AMOS 9:5-10 SIFTED FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS

5 The Lord, the LORD Almighty, he who touches the earth and it melts, and all who live in it mourn—the whole land rises like the Nile, then sinks like the river of Egypt— 6 he who builds his lofty palace in the heavens and sets its foundation on the earth, who calls for the waters of the sea and pours them out over the face of the land—the LORD is his name.
7 “Are not you Israelites the same to me as the Cushites ? ”declares the LORD. “Did I not bring Israel up from Egypt, the Philistines from Caphtor and the Arameans from Kir?
8 “Surely the eyes of the Sovereign LORD are on the sinful kingdom. I will destroy it from the face of the earth—yet I will not totally destroy the house of Jacob,” declares the LORD. 9 “For I will give the command, and I will shake the house of Israel among all the nations as grain is shaken in a sieve, and not a pebble will reach the ground. 10 All the sinners among my people will die by the sword, all those who say, ‘Disaster will not overtake or meet us.’

The process of producing the gravel for use in landscaping and paving involves passing large quantities of stones through a series of vibrating screens (sieves) of decreasing pore or mesh size. The first screen will catch only the largest rocks while the last will separate the tiny diameter gravel particles from the sand and stone dust. So, in the end, after starting with a large load of dirt and rock, you end up with a number of piles of rocks of uniform size.

The mesh of the screen of God’s judgment is very fine. In the landscaping world it would be like the screens used to prepare the cleanest and finest top soil; that from which every stone has been removed. Sin is the rock in the soil of our lives. It makes no difference whether our sin is a big as a boulder or as small as the pebbles on the beach, it will not pass through God’s sieve.

Looking again to the process of producing gravel, one additional step is the washing of the gravel in order to remove any soil that has adhered to the individual surfaces

Our lives are like the soil, as long as it adheres to the rock it will not pass through the sieve. The only way we can pass successfully through the sieve of God’s judgment is to let go of our sin. On our own we are not capable of separating ourselves from our sin-rock. But thanks be to God, like the high pressure water-wash at the quarry, the blood of Jesus, shed on the cross in the quarry outside Jerusalem, can flush us off and get us through the sieve. But like the gravel we must be placed in the cleansing stream, and only we can do that. The good news of the proclamation is repent, believe and live into your baptism.

Gracious Father, who is also the Righteous Judge, thank you for sending your Son in order to make it possible for me to pass through your judgment. Help me to ever live in the cleansing stream of his blood poured out for me on Calvary. Amen.