Shhhhhh

When even Amos says, "Zip it"

Therefore he who is prudent will keep silent in such a time, for it is an evil time. (Amos 5:13)

It’s a stunning verse. Amos is an Old Testament Prophet, no stranger to that tradition’s unfiltered announcements on God’s behalf. Verbal restraint was not a prophetic forte.

To read Amos is to experience the full range of prophetic “woes” — condemnations of idolatry, injustice, immorality and all of our other manifestations of sin. Amos, like other prophets, gets push back from the powers that be, who command him to go prophesy some place else. And he mouths off at them.

In Chapter 5 of the book that bears his name, Amos is into a critique of the legal system of his day, community disputations held in the gates of walled cities. And there in the midst of his God-given rant, he seems to accept that all of the cavalier injustice and normalized bribery is just too much, and says that a prudent person won’t waste (risk?) any words in the face of it.

It’s a verse that speaks to me from time to time when contemporary social madness gets loud. There comes a point where one more analysis, argument or rant is just another discordant blast, like a toddler pounding on a piano keyboard. Friends will pat you on the back and foes will call you names, and return to their bubbles unchanged by more noise.

My present Evening Prayer lessons include Paul’s Letters to the Thessalonians. The Second Letter includes,

Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way. (2 Thessalonians 2:1-3)

From the beginning, the Church of Jesus Christ had to filter for “fake news,” some of it dressed up as prophecy or even arriving as a counterfeit letter from the Apostles themselves. A time to keep silent and resist spreading the lies — important today as Christians are demanded to kneel to this or that political idol.

I can’t remember now if it was a Bishop or a seminary professor, but decades ago someone of influence said, “We (the Church) should say more about less.” He was pointing out the Church’s willy nilly issuing of resolutions, statements, and — God help us — declared “prophecies” about every issue to hit the news cycle.

We see the result today, as “Christian” groups and spokespeople show up like courthouse “expert witnesses” for every issue of the day.

God sent Amos to speak to the issues of his day, pointing out the nation’s disregard for the divine Law God gave them through Moses. But when it became clear that the spiritual rot had set in, God gave Amos the message that wise people should “zip it.” More words were pointless.

Also showing up at Evening Prayer is the Prophet Jeremiah. He, too, receives a message that even the holiest words — those lifted in prayer — become useless when a people are too far gone in evil,

The Lord said to me: “Do not pray for the welfare of this people. Though they fast, I will not hear their cry, and though they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword, by famine, and by pestilence.” (Jeremiah 14:11-12)

Jeremiah pleads with God, arguing that the people have been deceived by their spiritual leaders,

Then I said: “Ah, Lord God, behold, the prophets say to them, ‘You shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine, but I will give you assured peace in this place.’” And the Lord said to me: “The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds. (Jeremiah 14:13-14)

Churches say much about many things. But we have been in the business of forfeiting our unique contribution to public life: the proclamation that the bubble dwellers, grievance groups, elites, folks on the fringes, the whole lot of us, have fallen short of the glory of God but are recipients of God’s mercy in Jesus Christ. And because that mercy is extended to us by the Lord, it is our duty to extend it to one another.

I pray that it is not too late for that message. But I fear that the prudent might be called to zip it until the evil has devoured itself.