Let Fairness Roll Like a River

Amos 5:21-24

Once there were people
who sang very loud songs to God.
They lit their candles.
They brought their gifts.
They came to worship in their finest clothes.

But outside, in the dust by the gate,
a hungry old man sat begging.
And no one looked.
A widow had her last little field taken away.
And no one cared.
The small were pushed aside.
The poor were stepped over
like cracks in the road.

Do you know what that felt like to God?

It hurt him.
It hurt his heart so much
that he could not even listen to the songs.

"Take your music away,"
God said.
"I cannot hear it.
Not while my little ones are crying.
Not while the poor are forgotten in the dust."

God was never only counting candles.
He was never only listening for loud songs.
All this time
he was watching the gate.
He was watching the old man.
He was watching the widow.
He was counting every tear
that nobody else bothered to count.

God's heart wanted more than a song,
more than a gift.
He wanted something to roll through the whole world
the way a river rolls,
big and strong and never, ever stopping:

Let fairness roll down like waters,
let kindness pour like a river
that never runs dry.

A river for the thirsty.
A river for the small.
A river that lifts up
everyone the world pushed down.

For a long, long time
the people waited for that river to come.
Long before, God had promised through Joel
that one day he would pour himself out
on everyone, everyone, everyone.

And then, child, it came.
It came with a face and two hands and a name.
His name was Jesus.

He did not walk past the old man at the gate.
He stopped.
He knelt down in the dust.
He touched the ones no one else would touch,
and he said,
"I see you. You are not forgotten."

The hungry, he fed.
The crying, he held.
The smallest, the last, the pushed-aside ones,
he pulled close
and called them first.

That is the river.
That is God's own heart, walking,
lifting up everyone the world let fall.

And the river is rolling still.
It is rolling even now,
running into hearts like yours,
flowing out from Jesus
one gate, one little one, one tear at a time.

One day the river will fill the whole earth.
Every tear that was never counted,
God has been counting.
Every little one the world forgot,
he is bringing home,
every single one,
lifted up out of the dust,
and nothing will ever push the small ones aside again.

Turn the page and watch:
this same river of mercy
can run after a man
who is running the other way.