Painters and builders use plumb lines to keep their work straight. God uses a plumbline in a different way. When God said to the prophet Amos that he was setting a plumb line among his people, he was declaring an end to their attempts to justify their crooked ways. What is interesting, is this human behavior of quickly defending ourselves when something about us is being pointed out for correction. Israelites were no different. God had been patient, longsuffering but this time, God was done. He was not going to put up with a provoking people, so He told his prophet his intentions. The prophet learned that at the bottom of trouble was sin, and he also understood that at the bottom of deliverance was forgiveness of sin, so he prayed for that. I wondered and contemplated on what message could God be sending to us, in our busy postmodern lives. It is true that God also sent a plumbline in our midst: The Bible. Do we have a track record of justifying our behaviors and shenanigans? It’s tough to speak for God but, is there a chance this might be speaking to us? That our God is tired of us defending our bad behaviors, our crooked ways and ignoring God’s will and His ways? If so, we need to take note. Yes, we know our God is the God of grace and mercy, yet we are still to submit to His ways. It is this idea of God’s mercy and God’s truth coming together. We ought to try to measure up to God’s plumb line and be conformable instead of deviating from God’s plumb line. A faithful follower of Jesus Christ will always attempt to be conformable to God’s plumb line, the Bible.
Paul told Ephesians that believers are destined to be adopted Children of God through Christ Jesus our Lord. But even knowing this, we still see the human struggle to live a life that is acceptable to God. Yes, we love God, but also, we mess up; quite a lot. We also know that God is full of mercy and forgiving to those who sincerely repent. The truth is, often enough we are not ready to hear that God is done with our nonsense. That’s what happened to Israelites. They always thought, God will always forgive them and take away the consequences of their sin. Then the prophet Amos prophesied that things will turn really bad and their King would die and they would be taken into exile far from their land. For Israel, this was too much to bear.
How did they get there? God’s plumb line. Our behaviors are to match the straightness of God’s plumb line. You may ask: what if our lives are too crooked and can’t seem to conform to the straightness of God’s plumb line? Go to God, plead for God’s strength, (He gives you bread of life to eat), His grace to spark a divine transformation within you, so your life can attempt to measure up. That’s not what happened with Israelites. They kept justifying their crooked ways, instead of correcting them. Talking about the final straw. We never imagine God having to deal with the final straw, but full disclosure: the Old Testament is full of those moments. We should learn from them. Since God is full of mercy, shouldn’t we be full of God’s truth? God’s mercy meets truth (Ps 85). What’s our relationship with the truth?
John the Baptist becomes a huge example for us: a human with a strong relationship with the truth. A man determined to live a life conformable to God’s plumb line. A man of courage who lived for truth and died for it. That’s the kind of believer we ought to strive to become. When the world around us persists in descending into more darkness, what will be our relationship with the truth? Will we shy away from the truth because we are afraid of the majority? King Herod was that person who was afraid of the majority. His relationship with the truth became limited only to what can be beneficial to him personally. Sadly, a lot of people have begun to swallow some of that. Herod became committed to half-truth. Let’s be honest: Half-truth is no truth at all.
Seek the truth and live a life, that is conformable to God’s plumb line: the Bible!
Amen.
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