Testing
Day 456, Monday, Nov. 10
Amos Chapters 7 – 9
Chapter 7 begins with some back-and-forth between God and Hosea, with God pleading for mercy on God’s people when God is preparing to punish them.
After that, though, Amos sees a vision of God with a plumb line in his hand. A plumb line is a string with a weight on the end; it is used to determine if something is truly upright.
God says, “Look, I am setting a plumb line among my people Israel; I will spare them no longer.”
The days for punishment are coming, but with a twist.
“‘The days are coming,’ declares the Sovereign Lord, ‘when I will send a famine through the land—not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord. People will stagger from sea to sea and wander from north to east, searching for the word of the Lord, but they will not find it.”

-Rev. Mark Fleming

Monday meditation

Psalms 24:1-10
The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it; for he founded it on the seas and established it on the waters.
Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? The one who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not trust in an idol or swear by a false god.
They will receive blessing from the Lord and vindication from God their Savior. Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek your face, God of Jacob.
Lift up your heads, you gates; be lifted up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, you gates; lift them up, you ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in. Who is he, this King of glory? The Lord Almighty—he is the King of glory.

Prayer focus
Lord, when you test us may we be found upright, with clean hands and a pure heart.