Amos' Treasure

The first reading today is from the prophet Amos. We don’t hear from him too often, so I’m going to tell you his story. He was from the Kingdom of Judah, from a town just a little south of Jerusalem. God called him and sent him on a most difficult mission… to go and prophesy… to speak for God… way up in the Northern Kingdom of Israel.

Now the northern kingdom had no use for Jerusalem, the temple or any prophet from south of the border. So the cards were stacked against Amos right from the start. Nevertheless he went north and fearlessly spoke what God inspired him say. Now the Northern Kingdom at this time was rich and great, so everyone in business (and lots of people were) was making lots of money. Of course there were taxes, so the great King of Israel could afford a large army and a big palace, and monuments and big buildings too, so they could impress traders and ambassadors from other lands. But even after taxes, the businessmen had a lot of money left over.

Now they were very busy people; they didn’t get rich by being lazy, mind you, and they didn’t have a lot of time for prayer. But they could pay for sacrifices, which they did big time, LOTS of sacrifices. After all, they thought God liked sacrifices, and the bigger the animal the better. So the priests were also getting quite rich off of their share of the sacrifices. Now what could these people do with all this wealth? It was a problem, if you invested it, you just got MORE wealth and made the problem bigger. So their answer was, spend it. Whatever luxuries that could be imported, from Persia, from India, from Egypt, from China and the East Indies, they bought it all.

Life was good, real good in the Northern Kingdom, except for one thing. There were a lot of unhappy people that weren’t rich. These people didn’t own land, or flocks or a business; as a matter of fact all they owned was the clothes on their back. They had no skills, only their muscles. These people couldn’t bathe often or use perfumes; they smelled. They had too many children, so they had to beg, and often they had to borrow, but the only collateral they had for a loan was their cloak, which was a needed for warmth at night and in the winter. Well, the rich people gave when they begged, sometimes, and even lent money to them, at least you could make a little profit that way. But just to make sure that these poor people didn’t think a loan was a gift, or get any ideas about not repaying, the Northerners held on to their cloaks as collateral, even when the law said you had to cloak to a borrower at nightfall so its owner could use it as a blanket.
As you can imagine, the Northerners were not happy with Amos, telling them they were wrong. They ridiculed him, insulted him, told him to go back where he belonged, down south. After all, the king had his own prophets in the north, and the way things were was just fine with them. After a serious run-in with Amaziah, high priest and friend of the king, Amos either returned home to Judah or he was murdered. But he had kept faith with the Lord and fearlessly spoke his word. God’s word to the Northern Kingdom was this:
I hate, I despise your festivals. I want mercy, not sacrifices. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.

About 20 years after Amos prophesied, the North was conquered by Assyria and all the rich and smart people were sent off to far away places and the Ten Tribes of the people who followed Moses from Egypt and Joshua into the promised land were forever lost. But God’s word and prophecy aren’t just one moment in time. They are for our time too. Here in America and the first world we cannot escape the fact that life is pretty good here. Of course, life today is a lot more complicated than it was in Amos’ time, or when Jesus told that story in the gospel about poor Lazarus.

But we do have much more than we need, and we are of the same Jesus Christ who told that important story in the Gospel, and he told it for a reason. If there’s anything most people, rich and poor, believe in and agree upon in America today, is that its good to buy lots of thing. Our economy depends on that. It’s complicated, but Jesus did not say: “This Gospel is not meant for 2022.” It still holds true for today and for us.

Abraham tells the rich man in Jesus’ story “between you and us there is a great well.” The truth is that the rich man built that wall while he lived, if we are not careful, we can do the same thing. By our lives we build either walls or bridges.

In St. Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus says: “Where your treasure is, there is your heard.” If our treasure is money, power, status or things then that’s where our heart is. He says that because God judges hearts, and if our heart does not seek God as its treasure, we are in big trouble. God is love, and love is the only thing you can take with you, when you go to meet God at the end of this life. And the end will come.

An ancient and beautiful funeral chant of the Church says this:
May the angels lead you into paradise: when you arrive may the martyrs receive you, and bring you into the holy city Jerusalem. May the chorus of angels receive you and with Lazarus who once was poor may you have eternal rest.

So, when we arrive at the judgment seat of God, Lazarus, the same Lazarus we heard of in the Gospel today, or someone just like him, will be there too, waiting to hear where our hearts were. Will we be comfortable with that? Will we be comfortable to be in the company of that Lazarus, who was covered with sores, so unpleasant in this life? It is complicated and each of us builds and finds our own way in life, but if we really want to be comfortable with Lazarus’ input at our judgment, we have lots of time and opportunities to straighten out our hearts.

Jesus also says in the Gospel: “The poor you will always have with you.” There will always be around us poor people, people in need, in desperate need of help, of food, of medical care, of a job, of a place to live, of someone to care, someone to listen. The poor you will always have with you. Because all of us are poor in some way, poor in some skill, poor in some subject, poor in social skills, poor in athletic ability, poor in reputation, in self-respect, poor in respect given by others.

It's not just money the poor need. And not all of us have much money to give to charity. But we can give our time in community service, or contribute our talents to helping someone, some cause. The poor need our attention. In his description of the last judgment Jesus tells us what God will look at and look for in us, and He assures us:
Whatever you do or don’t do to the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you do or don’t do for me.

It may seem complicated, but it’s really simple. It may be hard, but it’s so worth the effort. May we always do the right thing.