“A fox in the henhouse?”
By Rev. Michael Stonhouse
Meditation – Tuesday, December 12, 2023
Amos 7:10-17 (Forward, p. 44) CEV p. 934
Here you have two visions, two senses of expedience, two understandings of what is right and wrong. Amaziah, on the one hand, the priest at Bethel, is concerned with the status quo, with ‘keeping everything under wraps’ and not allowing any kind of ferment or unrest to creep into the national psyche. The temple at Bethel, his personal domain, was the national temple where the king worshipped and was not therefore to be disturbed for any reason. And thus, he accuses Amos of plotting against the king, against his nation, right at its very heart, its temple. Amos, to his thinking, is a veritable ‘fox in the henhouse’, posed to do great damage there. Furthermore, Amaziah accuses Amos of being in ‘the business’ of being a prophet and tells him to go back home and earn his living there via this profession.
Amos counters that he is not a prophet and wasn’t trained to be one. In fact, he tells Amaziah that he is only a shepherd and tender of sycamore trees. He relates that he is only here in Israel, the northern kingdom, and preaching because God has ordered it. ‘So then,’ he says to Amaziah, ‘are you to order me to do otherwise?’
In a sense, however, Amos is like a fox in the henhouse, for he has some very unpleasant news to convey to Amaziah and to King Jeroboam and to all who dwell ‘in the henhouse’ of Israel:
Jeroboam will be put to death;
Israel’s people will be sent into exile;
Amaziah’s wife will become a prostitute;
His sons & daughters will be killed in the war;
The land of Israel will be divided up among others’
And he himself will die in a foreign land.
Sadly, there would be no reprieve from this, for God had given them a multitude of warnings and second chances, and yet their depravity and waywardness and unrighteousness and injustice had continued on unabated.
So, what can we today say about this? What is the message that we should derive from this? Perhaps it is to warn us that while God’s kindness and mercy continue on, there does come a time of accounting, a time when God says, ‘enough is enough’. So, when might that be? We simply don’t know so it is best to make the necessary amends, the required changes in our lives, while there still is time. Certainly, we don’t want ‘this fox’ to appear ‘in the hen houses’ of our lives!
Forward notes: “Then Amos answered Amaziah, ‘I am no prophet, nor a prophet’s son; but I am a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees, and the Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said to me, ‘Go, prophesy to my people Israel” (verses 14-15).
“Amos, called by God to speak up about a society becoming corrupt, defended himself to a priest named Amaziah. Amos insisted he had never asked to be a prophet. Yet he threw himself into the task once he felt called to do so. He warned about immorality, shallow piety, and treating others unfairly. Amos proved that an ordinary person going about daily work can suddenly hear extraordinary messages and act on them. How much easier it would have been for him to turn away from the nudgings of God! How often do we ignore God’s call in our lives?
Moving Forward: “How can we be more like Amos, willing to act upon God’s messages in the world?”