Text: Amos 5:18-27
My hope for writing this year’s Advent devotion was to invite my son Andrew, currently in the confirmation class, to join me in reading, listening and wondering. I chose the reading from Amos, and I asked Andrew to close his eyes and listen as I read it aloud, asking him to not think so much about the words but simply listen and to try to hear which words or phrases jumped out at him. He replied, “the part about ‘rested a hand against the wall, and was bitten by a snake’, and ‘I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies’”. I grinned, because the second one struck me too, as did the part, “But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream”.
For many teens, church can be a challenge. It can be hard to meld the secular and religious worlds and much of the teachings are difficult to apply to real world, as they see and experience it. It’s not surprising that a teenager might hear messages of distrust in this reading. I heard them too – they were pretty powerful!
I think I’m like many parents who recognize this conflict for our teens, and probably am not alone in the effort of having my children simply come to church. I do this with the hope and faith that messages do and will reach them, trusting that this will happen in wondrous ways which I cannot and shouldn’t even try to control. In this season of Advent, we sit and we wait and we listen. With this reading, we can do the same. Hopefully we get to the point where we can hear justice rolling down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream…
Click here to both visualize and hear a flowing stream.
(Lori C.)
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