Not for Sale

Not for Sale--May 25, 2018

"But as for me, I am filled with power, 

     and with the Spirit of the Lord, 

 and with justice and might,

     to declare to Jacob his transgression

           and to Israel his sin.

 Hear this, you rulers of the house of Jacob,

      and chiefs of the house of Israel,

 who abhor justice

      and pervert equity,

 who built Zion with blood

     and Jerusalem with wrong!

 Its rulers give judgment for a bribe,

     its priests teach for a price,

     its prophets give oracles for money;

 yet they lean upon the LORD and say,

     'Surely the LORD is with us!

      No harm shall come upon us'." [Micah 3:8-11]

The other day I caught my kids bribing each other over the rights to picking TV shows before school.  And it told me that something was wrong.

Our household has limits on how much television we can watch in a day, and usually the rule during the school year is that the kids can only watch a show (a single episode of a tv show) once their clothes are on for the day, and their breakfasts are eaten.  Then, and only then, will there be the possibility of TV.  Well, as any economist will tell you, when you increase the scarcity for a commodity, demand drives the price up.  And that means that my kids will try all sorts of tactics to get the "rights" to pick the morning's show. Sometimes one will use intimidation and just try to yell their way into claiming "It's my turn to pick!"  Sometimes they will try and throw one another under the bus and tattle on their sibling for some small infraction, hoping I will then rule in favor of the whistleblower and give them the choice of TV shows.  And then sometimes, like just the other day, I will catch them basically bribing each other, often on a preposterous scale.  

The conversation the other day in the family room went like this.  "If you give up your turn to pick MY show, I'll buy you a toy."  (Not terribly virtuous as a deal at this point, but not strictly breaking the rules, either.)  From there, it became, "You have to get me a toy that I pick, and then I'll let you pick the show, and I pick a life-size  Barbie go-cart."  And then, in a turn of plain old trickery, it became, "If you pick my show (right now), then on your birthday (in ten months), I'll buy you a life-size Barbie go-cart that really drives (something that would cost hundreds of dollars that neither of my children have to spend)."  And had I not stepped in at that moment to interrupt their economy of bribes and shady deals, they would have agreed to that arrangement... despite the fact that what was being promised in the future was not theirs to offer, and was so far off in the future it would be forgotten, and was ridiculously disproportionate to promise in exchange for picking a morning's TV show.  Each of my kids was trying to game the other--one making absurdly large demands, and the other offering it so far in the future that no one would remember the deal when it came time to pay up.  They certainly seemed to show promise for a career in politics in that instant.

So, like I say, I put a stop to it.  I said "No."  I said "No," in fact, preemptively, before any TV shows had been watched, and before any supposed "deals" had been struck, before any specific wrong acts had been committed and anybody was cheated.  I said "No," not just to one of my kids, but to both--to the whole system of TV-related-bribery they were trying to set up, in fact--because I love both of them.  Saying NO to their deliberately crooked system was a way of saying YES to both of my kids, in reality, because I don't want either of them to be taken advantage of (by their brother or sister, or by anyone else) and also because I don't want either of them to become the kind of persons who cheat and swindle other people.  I love my children too much to be OK with them setting up a system whereby they can trick each other, con each other, or bribe each other with empty promises or outrageous demands.  And so I intervened and said, "No.  TV shows, among other things, are not for sale."

In a way, that's all the prophets of Israel and Judah ever said.  We sometimes misunderstand the role of the Hebrew prophets and cast them as fortune tellers who were only interested in predicting the future and setting up a complicated system of pre-determined events that will bring about the end of the world.  But usually the people who think that about the prophets are the ones who haven't spent very much time at all actually reading their words or listening to their message.  The prophets were people who, provoked by the Spirit, kept on declaring that the truly important things in life were simply not for sale. 

This passage of verses from Micah are hardly the only example, but it's a good representation of what the prophets, from Isaiah to Malachi, were really all about.  Micah talks about being filled with the power of the Spirit of the Lord for a particular purpose--to speak up for justice and to say "No" to all the systems God's people had set up that were turning them into crooks and schemers.  The "No" was an all-out, no-holds-barred, truth-to-power criticism of the leaders of Israel and Judah--the kings, the courts, the priests, and the court prophets. And the basic criticism here was that the Spirit said "NO" to the ways they were setting up a bribery-based system where everything was available for a price.  And the "No" was necessary because behind it was God's eternal "Yes" to humanity. God does not want us taking advantage of each other or being taken advantage of, because both being the schemer and the victim distorts us and who we are meant to be.  The "Yes" of God's care for all people requires the "No" to whatever crooked systems people set up--even when we think we are agreeing to those arrangements freely--that allow us to take advantage of each other.  And that, Virginia, is what prompted the Spirit of God, time and again, to whisper in the ear of prophets like Micah to call the people on the carpet, from the royal palace to the courtroom to the sanctuary.  No, Micah said, you are not allowed to do this to each other.  No, the Spirit prompted, you are not allowed to create a whole system where we scheme against each other and call it "deal-making," while it distorts our souls and disfigures our hearts.  No, the living God said--and keeps saying--I love you too much to let you think I don't care about the ways you are treating each other.  Influence and favors, imaginary religious "points" and public approval, these things are not for sale.  Justice is not for sale, and God's favor is not available for purchase at the Temple gift shop.

We would do well to remember what the prophets--and the Spirit who speaks through them--were really all about.  Otherwise we tame them and act like we can ignore their message.  The Spirit has always had a way of speaking God's "Yes" by also saying "No" to the ways we harm each other and the systems we set up to con each other out of good things. And the Spirit has not retired from that work, even if the names of the prophets, rulers, and priests have changed over time.  

Because I love my children, and because both of them were bent on conning the other, I had to say a clear "No" to their proposed system to mutually hoodwink each other. I had to insist some things are simply not for sale.

And because God loves all humanity--both the would-be schemers and the potential victims--God's Spirit keeps on inspiring prophetic voices to say "No" to our crooked systems and corrupt hearts, too... in order that God can say "Yes" to us at the same time. 

The Spirit keeps on insisting that some things are not for sale, no matter how great we think we are at deal-making.  That is the only way we will learn that God is intent on giving the best away for free.

Lord God, let your Spirit open our ears to your prophets, and let your Spirit open our mouths when you appoint us to be your prophetic voices, too.