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Sunday June 5, 2005 - Proper 5, Year A

Abram
was an old man. Seventy five years old;
even now that's right on the average life expectancy for a male born today;
four or so thousand years ago, seventy-five
was old.
The time
to spend your days
reminiscing with friends over coffee,
complaining that it's not like it used to be,
watching the grandchildren playing in the dirt.
Time to let the younger generation take over, to enjoy everything you've worked so hard for, to finally take a break.

The last time
to think about tearing yourself up from your roots,
from family and friends and the life you've built for yourself
all on the recommendation
of a God
who is whispering
in your ear.

They must have thought
he was crazy,
this Abram,
convincing his wife, who was up there with him in age,
packing up all his worldly goods,
along with servants, slaves, and one nephew,
and heading off to another country
to begin life again,
and why?
Because God spoke to him.
Right.

And then there was Matthew. A tax collector, maybe not the most popular of professions, but he sure could make a lot of money. He was sitting there at his little booth, demanding a toll from everyone who passed by, when Jesus
came up and said
"Follow me."
And as simply as that,
Matthew got up, left his job, and followed Jesus.

Time after time after time it happens in Scripture. People hear the call of God,
and drop everything
so they can respond.
Sometimes the call to follow
was to move to a different place, like Abraham, taking everything with them, and then beginning again to build a life for themselves, much the same as they had before
but in a new place and a new focus
on God.
Sometimes the call to follow
was to leave everything, home and family and livelihood
and travel with Christ, learning and becoming a leader
for the new-born Church,
never really fixed in one place, but rooted by
that new focus on God.
And sometimes the call to follow
was to stay right where they are, living out their new-found faith
in the communities where they have always lived, just with that same new focus
on God.
That's how it was for Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth, who heard the good news of God in Christ
and was baptized,
and immediately opened her home
as a place of hospitality for traveling Christians,
and the location
for a newly formed church.

Whether God's call
meant tearing up roots
or staying where they were,
whether it meant working full time as a preacher and teacher
or continuing in their old work
one thing is clear:
God's call
was to a new focus,
a new commitment
to God. One that took center stage,
and shaped every other part of their lives.

And in the bible,
that call of God is presented
as a wonderful thing,
the invitation
to be part of something far beyond themselves,
the promise
of great blessing.

But for most of us
that call
seems a long way away. It was one thing for God to make that sort of call back then, thousands of years ago, in a culture not so far distant from being nomads,
a society that thought nothing
of hearing voices from the gods and doing something in response.

But we are here in the twenty-first century, in a culture that is dependent on people putting down roots, a society that has built into its very structures responsibilities that limit our freedom.
For most of us, to imagine ourselves in the shoes of Abram
or Matthew
is to imagine the impossible. We simply can't
imagine
packing up our families and lives
and moving to another country
all at the whim of some apparent voice of God. We can't imagine throwing in our jobs
and taking on some sort of ministry full time
just because we believed God was speaking to us.
We're settled, we have commitments, both financial and personal, and all this seems
just unimaginable.
And what that means, is that most of the time, when we hear someone in the church talk about call
we tend to assume
it's about someone else.
"I'm not called; it can't be me. I'm just not the type
that God would call."

And of course, the church doesn't always help. We tend to only talk about call, or a similar word, vocation, when we're talking about the call some People receive
to enter ordained ministry. Call is something for a chosen few, people
who aren't really like us at all.

But the call of God in scripture
comes to all sorts of people, in all sorts of ways,
and the life they're called to
has as many different versions
as there are people called.
Because what shows us that they're called
is not what they do with their life;
what shows us they're called
is that God
is the center of their lives.

Because that's really
what the call of God boils down to:
God's call, God's call to people through the ages, God's call
to each and every one of us
is to put God
at the very center of our lives,
to be loyal to God
above all else.

The rest, Abram heading off to a promised land, Matthew leaving his tax collector's booth, Lydia hosting a church meeting in her home, all that
is secondary. It's important in its own way, but what really matters
is that each of them listened to God
and made a decision
to make their loyalty to God
the central
loyalty
of their life.
And God's call to us is the same.

It's easy to get distracted by our limitations. We can't imagine ourselves as Abram or Matthew, we see them as kind of super-Christians, somehow capable of far more than we are.
We're just ordinary people, and we assume that God will be happy enough
with just an ordinary response.
But the way God sees it, there is no such thing as super Christians. All of us are equally important; all of us are equally loved; all of us are equally called
to put God
at the center of our lives.
The bible is clear — not just in the stories of call, like Abram and Matthew and Lydia, but through and through.
We are called
to put God
at the center of our lives —
and God isn't willing to settle
for any less.

Remember those well known words, from chapter 3 of the book of Revelation,
"Listen! I am standing at the door, knocking; if you hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to you and eat with you, and you with me."
God is inviting us
to come, share, have the most intimate of relationships; God is waiting for us to let him into our lives. It's a wonderful invitation, a wonderful promise.

But God doesn't settle for second place. Because a couple of sentences before that wonderful picture
of God standing knocking,
come these words of warning, as God says:
"I know your works; you are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were either cold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I am about to spit you out of my mouth."

God calls us, God invites us, but God isn't willing to settle for second best. God wants our whole hearts, our whole lives,
and if we're willing to give our trust to God, give God our first loyalty, then God promises blessing
upon blessing.

It means making a decision, making it again and again and again. To put God first, even when it's hard, even when there are other things we'd rather do, even when people think we're a little crazy.

But it can bring surprising gifts. I was watching "Postcards from Buster" on PBS Kids a couple of days ago — the show where a cartoon rabbit goes visiting real families to find out about their lives. This week Buster went to visit an Orthodox Jewish family in New York City. Everything about their life reminded them to put God first , from the blessings they said to the clothing they wore to the practice of observing the Sabbath. I can't imagine living like they do. And yet what I saw
was a family that were very close,
that took great joy in their friends,
whose house was filled with laughter and love.
Pretty much the same things that are important to me.
And at the heart of it all
was their wholehearted
commitment to God.

We are God's, God's own precious people. And God is calling us, constantly, calling us to stay close, calling us
to give God our first loyalty.
And who knows where that will lead us?

For most of us, it will probably lead us right back to where we are now,
living here in south Jersey, heading out to work, going to school, caring for our homes and communities, but with a new focus at the center of it all, that is, God.

For some of us, it might lead us further afield. If Abraham was 75, it's not too late for God to call us to a new place, new work, new relationships. Some may even be called to work for God full time, as ordained ministers.

But we'll never know
unless we take the risk. We'll never know
unless we decide
to put God first in our lives,
and then wait to see
where our God will lead us, where our God
will bless us.

It's a risk, but a risk
that comes with all the safeguards in the world,
the safeguards
of the God who gave us life
and is continually offering us new life,
safe and secure
in divine love.

 

Sermon ©Raewynne J. Whiteley 2005