Trampling the Poor (July 20)

Readings, Amos 8:1-12 and Psalm 52
Image, Vincent van Gogh, “Olive Grove,” July 1889​

There’s an old axiom that a preacher should preach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. Hardly an iron, or even golden, rule, but there are times, even when one does not set out to do so, that the news and the assigned reading happen to touch. This week one particular story overlapped so much with our reading from Amos that the Venn diagram is practically a circle. We’ll get to the story soon, let’s begin with Amos.
 
Last week, Amos was told to pack up and leave by the powers that be, this week we see what he has to say in response: The Lord said to me, ‘The end has come upon my people Israel.’ Hardly likely to reverse the prevailing antagonism being directed toward him.
 
Readings like these are part of a slew of texts which stress the sinfulness of economic exploitation and injustice. The word of the Lord given to Amos rails against those who trample the poor and treat the Sabbath and holy festivals as inconveniences delaying their profiteering off their neighbour. When, they ask, can we go back to practicing deceit with false balances, buying the poor for silver, and the needy for a pair of sandals and selling the sweepings of the wheat. The exploitative nature of these practices is evident – placing a thumb on the scale to increase price and profit, trapping the poor and vulnerable in cycles of debt, issuing dangerous loans to those without basic necessities, selling that which God’s law stipulates is meant to be left for the vulnerable. The Lord promises that these deeds shall not be forgotten, and God’s wrath shall be swift and severe: I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation.
 
Today’s psalm also looks forward to a great upturning where those who performed mischief against the godly, trusted in abundant riches, and sought refuge in wealth will be broken down for ever, snatched from their tent, and uprooted from the land of the living.
 
The vehemence of these condemnations is due to the fact that these violations of the poor, this exploitation of the needy, this rank profiteering is a gross abnegation of what it means to be the people of God. God’s people are set apart to serve as an example to the nations, a witness to the nature of God, a testament to the possibility and beauty of another way to be in the world. From the beginning, when Israel is shepherded safely across the Nile, they are called to be different to the empire which had enslaved and exploited them. As the fourth commandment declares in instituting the Sabbath, Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the Lord your God commanded you to keep the sabbath day. The Sabbath is placed in contrast with exploitative earthly economics which work people, animals, and land without rest. It is the same with the laws of Jubilee, which decree that every seventh year the land must be allowed to rest, that land sold because of economic trouble, should be returned to those who sold it, and that those who had to sell themselves into slavery are set free. In this way the laws of Sabbath and Jubilee, like the broader laws around the care of orphans, widows, and foreigners, are aimed to stress that economic exploitation and injustice which cause perpetual inequality and indenture are anathema to the Lord. In contrast, the Lord requires justice, mercy, and kindness, desiring a people determined not to let struggle and bad luck entrench generational divides of haves and have nots, free and unfree, rich and poor. In short, a people who do not seek refuge in money, but trust in the steadfast love of God. It is the dire gap between the people as they should be and as they have been that provokes the judgment of God delivered by the prophet Amos.
 
Now to the promised stories. Which are also a situation where in the realm of economic justice the has comes up despairingly short of the should. SBS News reported on a recent study of nearly 3000 workers under the age of 30. The study found one-third recorded been underpaid by their employers (some are being paid $10 less than the minimum wage), 1/3rd were found to have not been paid their compulsory super and the same number had been banned from taking entitled breaks. As alarming as this sounds, the researchers are confident that these numbers underreport the issue, as many, many more simply do not know or understand that they are being exploited or underpaid.
 
Another story reported the expansion of the AfterPay app and the intention to make it as widely available as card payments. Debt support groups have expressed alarm and concern, that such ease (especially when used to purchase every day, basic necessities) dramatically increases the risk of already vulnerable people getting trapped in debt spirals.
 
Another story recorded on once more that not only is the current gap between rich and poor the widest in history, but the gap between rich and “comfortable” is so ludicrously large we cannot even fathom the maths required to comprehend it. For instance, let’s say tomorrow when you awoke, I gave you $150million. Pretty sweet deal and likely enough to get everything you ever wanted or needed. And then the next day you wake up and I give you $150m again, okay, still sweet, now you can likely get everything all your loved ones ever wanted or needed. Ok, the next day, 150m again, look now you can buy a sports car and a house for everyone working at your favourite ten cafes. Another day, another 150m, now you can give handsomely to all the charities that mean a lot to you and become an esteemed patron of the arts. Another day… now don’t tire on me yet, we’re not even out of the first week! Imagine this goes on and on, every morning for a year. Do you know what you have at the end of this year, after receiving 150m a day for 365 days, what your refuge of wealth will have amounted to? ¼ of the net worth of the world’s richest man.
 
So perhaps it’s better to focus back on that SBS article: the little infringements, the small thefts of wages, which are hardly insignificant in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis. But one of the troubles we face when we consider our response is that, in contrast to Amos, we are not speaking to or about the people of God. That is to say, we cannot presume to say, hey this is wrong because our God loves justice. We cannot presume to say, if we do not fix our ways, the songs of the temple shall become wailing. Because that might have meant something to Amos’ audience (though perhaps not enough) but it means little to less now.
 
It is interesting then, to consider exactly what God says shall befall Israel for its wanton disregard of the commands for economic fairness and integrity: The time is surely coming, says the Lord God, when I will send a famine on the land; not a famine of bread, or a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. This is the cataclysm that is coming, this will be the result of all that false piety. They shall wander from sea to sea, and from north to east; they shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, but they shall not find it.
 
Could this have befallen our own day? Could such inequality, injustice, and rank ignoring of systemic jubilee, be the result of a famine of hearing the word of God? Could it be that so few who see the state of the world are moved to act is because the words of prophet and psalmist have fallen on closed ears? That these stories can be frowned upon without the fear of God, could this be in part the result of a famine of hearing the words of the Lord?
 
If this could be the case then what is needed is what the psalmist describes: people rooted like a green olive tree in the house of God; ready to laugh at the evildoer and trust in the steadfast love of God. That is to say, what is needed are those who live not on bread alone but every word that proceeds from the mouth of our Lord. Those able to see the mockery of God in the tipping of scales, the stealing of wages, and the building up of storehouses so monumental they make the tower of Babel seem a miniature made for model train set. Perhaps one way through is for people rooted in God’s word and love to speak, like Amos, the word of righteous judgment against the sins of exploitation and inequity.
 
But importantly, this people, being rooted in God’s word and God’s love, fed on scripture and song, must offer more than just critique. The point of a people of God is to be an alternative, to embody possibility. The people of God are set apart to witness, to be a testament to what is possible when rooted in God’s house, God’s word, God’s love. To show what can happen when we commit to living the way of justice, mercy, and kindness, where our way of relating to people, creation, and wealth is not one of competition, acquisition, and surplus, but is grounded on rest, peace, wholeness, community, and abundance of life.
 
The call placed upon us as the church, as a people set apart, is to glorify God and serve the world by being a living example of what can be possible when rest, mutuality, jubilee, justice, and neighbourliness, shape the ordering of our days together. What we owe to the world is a commitment to this vision, possibility, and calling. And we sustain this commitment by being rooted in the house of God so we shall never hunger or thirst for God’s word. It won’t solve everything, and we can’t do it alone, but the wider results of such witness are almost secondary. Because first and foremost such a commitment is one which keeps us from being uprooted by the winds of worldly allure, by grounding us in the house of God where in the presence of the faithful we proclaim the Holy Name, for it is good.