live, and an adequate diet ARE justice. So is the provision of adequate medical care, and guidance and protection for those unable to manage their lives for themselves.
So...if everyone obeyed God's Law, these things would happen effortlessly and smoothly. And that, basically, is why we have God's Law. That's why we need to understand it and obey it.
Now, we come to the rich young man. He came up to Jesus and asked, What must I do to have eternal life? And Jesus got right to the heart of the matter. Just obey God's Law, he said. That's all it takes, really. If you do that, you'll have eternal life.
But, the young man said, I've been keeping the Law all my life, since I was a little kid. There must be something more!
And Jesus looked at him with love in his eyes. It was really too bad. This young man thought that you get eternal life by keeping rules. He didn't know that it goes deeper than that. Jesus decided to give him a shock treatment, rub his nose in the real meaning of God's Law. And so, he said: Go, sell all you have, and give the money to the poor, and come, follow me.
The young man went away, very sad and upset. He was very rich and he could not bear to think of getting rid of his money, fine house, beautiful clothes and everything else....being poor. So he went home, in great distress.
Now why do you think Jesus said that?
The young man was keeping all the rules he had been taught by his parents and the preachers. Why wasn't that enough?
What Jesus wanted the young man to figure out for himself (but the young man didn't get the point) was really very simple. It wasn't that being rich was so terrible. What was wrong with that was that he had more than he needed, and was not using his wealth to help people who did not have what they needed.
What's more, he overlooked the fact that he, himself, belonged to God, and that obeying God's Law is not just a matter of keeping rules. Obeying God's Law SHOULD mean that we understand why God gave us that law to begin with....so that everyone would have what they needed, and nobody would suffer because of injustice....not economic injustice, not political injustice, not physical abuse, not mental inadequacy, not even a run of bad luck. It is quite clear that God intended that people who had more than they needed, would use it to help those in need; that people who had the good fortune to have power and friends and political clout would use it to help people who, for whatever reason, were unable to help themselves. The young man completely overlooked the fact that he belonged to God and needed to remember that he was supposed, like all of us, to be used by God to make justice happen.
Jesus didn't really mean that the young man was wrong to be rich. But he was not using his money and power for the homeless, the hungry, the elderly, the handicapped and the oppressed. And, as we all know, you can't take it with you. If you are going to use money or power for good...let it not be all for your own good, but also for the good of others.
St. Ignatius Loyola, the man who founded the Society of Jesus, gave his priests and monks a prayer to say every morning:
Lord, all that I am and all that I have comes from you, and I thank you. And now, because I thank you, and know you are God, I give back to you today all that I have and all that I am, to use for your glory and for the good of souls. Amen.
It's not a bad prayer for all of us to learn and use every morning. And then, of course, we must live up to it! Amen.
