The Sun goes down at noon!

by Peter Lockhart
A sermon on Amos 8

This is what the Lord God showed me—a basket of summer fruit. He said, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then the Lord said to me, The end has come upon my people Israel; I will never again pass them by.

When I first read the readings for this week I automatically shied away from Amos with his harsh words of

prophecy as they made little sense to me and I have not really given time for myself to enter into the Old Testament deeply enough.

What the heck does the image of this basket of summer fruit signify? It was a complete mystery.

The other readings set down from Luke with the story of Mary and Martha and the wonderful images of Jesus in Colossians as the eternal Word of God in who the whole world finds its meaning were rich troves from which to preach.

Then by chance I decided to return and read Amos, I read the whole book of the prophet and then a commentary about Amos and suddenly a new light dawned.

I learnt that in the Hebrew language the word for summer fruit is a word play with the word end. They sound the same, to use the technical term they are homonyms.

So the imagery of the basket of fruit is somewhat meaningless because the Hebrew writer is using a poetic device to emphasise the word end.

Confronted by this new learning I was drawn to consider the rest of the passage more closely and found myself feeling somewhat judged by the words towards the end of the passage in verse 11:

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.

As a preacher I am deeply troubled with my struggle to hear God. I long for a direct revelation and clear and concise words to speak of the hope that I have found in Jesus Christ, whom I count as my Lord and Saviour.

Yet whilst I have had my moments of insight and comfort much of the time the deep silence of God’s vastness and mystery confronts me.

So as the prophet suggests I wander:

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.

I delve deep into books on theology and church history and spirituality. I go to my supervisor and spiritual director and seek out mentors – I run to and fro seeking the word of the Lord for in the din of this secular age of the West there are so many distractions and idolatries.

Yet in the midst of all of this struggle with the silence on reflection it was the moment in which I first walked up the three steps of the pulpit in St Andrews Church of Bundaberg to preach that I discovered what it meant to be home – for I had arrived to be at home with God, where our true home lies. Up until this point in my life I had always felt a sense of homelessness as if I had nowhere to belong. But at this moment Jesus embrace enfolded my life in purpose.

It is this experience alongside the knowledge that that first sermon would have been consider a basic heresy of the early church that has kept me going in ministry. Despite my error I continue to believe and be reassured that God was in that moment not simply for me but for the congregation as well and that somehow in the power of the Holy Spirit God’s eternal Word Jesus Christ was present as he was proclaimed.

Faith is a mix of doubt and unknowing as much as it is about assurance and certainty.

And so week by week we gather to listen again for the most important message and hope in this culture of despair in which we live.

A culture in which for most of us our wealth blinds us to the abject need of the world and of the immense problems associated with our economic structures, with our use of energy and resources and our irreparable impact on the environment.

Amos declared to his people the threat of the darkness to come, a time of great angst:

On that day, says the Lord God, I will make the sun go down at noon, and darken the earth in broad daylight. I will turn your feasts into mourning, and all your songs into lamentation; I will bring sackcloth on all loins, and baldness on every head; I will make it like the mourning for an only son, and the end of it like a bitter day.

I heard a story which involved fear of such descending darkness recently.

In conversation with a minister from the Solomon Islands I was describing the Australian context in which less than 10% of Australians attend church regularly and whilst many still claim belief in God it is an ambiguous belief at best. Atheism is on the rise and they are seeking converts!

The response of the minister from the Solomon Islands was a plea not to tell his people about the unbelief of Australians. White people bought us the gospel, don’t tell us that they have stopped believing! It struck me then and there the irony that the enlightenment has brought such darkness of unbelief in the West. This minister feared the impact of such a darkness descending on his people – the sun going down at noon!

What confidence can we offer to him and his people? What faith can they offer us?

Surely the message of the crucified risen son of God present now in our midst, which can stand against the very gates of hell, can prevail against the onslaught of the bright fluorescent and neon lights of our progressive enlightened era.

The sun goes down at noon... this event has occurred. I read from Luke 23:

It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness came over the whole land until the ninth hour, for the sun stopped shining. And the curtain of the temple was torn in two. Jesus called out with a loud voice, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit." When he had said this, he breathed his last.

But this as we know is not the last word on the matter of descending darkness. For the Jesus who died on the cross, the wisdom teacher before whom Mary sat listening, the man who walked the roads of Galilee is at one and the same time God who walks amongst us, the light sent into the world. As Paul wrote to the Colossians:

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; for in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or powers—all things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.

In the face of darkness new life springs forth, hope transcending our attempts in the West to domesticate God or even worse to pronounce his eulogy and lay him to rest as if God never was.

Jesus has come into the world and like Mary we can sit at his feet and learn about who God is from God himself, in God’s own words. The riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ is in you, the hope of glory sustains us because we know that God loves us in this transitory existence as we await the fullness of Jesus return to make all things new.

As Paul wrote to the Romans for now we see through a glass darkly but then we shall see face to face yet what wondrous images of hope do we glimpse though that glass and witness to by God’s actions in and through our lives – justice flowing like a river, the blind seeing, prisoners set free, the poor blessed, people reconciled with God and with one another... peace!

So like Mary let us sit in silence now before our Master teacher and listen for his word to each of us on this day.

The Silence of God

by Peter Lockhart on Psalm 42

(As you reflect on the Silence of God listen to Andrew Peterson's song.  His language is not inclusive but the sentiments I believe apply to all of us as we are confronted by the silence of God)


“As a deer longs for flowing streams,

So my soul longs for you, O God.”

The silence of God in our era, as with many other eras in history, is palpable. The longing words of Psalm 42 are words that could be cried out as much by an agnostic as man or a woman of faith.

Where is God?
When shall I come and behold the face of God?
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

These are words of confusion and of lament, words that many of us in our faith are reticent to articulate for fear others might judge us as somehow inadequate in our walk with God. If I admit I do not hear God’s voice to other Christians, let alone people who have a different or no faith, what will they think of me?

Yet I would argue that direct revelation whether they come in dreams or audible voices are the exception not the rule. Certainly this is the case in the Biblical narratives. Whilst there are people who have such miraculous moments of connection, those whose hearts are strangely warmed and those who see visions, so many others have only silence.

Where is God?
When shall I come and behold the face of God?
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

In the storm of life there are people who cry out to God all the time.

The cry of those born in poverty who die as yet another statistic in a roll call far too great for our hearts to bear.

The cry of those without work and whose dignity is lost and whose lives so often spiral into despair.

The cry of those who live with constant pain as age and infirmity eat away at their lives.

The cry of those who suffer from a terminal illness as they long for a miracle.

The cry of our own lives as we look for a glimpse of the divine in the midst of our joys and sorrows.

I often think that those who sit in the mysterious silence of our God are in some way are especially blessed if maintain any faith at all. Jesus said to Thomas, blessed are those who believe without seeing, and might I add hearing.

For it is not simply the silence of God which confronts us it is the loud doubt and scorn of the world that surrounds us. The Psalmist laments:

My tears have been my food day and night,
while people say to me continually, “Where is your God?”

We live in a country and a time where and when less people are involved in the church and the church is subject to judgement and to ridicule. The mob’s voices fill the silence with a raging torrent of words offering other options and other hopes and other despairs.

Whilst the voices clamour around us as people of faith as we are questioned in our confused silence and misconceptions about God’s revelation we argue amongst ourselves.

Where can we find hope?

In the Old Testament we read of the prophet Elijah in the midst of despair on the run from Ahab and Jezebel and in the midst of his trials God comes in this way:

9At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there. Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” 10He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” 11He said, “Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; 12and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence. 13When Elijah heard it, he wrapped his face in his mantle and went out and stood at the entrance of the cave. Then there came a voice to him that said, “What are you doing here, Elijah?” 14He answered, “I have been very zealous for the Lord, the God of hosts; for the Israelites have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I alone am left, and they are seeking my life, to take it away.” 15Then the Lord said to him, “Go, return on your way to the wilderness of Damascus; when you arrive, you shall anoint Hazael as king over Aram.

The storm may rage around us, the storm that is life and we might think that God is absent as we cry when God is silent but let us not forget Elijah’s experience that it was in the sheer silence that God was present.

Maybe the silence that we experience is simply that moment which rests on the cusp of God’s speaking and maybe like the Psalmist we will remember that whatever we may be feeling or thinking, that:

By day the Lord commands his steadfast love,
and at night his song is with me,
a prayer to the God of my life.

For the silence of God that we experience is the silence that Jesus experienced in his sense of abandonment on the cross. The silence we experience is the still of Saturday when Jesus descended into the dead. But the silence we experience is also the sheer quiet in the empty tomb from which Christ has risen. God is never absent from the silence and if God is silent it never means that God is absent, and maybe it even means that God is listening, deeply listening to our lives and our voices. Let us find hope and heart in the silence of God that we are not alone.

"Silence" and God's love

I have just finished reading "Silence" by Shusaku Endo. Put simply it is an excellent novel exploring the silence of God in the face of suffering and the nature of grace.

Whilst there are numerous themes to consider the one that seems most pertinent to me is the question of God's silence.

In the novel the Jesuit Priest conitnually comments on the silence of God in the face of suffering and I was struck by the candid honesty of his struggle.

In a church such as the Uniting Church in Australia which speaks of dsicerning God's will confessing that we hear silence from God can be difficult as it may indicate a lack of faith.

In a culture such as the Australian culture which touts atheism and in which my children are taught to beleive in Easter Bunny at school by their peers speaking of the silence of God may be seen as undermining an already shakey faith.

In a world where there continues to be great suffering through social, economic, political and natural movements admitting the silence of God may seem fatal.

Yet the silence from God can be almost palpable, a tangible reminder of our human frailty and need for answers.

For me the services in the week ahead are an opportunity once again to throw ourselves on the mercy of God and in our longing to hear his voice recall how Jesus prayed in the garden "not my will but yours". To recollect how on the cross Jesus experienced the agony of Godlessness "why have your forsaken me". To remember that in the face of the finality of death Jesus came and stood among his disciples and said "peace be with you".

It is remembering that God's silence is broken and we discover again God's loving concern for our world.

The Noise of Life

For some it is not so much the silence of God which interferes with the hearing of God but the overpowering noise of life.

It is the noise of the rhythm of an alarm clock waking you day by day to go to a job where you work hard and earn a decent salary.

It is the noise of rich friendships and close family who take up so much joyous time gathered at social events: reposing with glasses raised and clinking in toasts to the great things that are happening.

It is the noise of the parental taxi going from swimming lesson, to ballet and cricket, from school to piano practice and plays in the park.

It is the noise of the luxurious life of entertainment: of movies, shows and concerts, of radios blaring and TV announcing the (good) news, whilst the computer whirrs the world into the lounge room.

Not so much an evil din as a distraction from entering the depth and purpose of our human existence as children of God. How and when and where can silence by found in this diarised cacophony? Kairos: living life in God’s time.