In light of my Word of Faith experience, The Message's paraphrase of Old Testament writings is right on target.
It's funny how well some of it matches not only the WOF but contemporary church as well.
It's also very disturbing.
Amos 2:6-8
(Speaking of Israel )
They buy and sell upstanding people.
People for them are only things—ways of making money.
They'd sell a poor man for a pair of shoes.
They'd sell their own grandmother!
They grind the penniless into the dirt,
shove the luckless into the ditch.
Amos 6:1-7
Woe to you who think you live on easy street in Zion,
who think Mount Samaria is the good life.
You assume you're at the top of the heap,
voted the number-one best place to live.
Well, wake up and look around. Get off your pedestal.
Take a look at Calneh.
Go and visit Great Hamath.
Look in on Gath of the Philistines.
Doesn't that take you off your high horse?
Compared to them, you're not much, are you?
Woe to you who are rushing headlong to disaster!
Catastrophe is just around the corner!
Woe to those who live in luxury
and expect everyone else to serve them!
Woe to those who live only for today,
indifferent to the fate of others!
Woe to the playboys, the playgirls,
who think life is a party held just for them!
Woe to those addicted to feeling good—life without pain!
those obsessed with looking good—life without wrinkles!
They could not care less
about their country going to ruin.
But here's what's really coming:
a forced march into exile.
They'll leave the country whining,
a rag-tag bunch of good-for-nothings.
Amos 6:13
And yet you've made a shambles of justice,
a bloated corpse of righteousness,
Bragging of your trivial pursuits,
beating up on the weak and crowing, "Look what I've done!"
a bloated corpse of righteousness,
Bragging of your trivial pursuits,
beating up on the weak and crowing, "Look what I've done!"
excellent observations
ReplyDeleteThese scriptures describe my former church and my former pastor exactly. How sad for the people that have lived under that excuse for a pastor.
ReplyDelete