Preach or Plow?
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For February 10, 2019:
Preach or Plow?
by Dean Feldmeyer
Isaiah 6:1-9
Every preacher probably knows the old story of the farmer who, exhausted from his chores, decided to take a nap under a shade tree. When he awoke, he found himself looking at a perfectly blue sky and two clouds that looked remarkably like the letters, “G” and “P.”
At once he took this miracle to be a sign that God wanted him to “Go Preach” so he leapt up, ran home and took the first train he could to the city where he registered as a student at the Bible college.
Upon graduation, a couple years and a few thousand dollars later, he applied to and was invited to preach a trial sermon at a small, country church that was in need of a pastor. He was filled with excitement when he took the pulpit and told the story of his call to ministry by way of the two clouds.
As the small congregation filed out of the church, he noted that they seemed less than enthusiastic about his sermon and, finally, he asked the chairperson of the church council what she thought might be the problem.
“Well, pastor,” the elderly lady said, “I think some of them are wondering if that G.P. you saw didn’t stand for Go Plow.”
In the News
Last week, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders told the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) that God “wanted Donald Trump to become president” so he could support “a lot of the things that people of faith really care about.”1
The early, abbreviated transcript provided by the conservative evangelical station didn’t include specifics from Sanders. It seems pretty clear, however, that when Ms. Sanders referred to the cares of “people of faith” she was not speaking of all people of faith, or even most people of faith, for that matter. What she really meant was a small subset of the Christian faith that is made up of conservative, evangelical/fundamentalist, caucasian people. Polls consistently show that many conservative and fundamentalist Christians have chosen to ignore what some may call moral lapses by the President because he seems to support their political priorities and he has picked two Supreme Court justices believed to oppose abortion. He also recently proposed state-level legislation meant to bring more teaching of the Bible to public schools.
Whether or not the President agrees with Sanders about God’s intentions concerning his presidency, doing so would put him in good company among conservative politicians.
Sanders’ father, right wing political pundit and pastor, Mike Huckabee, Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, Texas Governor Rick Perry, Dr. Ben Carson, Ohio governor John Kasich, and Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, have all invoked the name of God when talking about running for political office.2
Whenever politicians claim to be anointed by God for public service, people of faith (conservative or progressive) might consider stepping back and doing some critical thinking on the topic of God’s call. Especially, they might ask how the alleged calls that politicians claim to have received compare to that tested and proven authentic call of the prophet Isaiah (Chapter 6).
In the Scripture
Uzziah was a good king. Some even said a great king.
Some even went so far as to believe that he might be the promised messiah.
But then came that horrible day when diagnosis came back and we all learned that our beloved king was merely human: Leprosy.
He stood on the balcony next to his son, Jotham, and announced that he and Jotham would reign together as co-regents until he could no longer do so and then Jotham would take over as king — Jotham, who didn’t possess even a fraction of the talent, wisdom, and vision of his father. Then Uzziah disappeared into the palace never to be seen again in public.
When, finally, mercifully, the great king died, his funeral was an occasion befitting the man. It went on for days. And it was at that funeral, in the temple, while the royal orchestra played and the great chorus sang their psalms of praise that Isaiah received, by way of a vision, his call to ministry as a prophet.
It began with a vision of God seated upon a throne, flanked by seraphim — soldier angels with the bodies of humans, the heads of animals, and six wings. With two wings they covered their nakedness, with two wings they covered their eyes so as not to be undone by looking upon the person of the Lord, YHWH, and with two wings they flew, hovering above and beside the throne of God.
And they sang, presumably with the royal chorus, hymns of praise. The sound of their singing was so loud that the temple shook even down to the foundations of the thresholds, the strongest, soundest part of the building.
Confronted with this divine spectacle, Isaiah’s first reaction is telling: humility and repentance.
“Woe is me. I’m dead man, walking. For I have seen the Lord, God, and I am a sinful person living in a world of sinful people.”
No sooner are the words out of his mouth than one of the seraphim removes a coal from the altar with a pair of tongs and uses it to symbolically sterilize Isiah by holding the coal, somehow painlessly, against the prophet’s mouth, while pronouncing words of grace: “By this holy coal you are sterilized. Your sins are forgiven and your guilt is taken away.”
Immediately, Isaiah hears the voice of God asking, “Whom will I send and who will speak for me?” And Isaiah, cleansed by grace of all his sins, empowered and emboldened by his experience of the holy, responds: “Here am I. Send me.”
YHWH answers, “Go and say to this people…”
First, an experience of the holy.
Second, conviction and despair, an undeniable sense of personal sin and guilt. “Woe is me.”
Third, grace. The divine indicative: “Your sin is forgiven and your guilt is taken away.”
Fourth, calling: “Whom shall I send and who will go for us?”
Fifth, response: “Here am I! Send me!”
Sixth, God’s call and commission: “Go and say…”
In the Pulpit
Also last week, while Sarah Sanders was ordaining the president on Christian TV, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, was making a public apology on Friday for a picture that appeared on his personal page of the 1984 yearbook of his medical school, a picture that showed a student in blackface makeup standing next to a student dressed in a white KKK type costume. He called the photograph “shocking and horrific” and clearly racist. Just about everyone seemed to agree and the calls for him to resign were legion, voiced by Democrats and Republicans, white and black.
Then, less than 24 hours later, on Saturday, he defiantly said he would not resign because he did not believe that it was him in the photograph. “I am not either of those people in that photo,” Northam told media gathered at the Executive Mansion.
He didn’t say that it couldn’t be him, that it couldn’t possibly be him but that, in this particular case, it wasn’t him. And he did allude to other actions in his past, and disclosed that in 1984 he won a dance contest in San Antonio where he wore dark shoe polish on his cheeks as part of a Michael Jackson impersonation.
“I have made mistakes in my past but I am a person of my word…” Northam said. But one is left to wonder which word that is, the one where he confessed to being in the photo and apologized or the one where he denied being in this particular photo.
Northam said if he felt he wasn’t able to function efficiently as governor, he would re-visit the matter.3
We don’t know if Governor Northam ever claimed to be called by God to be governor but we do see, in this ongoing story, his difficulty in getting past the second step in the series experienced by Isaiah and listed above. Perhaps that is because he has been confronted not by the holy but by accusations voiced by people who are, by and large, no less sinners than himself.
In fact, politicians who claim to be called by God rarely recount going through a process anything like that of the prophet. Theirs’ tend to be something like this:
First, consider running for office.
Second, let it be leaked that they are considering running for office.
Third, hold a press conference where they say that they haven’t decided anything yet and they have to talk with their family and pray about it, asking God for God’s imprimatur.
Fourth, announce that they are running for office.
Fifth, forget about any references to God and make no more unless speaking to a conservative, evangelical/fundamentalist Christian audience.
The honest fact is that few of us who feel that we have been called to our various professions have gone through a process as thorough and vigorous as Isaiah went through. The further fact is that we probably should have, if not literally, then at least figuratively.
Whether our calling is to politics, the professional ministry, business, education, horticulture, agriculture, or serving customers at the counter of the local diner, we would probably be better prepared to do it and do it well if, at some point, as we grow into that calling, we stopped and asked ourselves if it was God or convenience, God or mammon, God or our parents’ expectations, God or our own lack of direction or conviction that was really making the call.
Only when we have made that kind of journey can we know with anything like confidence that those letters really did stand for “Go Preach.” Only then can we stand with the prophet and say, “Here am I. Send me.”
The preacher who seeks to preach on the topic of being called by God might begin with his or her own sense of call. What was it like? How was it received by the preacher?
A sensitive sermon might explore different ways the call comes to different people. Some may hear something like the voice of God, but that experience is rare. More often we hear God’s voice through the voice of others, people we know, love, respect, who question us and suggest to us that we explore certain career directions.
Some are called through no one, identifiable, moment or event but over the course of a long life lived under certain circumstances. I, for instance, was raised in the church. Thanks to my parents who were very involved and dedicated to their church, the church was my home and, when it came time to consider a career direction, the ministry just naturally fell among those careers that I considered.
Finally, a sermon on the topic of call, might also explore how we “test” the call for authenticity. How do we know or reasonably believe that the call we are hearing is from God and not just from our own desires and dreams or the expectations of our parents and teachers?
Sermons on this topic can help our laity explore deeper their own sense of calling and lead them to some revealing conversations about their lives and the directions they have chosen.
1 Boorstein, Michelle. "Sarah Sanders tells Christian Broadcasting Network: God wanted Trump to be president" Washington Post, Jan. 30. 2019.
2Sophia Tesfaye, "'God's plan': These GOP candidates claim the Almighty wants them to run" Salon July 22, 2015.
3 Laura Vozzella, Gregory S. Schneider "Gov. Northam refuses to step down, despite flood of calls for his resignation over racist photo" Washington Post February 2, 2019.
SECOND THOUGHTS
Never Having to Say You’re Sorry for Changing Your Mind
by Mary Austin
1 Corinthians 15:1-11
The apostle Paul is the greatest example in history of someone who changes his mind, and is willing to brag about it. In American life, changing our minds is seen as a negative. Politicians who evolve are accused of being wishy-washy. They risk having people hold up flip-flops at their rallies, to make the point perfectly clear. Every political campaign must figure out how to deal with a candidate who now has a different view on an issue than she or he did earlier. It’s rare to hear someone say, “I learned something new and I changed my mind.” We see that as a flaw, instead of as a sign of growth. But Paul has a different model for us. Moving from enthusiastic persecutor to zealous advocate for Jesus, he dives completely into his new identity.
For Paul, there was none of the foolishness of modern politicians, who say things like, “I was for it before I was against it.” Or, were you against it before you were for it? Paul claims his identity as an apostle, and never tries to hide his past beliefs. He writes that Jesus “appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to someone untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.” He may be the least of the apostles, but he claims his place in the list, acknowledging his past as he does.
Why is it so hard to say that we learned something, and have a new understanding?
As we go to press, Virginia governor Ralph Northam is facing calls for his resignation after racist photos surfaced from his medical school yearbook. “Northam initially apologized Friday night for appearing in the photograph after it became public. But he reversed himself Saturday at a nationally televised news conference and insisted he was not in the photo. He said he wanted to serve out the remaining three years of his term, and use the episode as an opportunity to have honest discussions among Virginians about the state’s long and painful racial past. Although he pledged to stand his ground, he said he would reconsider if it was clear he could no longer be effective as governor. On Sunday night during the Super Bowl, Northam met with senior staffers of color to discuss his future.”
The story is still evolving, but many politicians and allies have called for Northam to resign as governor. “But even after meeting Sunday night with a group of his African-American aides, most of whom told him the only way he could clear his name would be to quit, Mr. Northam was giving no indication that he intended to step down.”
Clearly, Northam was part of a system that took racism casually. The photo was in a yearbook, which presumably had an editing staff and perhaps a faculty advisor. Dozens of people must have seen the picture before it went to print, and it was so unremarkable in that particular medical school culture that no one complained, or it was so familiar that no one felt comfortable complaining. One has to wonder how the African-American patients of those doctors have been treated over the years. Did they receive the respectful medical care they deserve?
Like Northam, I also grew up in a system that didn’t see the depth of the racism around me. I have let comments go by that I should have challenged, succumbed to stereotypes, laughed at jokes that weren’t funny, and said things that showed my ignorance. The question, for me and for Governor Northam and for all of us, is whether we have learned anything over the years.
So far, I don’t hear the governor claiming the legacy that Paul opens up for us. Paul paves the way for all of us, as people of faith, to say, “I know how to do better.” We can say, with Paul, that we’re learning.
In an interview last fall, spiritual writer Richard Foster said, “All that happens is by grace; grace is God’s interactive relationship with his children. There are times when God just pours grace into a person’s life, but the normal way that grace functions is through this interactive relationship. There’s a back and forth — there is a role that we play in our relational life with God. That role is, as Paul puts it, that we are to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice.” Famous for writing about spiritual disciplines, Foster says that they are only a tool. They “just allow us to place ourselves before God. The grace of God steps into that and begins to do work we can hardly imagine.” Foster says that we can change our minds, but “I cannot change my own heart. I cannot change anybody else’s heart. That isn’t my business — that’s God’s business.”
Along with Paul, may it be that we can allow God to work with our places of ignorance until we know better, and do better, to paraphrase Dr. Maya Angelou.
Richard Foster proposes an aim for us. “We go through a process of growth. I’m not talking about perfectionism, but I am talking about progress.” Progress is what we seek, following the example of Paul, who responded to God’s grace by taking up a whole different life, and was never ashamed to say that he had changed his mind.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Chris Keating:
Isaiah 6:1-8 (9-13)
A church of unclean lips
Isaiah recognizes that he’s caught in a dilemma. On the one hand, God’s glory and sheer holiness envelope him in the serene beauty of worship, yet he recognizes that he lives among a people of unclean lips. Will sin prevent him from responding to God’s magnificence and call?
There’s a similarity here between Isaiah’s “MeToo” moment and churches that are responding to revelations of sexual misconduct and harassment by leaders. Following allegations of misconduct by former Willow Creek Association leader Bill Hybels, the Chicago-area mega church recently released a program called “Ministry and #MeToo: A Learning Journey for Leaders.” The videos are part of the church’s work to understand the issues of abuse and the experiences of victims.
Willow Creek Association President and CEO Tom DeVries described how the issues of power, abuse, and gender bias have been found in the church as well as broader society.
“The church is not immune — and it is not innocent,” he said. “Many of the experiences that are being shared have come under the sanctity of the steeple or the shadow of a stained glass window.”
Perhaps like Isaiah, the church is beginning to recognize that it exists among a people of unclean lips. In the videos, author, pastor and justice advocate Danielle Strickland said the #MeToo movement has brought the church to a “terrible, awful, beautiful moment.” Strickland is identified as a survivor in the videos.
“That’s the moment that we’re choosing to say, ‘God, how could you take something terrible and awful and tragic and horrible that’s still happening all over the globe right now and help your church not only identify and heal and repent but also move forward as a potential example of what to do in these moments?” she said.
* * *
1 Corinthians 15:1-11
I am what I am
Paul’s testimony speaks to the transforming power of grace. The church he had once persecuted was now embracing him, and the Lord he had once decried was now calling him into ministry.
Former felons in Florida are experiencing something similar. Last month, a historic change to the Florida constitution restored voting privileges to more than 1.5 million former felons. The measure was approved in November by more than 4 million Floridians — more votes than were received by any candidate.
Among those lining up to register on the day the law went into effect was 45-year-old Jerry Armstrong. Armstrong stood in line early on the day when the law went into effect so that he could register to vote for the first time in his life. When it was his turn to register, Armstrong stood up and pumped his fists in the air.
“I never voted a day in my life,” Mr. Armstrong said. Now, he added, “I feel like I am a United States citizen.”
* * *
Luke 5:1-11
Staying safe
“Inoffensive, sleek, and promising little” were the words New York Times critic Jon Caramanica used to describe Maroon 5, the headline performer at this year’s Super Bowl halftime show. Caramanic continued:
For nearly two decades, it (Maroon 5) has been wildly popular without leaving much of a musical mark, as easy to forget as mild weather.
And the band did no better during its 13 and a half minutes onstage, in a performance that was dynamically flat, mushy at the edges, worthy of something much worse than derision: a shrug. It was an inessential performance from a band that might have lost some moral authority if it had any moral authority to lose.
Contrast that to Peter’s astonishing, jaw-dropping experience of Jesus by the lakeshore. Like Maroon 5, Jesus is surrounded by a crowd who is eager to receive his message. Pressing on him at every corner, the enthusiasm of the crowd builds. Afterwards, Jesus approaches Peter and his colleagues, who apparently have had a night of fishing about as inspiring as this week’s half-time show. Instead of an “inessential performance,” however, Peter and his band of fishermen encounter the transforming power of God in Christ. While Maroon 5 may have played it safe, Peter and crew were willing to “put out into the deep water.”
* * * * * * * * *
From team member Ron Love:
Luke 5:3 “taught the crowds from a boat”
Super Bowl LIII was played on Sunday, February 3, 2019. The New England Patriots defeated the Los Angeles Rams in a score of 13-3. The game was played at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. The fans who crowded into the stadium numbered 70,081. The television viewership, shown on CBS, numbered 91 million. That is over 91 million people all doing the same thing at the same time. It would be amazing if 91 million people, all at the same time, would be willing to gather on the shore beside the lake of Gennesaret to listen to Jesus teach from a boat.
* * *
Luke 5:9 “amazed”
Ford recently unveiled the most powerful car it has ever built. The 2020 Ford Shelby GT500 is a high-performance Mustang. It has a supercharged 5.2-liter V8 engine, and more than 700 horsepower. The Mustang can reach 60mph in just over three seconds.
* * *
Isiah 6:7 “your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out”
In the newspaper comic Born Loser by Art and Chip Sansom, we often read about Brutus seeking advice from his Uncle Ted. It would appear from reading the comic each day that Uncle Ted has moved into Thornapple household. In this series of three frames we only see both characters from the shoulders up, looking directly at one another, both smiling in appreciation. Brutus asks his uncle, “You and Aunt Hazel were happily married for many years, Uncle Ted. What’s the secret to a long marriage?” Uncle Ted, with his eyeglasses seen prominently resting upon his nose, responds, “The secret to a long relationship…” Then we move to the last frame in which he delivers the wisdom of elder statesman, “is a short memory!”
* * *
Isaiah 6:8 “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”
The Pony Express had a very short history of only 18 months, from April 1860 to October 1861. But in that short time, it has become a national legend. It was soon replaced by the stagecoach, the telegraph and ultimately by the railroad. Its official name was the Central California Overland and Pikes Peak Express Company. It became known as the Pony Express because the 400 horses used were very small, and the 120 young riders all weighed 125 pounds or less. The route began in Saint Joseph, Missouri, and traveled 2,000 miles to Sacramento, California. A rider would go ten miles on one horse, then quickly exchange it for another horse at one of the 186 change stations along the route. Each rider would cover 75 miles a day. The mail could be delivered in ten days at a cost of $5 per letter, or $150 in today’s currency. The Wells Fargo Company managed the Pony Express. Today. Wells Fargo Bank currently uses the stagecoach as its image.
* * *
Psalm 138:6 “haughty”
After defeating two-time Grand Slam finalist and Number 5 seed Kevin Anderson of South Africa, Frances Tiafoe, the 39th ranked American, experienced his first major victory in his developing career. After Tiafoe’s victory in the second round of the 2019 Australian Open, played in January, he was very haughty in his victory celebration. He rolled up his right white shirt sleeve, flexed his biceps and slapped the muscle five times. He then pounded his chest while yelling, “Yeah! Let’s go! Let’s go! Come on!”
* * *
Psalm 138:6 “haughty”
A lot of controversy has surrounded the three-way confrontation on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on Friday, January 18. We had the youth from the all-male and predominantly white Covington Catholic High in Park Hills, Kentucky. We had Native Americans present, celebrating one of their sacred religious days. And there were the Black Hebrew Israelites, who believe they are the only true Israelites. All three groups were disrespectful and antagonistic. The first video to go viral on social media was a student, Nick Sandmann, from Covington High, standing face-to-face with Native American Nathan Phillips as he played his drum. Later, an additional video was shown as viewers could witness the antagonistic actions of the Black Hebrew Israelites. Both Sandmann and Phillips claimed they were trying to restore peace. But, the degrading smirk that Sandmann had on his face as he stared unblinking at Phillips was anything but a look calling for reconciliation.
* * *
Isaiah 6:7 “touched my mouth”
Mike Mussina, nicknamed Moose, is an American former baseball starting pitcher who played 18 seasons in Major League Baseball for the Baltimore Orioles and the New York Yankees. Having played in 537 games, he had an ERA of 3.68. The Williamsport, Pennsylvania, native was elected into this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame. In his remarks to the press Mussina said, “The game always evolves — it always has. I’m not sure I love the way it’s changed lately, but that’s just the nature of it.” He used as an example the new reliance on the infield shift that has dropped batting averages to .248, the lowest since 1972. This last season there were 34,673 infield shifts compared to 8,180 in 2013.
* * *
Psalm 138:6 “regards the lowly”
Elaine Pagels is a religious historian who is best known for her writings on the Gnostic Gospels. In 2018 she published a book titled Why Religion? A Personal Story. In her book she shares the death of her six-year-old son, Mark, from heart disease, and fifteen months later the death of her husband, Heinz, of twenty year,s from a mountain climbing accident. As a skilled writer Pagels is able to draw the reader into her raw emotions. She described what it felt like on the first New Year’s Day after Heinz’s death, “Walking alone in the dark early the next morning, New Year’s Day, the coming year stretched out like a bleak and endless highway, leading nowhere.”
* * *
Isaiah 6:8 “Here I am; send me!”
Dan Schutte was a 31-year-old Jesuit studying theology in Berkeley, California, when a friend asked him to write a song for an upcoming diaconate ordination Mass. It was Wednesday, and the Mass was on Saturday, only three days away. Though he was sick with the flu, he agreed to write a hymn for the ordination service.
One of Schutte’s favorite chapters in the Bible is Isaiah Chapter 6. He chose that chapter as the foundation for his hymn. In his own words he explains why:
I had always loved the particular Scripture passage where God calls Isaiah to be his servant and messenger to the people and Isaiah responds with both hesitation and doubt, but also with a humble willingness to surrender to God.
With guitar in hand and a blank piece of paper in front of him, no words for a hymn were placed upon the sheet of paper. Then Schutte remembered that God had called Samuel during the night to challenge Samuel to do that which he felt incapable of doing. That was the same challenge that Schutte was experiencing, with only three days to write an ordination song. The calling of Isaiah and Samuel, two prophets who vacillated in responding to the call of God, became his inspiration.
Then he thought of Jeremiah, who asked God to give him the right words to say. Reflecting on the prophets, still with a blank sheet of paper before him, Schutte came to the understanding that, “In all those stories, all of those people God was calling to be prophets have expressed in one way or another their humanness or their self-doubt.”
The uncertainty of three great prophets created the self-doubting refrain, “Here I am, Lord; is it I, Lord?”
As Schutte was walking to his friend’s house on Friday evening, with his newly-written composition, he was still jotting down changes to the song as he walked.
Dr. C. Michael Hawn is the University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Church Music at Perkins School Theology, Southern Methodist University. In an article on the history of hymns that he wrote for Discipleship Ministries United Methodist Church, he reviewed the hymn “Here I Am, Lord.” Dr. Hawn points out that,
This is a hymn of transformation. God transforms the darkness into light in stanza one, melts “hearts of stone” with love in stanza two and nourishes the “poor and lame” with the “finest bread” — a clear Eucharistic reference.
Each stanza ends with the question, “Whom shall I send?” Rhetorical questions are very common poetical devices in Christian hymnody, but this is not one of them. The refrain immediately offers the response, “Here I am, Lord.”
Dan Schutte’s hymn “Here I Am, Lord” has become one of the most favored hymns in today’s congregations, both Catholic and Protestant. In the refrain, worshipers offer God the affirmation,
Here I am Lord, Is it I Lord?
I have heard You calling in the night.
I will go Lord, if You lead me.
I will hold Your people in my heart.
* * *
Isaiah 6:8 “Here I am; send me!”
The Seventh-day Adventist was founded upon the immediate return of Christ. Now, over 150 years later, they are still expecting Christ’s return. When Lisa Beardsley-Hardy was a child, she thought every thunderstorm she heard meant the immediate return of Christ. Now with two children and two grandchildren she said, “I’m getting back to waiting. But I’m kind of glad the Lord has tarried.”
From team member Tom Willadsen:
Isaiah 6:1-8 (9-13)
Observations
These seraphs flying around the Temple, they are something like flying cobras. They fly with two wings; they cover their eyes with two wings; they cover their “feet” with two wings. “Feet” is a euphemism for “naughty bits,” (cf. Ruth 3:7) which is itself a euphemism.
The call that Isaiah responds to is not addressed to him. God is talking to Godself and Isaiah overhears. How would you feel if someone approached a member of the congregation you serve because of an opening on the Board of Deacons, but someone overheard and volunteered? Is this likely to be someone who would be a good fit for that board?
God is talking to Godself in this scene. Often this passage is used as evidence for the doctrine of the trinity, because the seraphs begin by saying “Holy, holy, holy.” “Holy, Holy, Holy” is a hymn that is sung on Trinity Sunday, the first Sunday after Pentecost — and the only day on the liturgical calendar dedicated to a doctrine of theology. God talking to Godself can be imagined as the Holy Spirit addressed God the Son, or God the Creator, without doing violence to the text.
My uncle says that the reason he talks to himself is sometimes he needs an expert opinion….which bring us to…
***
Modesty, humility, unworthiness
Isaiah says he’s in danger because he is a man of unclean lips and lives among a people of unclean lips, yet he has seen the Lord. Remember the last scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark? Good thing Indiana Jones knew that one could not look at God Almighty and live. He paid attention in Sunday school. (Did you ever wonder what was in all those other boxes in that federal warehouse? Maybe treasures similar to the Ark of the Covenant, but more likely personnel files from the Department of Agriculture from the 1920s.) Isaiah knows that he does not belong in the presence of the Holy One.
Simon Peter, though at this point he’s only Simon — Jesus hasn’t turned him to stone yet — reaches the same conclusion as Isaiah when he hauls in an enormous catch of fish. He doesn’t say, “This is the fish story to end all fish stories. I can’t wait to tell the guys at the lodge!” He doesn’t say, “We’re rich! We’re rich!” He recognizes he’s in the presence of the Holy and he is in peril. At this point in Luke’s gospel Jesus has provoked the crowd in his hometown, driven a demon out of a possessed man, healed Simon’s mother-in-law (perhaps purely out of self-interest, once she’s better she served Simon, Jesus and whoever else had dropped in) and started the Judean leg of his tour. He hasn’t called anyone to be a disciple. A close look at the text shows that he does not really even call Simon, James and John. He simply tells them not to be afraid and gave them a new job description. They left the biggest catch of their career in the boat and followed Jesus.
Paul also plays the humility/unworthy card in establishing his credibility to the Corinthians. In today’s reading he reminds the Corinthians of the tradition he handed on to them. “Tradition” really means “that which is handed over,” so Paul is reminding them of things he has already passed on to them. The word “traitor” comes from the same root. Tradition is really, really important. Someone said, “The Christian church is always one generation from extinction.” (A lot of people have said that; I don’t know who said it first.) So Paul is grounding his message to the Corinthians by reacquainting them with what they already know.
He confirms his authority by saying that Christ appeared to him after the resurrection — after having appeared to lots of other people. Paul was the last, and contended that he was also the least. As one who persecuted the church in its early years he could have been excluded from the fellowship of other Christians and even the grace Christians know in Jesus Christ. He doesn’t belong with those who found Christ, or were found by Christ, before him. That God could use someone so lowly, so formerly antagonistic to the spread of the gospel makes it all the more amazing that Paul gets to be one of the church’s most effective evangelists. But he didn’t get there himself, he’s there by grace. And once he found grace he worked harder... No! Wait! That undermines the point he’s making! “Um, no it’s not that I worked harder, no, no, it was the grace of God within me, yeah, yeah, that’s the ticket! The grace that was given to me is my only qualification.”
In Philippians 3 Paul lays out all the education and status he had through birth, education and ritual observance. “You want credentials? I’ve got ‘em, better than yours, and yet…and yet….” Paul turns those credentials around, saying they have no significance. “I could show myself to be qualified with human measures…but I’m so humble, I won’t.”
Turning humility into a competition is dicey. It’s a contest to the bottom, because — keeping one’s eyes on the prize — the getting to the bottom is how one gets to the top! The first shall be last…the meek shall inherit the earth. It reminds me of a playground argument I overheard years ago.
“I was so dumb I flunked kindergarten!”
“Well, I was so dumb I didn’t start kindergarten until I was six and then I flunked it!”
“That’s nothing. I wasn’t born till I was five!”
Do we have a winner yet?
* * *
The authentic call — anti credentials
Simon was just a fisherman; Isaiah was filled with sin, and so were his people; Paul was a persecutor of the church. If the Lord wanted the gospel to be spread by influential people, the Lord could have done a lot better.
A member of a church I used to serve interviewed for a new position with a different firm, but decided not to accept their offer. It did not make any sense to her as a career move. The opportunity continued to nag at her, even after having declined it. After a few weeks though, she contacted that firm again, found that the position was still open and accepted the job. Two weeks later the job she left was eliminated in a corporate restructuring. She is convinced that she was called to this new position…and her call was authenticated in her mind because it didn’t make sense.
Another colleague interviewed for a position and after looking at their history and her credentials, she was quite honest in explaining to them why she was not the person for the job. She was the one they accepted.
When “church shoppers” visited the churches I served I would always ask them what they were looking for: worship style, size, denomination, architecture, music, and liturgy. I would suggest churches in town that sounded like they might be good fits for them and their families. Frequently that conversation convinced them to affiliate with the church I was serving. I was shocked that it was uncommon to put the needs of the worshippers ahead of the need to find a potential member of the choir or youth group.
* * *
Popeye?
Paul says “by the grace of God, I am what I am.” God said it first, when issuing the call to Moses. (Moses was on the lam, tending his father-in-law’s sheep — a bonus pun, blame the Polar Vortex). Popeye made this line famous.
Try this: title your sermon “I am what I am,” and see which of the three speakers the congregation recognizes.
WORSHIP
by George Reed
Call to Worship:
Leader: Let us give thanks to God with all our hearts.
People: Let us sing before all creation the praises of our God.
Leader: Let us sing of the ways of our God.
People: Great is the glory of our God.
Leader: God is high and lifted up above the heaven.
People: Yet God always regards the lowly with favor.
OR
Leader: We present ourselves to you, O God, this day.
People: We have come to listen for your call.
Leader: Let us quiet our hearts and minds before God.
People: We still the noises of the world to hear God’s voice.
Leader: We come to listen and to obey.
People: All that we hear that will we do.
Hymns and Songs:
Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah
UMH: 127
H82: 690
PH: 281
AAHH: 138/139/140
NNBH: 232
NCH: 18/19
CH: 622
LBW: 343
ELA: 618
W&P: 601
AMEC: 52/53/65
God, Whose Love Is Reigning O’er Us
UMH: 100
Here I Am, Lord
UMH: 593
PH: 525
AAHH: 567
CH: 452
ELA: 574
W&P: 559
Renew: 149
Lord, Speak to Me
UMH: 463
PH: 426
NCH: 531
ELA: 676
W&P: 593
Jesus Call Us
UMH: 398
H82: 549/550
NNBH: 183
NCH: 171/172
CH: 337
LBW: 494
ELA: 696
W&P: 345
AMEC: 239
Take My Life, and Let It Be
UMH: 399
H82: 707
PH: 391
NNBH: 213
NCH: 448
CH: 609
LBW: 406
ELA: 583/685
W&P:: 466
AMEC: 292
Renew: 150
Every Time I Feel the Spirit
UMH: 404
PH: 315
AAHH: 325
NNBH: 485
NCH: 282
CH: 592
W&P: 481
STLT 208
Where Cross the Crowded Ways of Life
UMH: 427
H82: 609
PH: 408
NCH: 543
CH: 665
LBW: 429
ELA: 719
W&P: 591
AMEC: 561
Lord, You Give the Great Commission
UMC: 584
H82: 528
PH: 429
CH: 459
ELA: 579
W&P: 592
Renew: 305
We Are His Hands
CCB: 85
God, You Are My God
CCB: 60
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELA: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day/Collect
O God who gives gifts as is needed for the Body of Christ:
Grant us the courage to heed your call to use those gifts
and the wisdom to know when the call is our own wish;
through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We bless you, O God, for the generosity of your gifts. You supple all that we need as the Body of Christ to do your will. Give us the courage to use those gifts when you call upon us. Give us discerning hearts that we may understand when it is our own ego that is urging us forward. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
Leader: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins and especially our failure to seriously listen for God’s call to service.
People: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You speak to us each day and yet we are listening to other voices as miss your call so often. We consult with all kinds of folks about what we should do and forget to ask you. When we have an idea of what to do we rush into it without checking the source of that idea. We fail to ask if it is your will or just our own ego’s desire. Help us to draw closer to you and listen more intentionally for your call to service. Amen.
Leader: God is speaking to us and desires that we listen. God seeks our good and the good of all creation. Receive God’s grace and by the power of the Spirit given to you, listen for God’s voice.
Prayers of the People
We praise you, O God, for the wondrous ways in which you bless us with the gifts we need to be a blessing to your creation. You supply all our needs.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You speak to us each day and yet we are listening to other voices as miss your call so often. We consult with all kinds of folks about what we should do and forget to ask you. When we have an idea of what to do we rush into it without checking the source of that idea. We fail to ask if it is your will or just our own ego’s desire. Help us to draw closer to you and listen more intentionally for your call to service.
We give you thanks for those who have listened to your call and have shared your love and grace with us. We thank you for your Spirit that dwells with us and speaks to us.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for all your children in their need. We pray that as you move among us seeking to bless us and bring us salvation that we might be attentive to how you are calling us to be a part of that work.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together saying:
Our Father....Amen.
(Or if the Our Father is not used at this point in the service)
All this we ask in the Name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Talk about when you were a child and would hear your mother or father call you home. Sometimes we don’t want to hear it because we are having fun. Other times it sounds good because we know we have a home and food to go home to. God calls us, too. Sometimes we just know what God needs us to do: to be kind, to share. Sometimes we see someone who is in need and God speaks through their need for us to help them.
CHILDREN'S SERMON
You Made the Team!
by Bethany Peerbolte
Luke 5:1-11
Kids will be able to relate to trying out for a team and the need to prove your skills in order to make the cut. When Jesus put together his team of disciples the qualifications he used were surprising. Instead of smart people who knew a lot, Jesus chooses people who were willing to continue learning. Instead of worldly people who have seen a lot, Jesus chooses people who are still able to be in awe. Instead of people who were fully qualified, Jesus chooses people who have potential….and that’s all of us!
Say something like:
Have any of you ever tried out for a team? Maybe it was a sports team, or a drama team like a play, or maybe it was a math team, or a dance team. Can anyone remember what you had to do to get on the team? (allow a few kids to tell you what they did to make the team)
Have you ever had to do something silly while trying out? In football there is this silly exercise where you run really fast in place then jump down and lay on your stomach then quickly jump back up and run in place again. (if you have the time/space you can demonstrate or have a child try it) Silly right? But even the silly exercises help coaches see our skills and if we would be good on the team.
Tryouts are supposed to help us show our skills and prove we deserve a spot on the team. Often coaches don’t pick everyone for the team, only the ones who are the best make the cut. Trying out for a team can be scary, and sometimes if we don’t think we will make the team we don’t even try.
Adults still tryout for teams, too. When they want a job they have to do an interview. In an interview the boss asks you lots of questions so they can get to know you. Then they decide if you are qualified, or good enough for the job.
Jesus put together a team too, we call them the disciples. This team helped Jesus as he traveled around teaching. Jesus wasn’t the only teacher with disciples. Most rabbis or teachers had disciples. Other rabbis would go to the local schools and quiz the students on what they knew about God and religion. Only the best of the best students were chosen to be disciples. But Jesus picked his team a little differently than the other rabbis.
To form his team Jesus doesn’t go to the schools, he goes to normal places, and does a kind of interview. He either tells someone he meets something amazing to see if they say WOW or “yeah right.” Or he asks them to do something they might think is silly to see if they are willing to try.
In the story we are reading today Jesus asks some fishermen to do something a little silly. These fishermen have been fishing all day, and you know how many fish they caught? Zero! Jesus tells them “try fishing on the other side of the boat.” How many of you have ever been fishing? It is kind of silly to think fishing on the other side of the boat will help. After all the fish can swim under the boat! What does it matter what side of the boat you fish on? Well guess what?! The fishermen listen to Jesus, even though they think it’s silly and WHOA are they thankful. They catch so many fish they almost tip the boat over!
One of the fishermen is so amazed he tells Jesus to leave because he does not think he should be on Jesus’ team. The fisherman has made lots of mistakes and knows he is not the best. Jesus doesn’t agree. Jesus wants him on his team because Jesus knows this fisherman is exactly who he needs. Jesus is looking for people who are still able to be in awe of God, and are willing to try and help make the world a better place. That’s what Jesus team is all about. Their “goal” is to show love to everyone!
This story reminds us that even when we think we aren’t good enough Jesus picks us for his team. Because to be on Jesus’ team we don’t need to know a lot of stuff, or have seen a lot of places, we just have to listen to Jesus and be willing to try and make the world more loving.
Let’s say a prayer about being on Jesus’ team:
Jesus, Thank you for picking us to be on your team, even though we make mistakes. We really want to help you make the world more loving. We can’t wait to help this week! In your name, Amen.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
The Immediate Word, February 10, 2019 issue.
Copyright 2019 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
- Preach or Plow? by Dean Feldmeyer — When we feel called, we would do well to ask by whom and to what before we shout “Here am I, send me!”
- Second Thoughts: Never Having to Say You’re Sorry for Changing Your Mind by Mary Austin — Why is it so hard to say that we learned something, and have a new understanding? Paul has a different model for us.
- Sermon illustrations by Chris Keating, Ron Love and Tom Willadsen.
- Worship resources by George Reed that focus on when God calls, and the discernment of that call.
- Children’s sermon: You Made the Team! by Bethany Peerbolte — Kids will be able to relate to trying out for a team and the need to prove your skills in order to make the cut. When Jesus put together his team of disciples the qualifications he used were surprising.
Preach or Plow?
by Dean Feldmeyer
Isaiah 6:1-9
Every preacher probably knows the old story of the farmer who, exhausted from his chores, decided to take a nap under a shade tree. When he awoke, he found himself looking at a perfectly blue sky and two clouds that looked remarkably like the letters, “G” and “P.”
At once he took this miracle to be a sign that God wanted him to “Go Preach” so he leapt up, ran home and took the first train he could to the city where he registered as a student at the Bible college.
Upon graduation, a couple years and a few thousand dollars later, he applied to and was invited to preach a trial sermon at a small, country church that was in need of a pastor. He was filled with excitement when he took the pulpit and told the story of his call to ministry by way of the two clouds.
As the small congregation filed out of the church, he noted that they seemed less than enthusiastic about his sermon and, finally, he asked the chairperson of the church council what she thought might be the problem.
“Well, pastor,” the elderly lady said, “I think some of them are wondering if that G.P. you saw didn’t stand for Go Plow.”
In the News
Last week, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders told the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) that God “wanted Donald Trump to become president” so he could support “a lot of the things that people of faith really care about.”1
The early, abbreviated transcript provided by the conservative evangelical station didn’t include specifics from Sanders. It seems pretty clear, however, that when Ms. Sanders referred to the cares of “people of faith” she was not speaking of all people of faith, or even most people of faith, for that matter. What she really meant was a small subset of the Christian faith that is made up of conservative, evangelical/fundamentalist, caucasian people. Polls consistently show that many conservative and fundamentalist Christians have chosen to ignore what some may call moral lapses by the President because he seems to support their political priorities and he has picked two Supreme Court justices believed to oppose abortion. He also recently proposed state-level legislation meant to bring more teaching of the Bible to public schools.
Whether or not the President agrees with Sanders about God’s intentions concerning his presidency, doing so would put him in good company among conservative politicians.
Sanders’ father, right wing political pundit and pastor, Mike Huckabee, Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, Texas Governor Rick Perry, Dr. Ben Carson, Ohio governor John Kasich, and Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, have all invoked the name of God when talking about running for political office.2
Whenever politicians claim to be anointed by God for public service, people of faith (conservative or progressive) might consider stepping back and doing some critical thinking on the topic of God’s call. Especially, they might ask how the alleged calls that politicians claim to have received compare to that tested and proven authentic call of the prophet Isaiah (Chapter 6).
In the Scripture
Uzziah was a good king. Some even said a great king.
Some even went so far as to believe that he might be the promised messiah.
But then came that horrible day when diagnosis came back and we all learned that our beloved king was merely human: Leprosy.
He stood on the balcony next to his son, Jotham, and announced that he and Jotham would reign together as co-regents until he could no longer do so and then Jotham would take over as king — Jotham, who didn’t possess even a fraction of the talent, wisdom, and vision of his father. Then Uzziah disappeared into the palace never to be seen again in public.
When, finally, mercifully, the great king died, his funeral was an occasion befitting the man. It went on for days. And it was at that funeral, in the temple, while the royal orchestra played and the great chorus sang their psalms of praise that Isaiah received, by way of a vision, his call to ministry as a prophet.
It began with a vision of God seated upon a throne, flanked by seraphim — soldier angels with the bodies of humans, the heads of animals, and six wings. With two wings they covered their nakedness, with two wings they covered their eyes so as not to be undone by looking upon the person of the Lord, YHWH, and with two wings they flew, hovering above and beside the throne of God.
And they sang, presumably with the royal chorus, hymns of praise. The sound of their singing was so loud that the temple shook even down to the foundations of the thresholds, the strongest, soundest part of the building.
Confronted with this divine spectacle, Isaiah’s first reaction is telling: humility and repentance.
“Woe is me. I’m dead man, walking. For I have seen the Lord, God, and I am a sinful person living in a world of sinful people.”
No sooner are the words out of his mouth than one of the seraphim removes a coal from the altar with a pair of tongs and uses it to symbolically sterilize Isiah by holding the coal, somehow painlessly, against the prophet’s mouth, while pronouncing words of grace: “By this holy coal you are sterilized. Your sins are forgiven and your guilt is taken away.”
Immediately, Isaiah hears the voice of God asking, “Whom will I send and who will speak for me?” And Isaiah, cleansed by grace of all his sins, empowered and emboldened by his experience of the holy, responds: “Here am I. Send me.”
YHWH answers, “Go and say to this people…”
First, an experience of the holy.
Second, conviction and despair, an undeniable sense of personal sin and guilt. “Woe is me.”
Third, grace. The divine indicative: “Your sin is forgiven and your guilt is taken away.”
Fourth, calling: “Whom shall I send and who will go for us?”
Fifth, response: “Here am I! Send me!”
Sixth, God’s call and commission: “Go and say…”
In the Pulpit
Also last week, while Sarah Sanders was ordaining the president on Christian TV, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, was making a public apology on Friday for a picture that appeared on his personal page of the 1984 yearbook of his medical school, a picture that showed a student in blackface makeup standing next to a student dressed in a white KKK type costume. He called the photograph “shocking and horrific” and clearly racist. Just about everyone seemed to agree and the calls for him to resign were legion, voiced by Democrats and Republicans, white and black.
Then, less than 24 hours later, on Saturday, he defiantly said he would not resign because he did not believe that it was him in the photograph. “I am not either of those people in that photo,” Northam told media gathered at the Executive Mansion.
He didn’t say that it couldn’t be him, that it couldn’t possibly be him but that, in this particular case, it wasn’t him. And he did allude to other actions in his past, and disclosed that in 1984 he won a dance contest in San Antonio where he wore dark shoe polish on his cheeks as part of a Michael Jackson impersonation.
“I have made mistakes in my past but I am a person of my word…” Northam said. But one is left to wonder which word that is, the one where he confessed to being in the photo and apologized or the one where he denied being in this particular photo.
Northam said if he felt he wasn’t able to function efficiently as governor, he would re-visit the matter.3
We don’t know if Governor Northam ever claimed to be called by God to be governor but we do see, in this ongoing story, his difficulty in getting past the second step in the series experienced by Isaiah and listed above. Perhaps that is because he has been confronted not by the holy but by accusations voiced by people who are, by and large, no less sinners than himself.
In fact, politicians who claim to be called by God rarely recount going through a process anything like that of the prophet. Theirs’ tend to be something like this:
First, consider running for office.
Second, let it be leaked that they are considering running for office.
Third, hold a press conference where they say that they haven’t decided anything yet and they have to talk with their family and pray about it, asking God for God’s imprimatur.
Fourth, announce that they are running for office.
Fifth, forget about any references to God and make no more unless speaking to a conservative, evangelical/fundamentalist Christian audience.
The honest fact is that few of us who feel that we have been called to our various professions have gone through a process as thorough and vigorous as Isaiah went through. The further fact is that we probably should have, if not literally, then at least figuratively.
Whether our calling is to politics, the professional ministry, business, education, horticulture, agriculture, or serving customers at the counter of the local diner, we would probably be better prepared to do it and do it well if, at some point, as we grow into that calling, we stopped and asked ourselves if it was God or convenience, God or mammon, God or our parents’ expectations, God or our own lack of direction or conviction that was really making the call.
Only when we have made that kind of journey can we know with anything like confidence that those letters really did stand for “Go Preach.” Only then can we stand with the prophet and say, “Here am I. Send me.”
The preacher who seeks to preach on the topic of being called by God might begin with his or her own sense of call. What was it like? How was it received by the preacher?
A sensitive sermon might explore different ways the call comes to different people. Some may hear something like the voice of God, but that experience is rare. More often we hear God’s voice through the voice of others, people we know, love, respect, who question us and suggest to us that we explore certain career directions.
Some are called through no one, identifiable, moment or event but over the course of a long life lived under certain circumstances. I, for instance, was raised in the church. Thanks to my parents who were very involved and dedicated to their church, the church was my home and, when it came time to consider a career direction, the ministry just naturally fell among those careers that I considered.
Finally, a sermon on the topic of call, might also explore how we “test” the call for authenticity. How do we know or reasonably believe that the call we are hearing is from God and not just from our own desires and dreams or the expectations of our parents and teachers?
Sermons on this topic can help our laity explore deeper their own sense of calling and lead them to some revealing conversations about their lives and the directions they have chosen.
1 Boorstein, Michelle. "Sarah Sanders tells Christian Broadcasting Network: God wanted Trump to be president" Washington Post, Jan. 30. 2019.
2Sophia Tesfaye, "'God's plan': These GOP candidates claim the Almighty wants them to run" Salon July 22, 2015.
3 Laura Vozzella, Gregory S. Schneider "Gov. Northam refuses to step down, despite flood of calls for his resignation over racist photo" Washington Post February 2, 2019.
SECOND THOUGHTS
Never Having to Say You’re Sorry for Changing Your Mind
by Mary Austin
1 Corinthians 15:1-11
The apostle Paul is the greatest example in history of someone who changes his mind, and is willing to brag about it. In American life, changing our minds is seen as a negative. Politicians who evolve are accused of being wishy-washy. They risk having people hold up flip-flops at their rallies, to make the point perfectly clear. Every political campaign must figure out how to deal with a candidate who now has a different view on an issue than she or he did earlier. It’s rare to hear someone say, “I learned something new and I changed my mind.” We see that as a flaw, instead of as a sign of growth. But Paul has a different model for us. Moving from enthusiastic persecutor to zealous advocate for Jesus, he dives completely into his new identity.
For Paul, there was none of the foolishness of modern politicians, who say things like, “I was for it before I was against it.” Or, were you against it before you were for it? Paul claims his identity as an apostle, and never tries to hide his past beliefs. He writes that Jesus “appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers and sisters at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to someone untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unfit to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me has not been in vain.” He may be the least of the apostles, but he claims his place in the list, acknowledging his past as he does.
Why is it so hard to say that we learned something, and have a new understanding?
As we go to press, Virginia governor Ralph Northam is facing calls for his resignation after racist photos surfaced from his medical school yearbook. “Northam initially apologized Friday night for appearing in the photograph after it became public. But he reversed himself Saturday at a nationally televised news conference and insisted he was not in the photo. He said he wanted to serve out the remaining three years of his term, and use the episode as an opportunity to have honest discussions among Virginians about the state’s long and painful racial past. Although he pledged to stand his ground, he said he would reconsider if it was clear he could no longer be effective as governor. On Sunday night during the Super Bowl, Northam met with senior staffers of color to discuss his future.”
The story is still evolving, but many politicians and allies have called for Northam to resign as governor. “But even after meeting Sunday night with a group of his African-American aides, most of whom told him the only way he could clear his name would be to quit, Mr. Northam was giving no indication that he intended to step down.”
Clearly, Northam was part of a system that took racism casually. The photo was in a yearbook, which presumably had an editing staff and perhaps a faculty advisor. Dozens of people must have seen the picture before it went to print, and it was so unremarkable in that particular medical school culture that no one complained, or it was so familiar that no one felt comfortable complaining. One has to wonder how the African-American patients of those doctors have been treated over the years. Did they receive the respectful medical care they deserve?
Like Northam, I also grew up in a system that didn’t see the depth of the racism around me. I have let comments go by that I should have challenged, succumbed to stereotypes, laughed at jokes that weren’t funny, and said things that showed my ignorance. The question, for me and for Governor Northam and for all of us, is whether we have learned anything over the years.
So far, I don’t hear the governor claiming the legacy that Paul opens up for us. Paul paves the way for all of us, as people of faith, to say, “I know how to do better.” We can say, with Paul, that we’re learning.
In an interview last fall, spiritual writer Richard Foster said, “All that happens is by grace; grace is God’s interactive relationship with his children. There are times when God just pours grace into a person’s life, but the normal way that grace functions is through this interactive relationship. There’s a back and forth — there is a role that we play in our relational life with God. That role is, as Paul puts it, that we are to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice.” Famous for writing about spiritual disciplines, Foster says that they are only a tool. They “just allow us to place ourselves before God. The grace of God steps into that and begins to do work we can hardly imagine.” Foster says that we can change our minds, but “I cannot change my own heart. I cannot change anybody else’s heart. That isn’t my business — that’s God’s business.”
Along with Paul, may it be that we can allow God to work with our places of ignorance until we know better, and do better, to paraphrase Dr. Maya Angelou.
Richard Foster proposes an aim for us. “We go through a process of growth. I’m not talking about perfectionism, but I am talking about progress.” Progress is what we seek, following the example of Paul, who responded to God’s grace by taking up a whole different life, and was never ashamed to say that he had changed his mind.
ILLUSTRATIONS
From team member Chris Keating:
Isaiah 6:1-8 (9-13)
A church of unclean lips
Isaiah recognizes that he’s caught in a dilemma. On the one hand, God’s glory and sheer holiness envelope him in the serene beauty of worship, yet he recognizes that he lives among a people of unclean lips. Will sin prevent him from responding to God’s magnificence and call?
There’s a similarity here between Isaiah’s “MeToo” moment and churches that are responding to revelations of sexual misconduct and harassment by leaders. Following allegations of misconduct by former Willow Creek Association leader Bill Hybels, the Chicago-area mega church recently released a program called “Ministry and #MeToo: A Learning Journey for Leaders.” The videos are part of the church’s work to understand the issues of abuse and the experiences of victims.
Willow Creek Association President and CEO Tom DeVries described how the issues of power, abuse, and gender bias have been found in the church as well as broader society.
“The church is not immune — and it is not innocent,” he said. “Many of the experiences that are being shared have come under the sanctity of the steeple or the shadow of a stained glass window.”
Perhaps like Isaiah, the church is beginning to recognize that it exists among a people of unclean lips. In the videos, author, pastor and justice advocate Danielle Strickland said the #MeToo movement has brought the church to a “terrible, awful, beautiful moment.” Strickland is identified as a survivor in the videos.
“That’s the moment that we’re choosing to say, ‘God, how could you take something terrible and awful and tragic and horrible that’s still happening all over the globe right now and help your church not only identify and heal and repent but also move forward as a potential example of what to do in these moments?” she said.
* * *
1 Corinthians 15:1-11
I am what I am
Paul’s testimony speaks to the transforming power of grace. The church he had once persecuted was now embracing him, and the Lord he had once decried was now calling him into ministry.
Former felons in Florida are experiencing something similar. Last month, a historic change to the Florida constitution restored voting privileges to more than 1.5 million former felons. The measure was approved in November by more than 4 million Floridians — more votes than were received by any candidate.
Among those lining up to register on the day the law went into effect was 45-year-old Jerry Armstrong. Armstrong stood in line early on the day when the law went into effect so that he could register to vote for the first time in his life. When it was his turn to register, Armstrong stood up and pumped his fists in the air.
“I never voted a day in my life,” Mr. Armstrong said. Now, he added, “I feel like I am a United States citizen.”
* * *
Luke 5:1-11
Staying safe
“Inoffensive, sleek, and promising little” were the words New York Times critic Jon Caramanica used to describe Maroon 5, the headline performer at this year’s Super Bowl halftime show. Caramanic continued:
For nearly two decades, it (Maroon 5) has been wildly popular without leaving much of a musical mark, as easy to forget as mild weather.
And the band did no better during its 13 and a half minutes onstage, in a performance that was dynamically flat, mushy at the edges, worthy of something much worse than derision: a shrug. It was an inessential performance from a band that might have lost some moral authority if it had any moral authority to lose.
Contrast that to Peter’s astonishing, jaw-dropping experience of Jesus by the lakeshore. Like Maroon 5, Jesus is surrounded by a crowd who is eager to receive his message. Pressing on him at every corner, the enthusiasm of the crowd builds. Afterwards, Jesus approaches Peter and his colleagues, who apparently have had a night of fishing about as inspiring as this week’s half-time show. Instead of an “inessential performance,” however, Peter and his band of fishermen encounter the transforming power of God in Christ. While Maroon 5 may have played it safe, Peter and crew were willing to “put out into the deep water.”
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From team member Ron Love:
Luke 5:3 “taught the crowds from a boat”
Super Bowl LIII was played on Sunday, February 3, 2019. The New England Patriots defeated the Los Angeles Rams in a score of 13-3. The game was played at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. The fans who crowded into the stadium numbered 70,081. The television viewership, shown on CBS, numbered 91 million. That is over 91 million people all doing the same thing at the same time. It would be amazing if 91 million people, all at the same time, would be willing to gather on the shore beside the lake of Gennesaret to listen to Jesus teach from a boat.
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Luke 5:9 “amazed”
Ford recently unveiled the most powerful car it has ever built. The 2020 Ford Shelby GT500 is a high-performance Mustang. It has a supercharged 5.2-liter V8 engine, and more than 700 horsepower. The Mustang can reach 60mph in just over three seconds.
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Isiah 6:7 “your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out”
In the newspaper comic Born Loser by Art and Chip Sansom, we often read about Brutus seeking advice from his Uncle Ted. It would appear from reading the comic each day that Uncle Ted has moved into Thornapple household. In this series of three frames we only see both characters from the shoulders up, looking directly at one another, both smiling in appreciation. Brutus asks his uncle, “You and Aunt Hazel were happily married for many years, Uncle Ted. What’s the secret to a long marriage?” Uncle Ted, with his eyeglasses seen prominently resting upon his nose, responds, “The secret to a long relationship…” Then we move to the last frame in which he delivers the wisdom of elder statesman, “is a short memory!”
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Isaiah 6:8 “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?”
The Pony Express had a very short history of only 18 months, from April 1860 to October 1861. But in that short time, it has become a national legend. It was soon replaced by the stagecoach, the telegraph and ultimately by the railroad. Its official name was the Central California Overland and Pikes Peak Express Company. It became known as the Pony Express because the 400 horses used were very small, and the 120 young riders all weighed 125 pounds or less. The route began in Saint Joseph, Missouri, and traveled 2,000 miles to Sacramento, California. A rider would go ten miles on one horse, then quickly exchange it for another horse at one of the 186 change stations along the route. Each rider would cover 75 miles a day. The mail could be delivered in ten days at a cost of $5 per letter, or $150 in today’s currency. The Wells Fargo Company managed the Pony Express. Today. Wells Fargo Bank currently uses the stagecoach as its image.
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Psalm 138:6 “haughty”
After defeating two-time Grand Slam finalist and Number 5 seed Kevin Anderson of South Africa, Frances Tiafoe, the 39th ranked American, experienced his first major victory in his developing career. After Tiafoe’s victory in the second round of the 2019 Australian Open, played in January, he was very haughty in his victory celebration. He rolled up his right white shirt sleeve, flexed his biceps and slapped the muscle five times. He then pounded his chest while yelling, “Yeah! Let’s go! Let’s go! Come on!”
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Psalm 138:6 “haughty”
A lot of controversy has surrounded the three-way confrontation on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on Friday, January 18. We had the youth from the all-male and predominantly white Covington Catholic High in Park Hills, Kentucky. We had Native Americans present, celebrating one of their sacred religious days. And there were the Black Hebrew Israelites, who believe they are the only true Israelites. All three groups were disrespectful and antagonistic. The first video to go viral on social media was a student, Nick Sandmann, from Covington High, standing face-to-face with Native American Nathan Phillips as he played his drum. Later, an additional video was shown as viewers could witness the antagonistic actions of the Black Hebrew Israelites. Both Sandmann and Phillips claimed they were trying to restore peace. But, the degrading smirk that Sandmann had on his face as he stared unblinking at Phillips was anything but a look calling for reconciliation.
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Isaiah 6:7 “touched my mouth”
Mike Mussina, nicknamed Moose, is an American former baseball starting pitcher who played 18 seasons in Major League Baseball for the Baltimore Orioles and the New York Yankees. Having played in 537 games, he had an ERA of 3.68. The Williamsport, Pennsylvania, native was elected into this year’s Baseball Hall of Fame. In his remarks to the press Mussina said, “The game always evolves — it always has. I’m not sure I love the way it’s changed lately, but that’s just the nature of it.” He used as an example the new reliance on the infield shift that has dropped batting averages to .248, the lowest since 1972. This last season there were 34,673 infield shifts compared to 8,180 in 2013.
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Psalm 138:6 “regards the lowly”
Elaine Pagels is a religious historian who is best known for her writings on the Gnostic Gospels. In 2018 she published a book titled Why Religion? A Personal Story. In her book she shares the death of her six-year-old son, Mark, from heart disease, and fifteen months later the death of her husband, Heinz, of twenty year,s from a mountain climbing accident. As a skilled writer Pagels is able to draw the reader into her raw emotions. She described what it felt like on the first New Year’s Day after Heinz’s death, “Walking alone in the dark early the next morning, New Year’s Day, the coming year stretched out like a bleak and endless highway, leading nowhere.”
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Isaiah 6:8 “Here I am; send me!”
Dan Schutte was a 31-year-old Jesuit studying theology in Berkeley, California, when a friend asked him to write a song for an upcoming diaconate ordination Mass. It was Wednesday, and the Mass was on Saturday, only three days away. Though he was sick with the flu, he agreed to write a hymn for the ordination service.
One of Schutte’s favorite chapters in the Bible is Isaiah Chapter 6. He chose that chapter as the foundation for his hymn. In his own words he explains why:
I had always loved the particular Scripture passage where God calls Isaiah to be his servant and messenger to the people and Isaiah responds with both hesitation and doubt, but also with a humble willingness to surrender to God.
With guitar in hand and a blank piece of paper in front of him, no words for a hymn were placed upon the sheet of paper. Then Schutte remembered that God had called Samuel during the night to challenge Samuel to do that which he felt incapable of doing. That was the same challenge that Schutte was experiencing, with only three days to write an ordination song. The calling of Isaiah and Samuel, two prophets who vacillated in responding to the call of God, became his inspiration.
Then he thought of Jeremiah, who asked God to give him the right words to say. Reflecting on the prophets, still with a blank sheet of paper before him, Schutte came to the understanding that, “In all those stories, all of those people God was calling to be prophets have expressed in one way or another their humanness or their self-doubt.”
The uncertainty of three great prophets created the self-doubting refrain, “Here I am, Lord; is it I, Lord?”
As Schutte was walking to his friend’s house on Friday evening, with his newly-written composition, he was still jotting down changes to the song as he walked.
Dr. C. Michael Hawn is the University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Church Music at Perkins School Theology, Southern Methodist University. In an article on the history of hymns that he wrote for Discipleship Ministries United Methodist Church, he reviewed the hymn “Here I Am, Lord.” Dr. Hawn points out that,
This is a hymn of transformation. God transforms the darkness into light in stanza one, melts “hearts of stone” with love in stanza two and nourishes the “poor and lame” with the “finest bread” — a clear Eucharistic reference.
Each stanza ends with the question, “Whom shall I send?” Rhetorical questions are very common poetical devices in Christian hymnody, but this is not one of them. The refrain immediately offers the response, “Here I am, Lord.”
Dan Schutte’s hymn “Here I Am, Lord” has become one of the most favored hymns in today’s congregations, both Catholic and Protestant. In the refrain, worshipers offer God the affirmation,
Here I am Lord, Is it I Lord?
I have heard You calling in the night.
I will go Lord, if You lead me.
I will hold Your people in my heart.
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Isaiah 6:8 “Here I am; send me!”
The Seventh-day Adventist was founded upon the immediate return of Christ. Now, over 150 years later, they are still expecting Christ’s return. When Lisa Beardsley-Hardy was a child, she thought every thunderstorm she heard meant the immediate return of Christ. Now with two children and two grandchildren she said, “I’m getting back to waiting. But I’m kind of glad the Lord has tarried.”
From team member Tom Willadsen:
Isaiah 6:1-8 (9-13)
Observations
These seraphs flying around the Temple, they are something like flying cobras. They fly with two wings; they cover their eyes with two wings; they cover their “feet” with two wings. “Feet” is a euphemism for “naughty bits,” (cf. Ruth 3:7) which is itself a euphemism.
The call that Isaiah responds to is not addressed to him. God is talking to Godself and Isaiah overhears. How would you feel if someone approached a member of the congregation you serve because of an opening on the Board of Deacons, but someone overheard and volunteered? Is this likely to be someone who would be a good fit for that board?
God is talking to Godself in this scene. Often this passage is used as evidence for the doctrine of the trinity, because the seraphs begin by saying “Holy, holy, holy.” “Holy, Holy, Holy” is a hymn that is sung on Trinity Sunday, the first Sunday after Pentecost — and the only day on the liturgical calendar dedicated to a doctrine of theology. God talking to Godself can be imagined as the Holy Spirit addressed God the Son, or God the Creator, without doing violence to the text.
My uncle says that the reason he talks to himself is sometimes he needs an expert opinion….which bring us to…
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Modesty, humility, unworthiness
Isaiah says he’s in danger because he is a man of unclean lips and lives among a people of unclean lips, yet he has seen the Lord. Remember the last scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark? Good thing Indiana Jones knew that one could not look at God Almighty and live. He paid attention in Sunday school. (Did you ever wonder what was in all those other boxes in that federal warehouse? Maybe treasures similar to the Ark of the Covenant, but more likely personnel files from the Department of Agriculture from the 1920s.) Isaiah knows that he does not belong in the presence of the Holy One.
Simon Peter, though at this point he’s only Simon — Jesus hasn’t turned him to stone yet — reaches the same conclusion as Isaiah when he hauls in an enormous catch of fish. He doesn’t say, “This is the fish story to end all fish stories. I can’t wait to tell the guys at the lodge!” He doesn’t say, “We’re rich! We’re rich!” He recognizes he’s in the presence of the Holy and he is in peril. At this point in Luke’s gospel Jesus has provoked the crowd in his hometown, driven a demon out of a possessed man, healed Simon’s mother-in-law (perhaps purely out of self-interest, once she’s better she served Simon, Jesus and whoever else had dropped in) and started the Judean leg of his tour. He hasn’t called anyone to be a disciple. A close look at the text shows that he does not really even call Simon, James and John. He simply tells them not to be afraid and gave them a new job description. They left the biggest catch of their career in the boat and followed Jesus.
Paul also plays the humility/unworthy card in establishing his credibility to the Corinthians. In today’s reading he reminds the Corinthians of the tradition he handed on to them. “Tradition” really means “that which is handed over,” so Paul is reminding them of things he has already passed on to them. The word “traitor” comes from the same root. Tradition is really, really important. Someone said, “The Christian church is always one generation from extinction.” (A lot of people have said that; I don’t know who said it first.) So Paul is grounding his message to the Corinthians by reacquainting them with what they already know.
He confirms his authority by saying that Christ appeared to him after the resurrection — after having appeared to lots of other people. Paul was the last, and contended that he was also the least. As one who persecuted the church in its early years he could have been excluded from the fellowship of other Christians and even the grace Christians know in Jesus Christ. He doesn’t belong with those who found Christ, or were found by Christ, before him. That God could use someone so lowly, so formerly antagonistic to the spread of the gospel makes it all the more amazing that Paul gets to be one of the church’s most effective evangelists. But he didn’t get there himself, he’s there by grace. And once he found grace he worked harder... No! Wait! That undermines the point he’s making! “Um, no it’s not that I worked harder, no, no, it was the grace of God within me, yeah, yeah, that’s the ticket! The grace that was given to me is my only qualification.”
In Philippians 3 Paul lays out all the education and status he had through birth, education and ritual observance. “You want credentials? I’ve got ‘em, better than yours, and yet…and yet….” Paul turns those credentials around, saying they have no significance. “I could show myself to be qualified with human measures…but I’m so humble, I won’t.”
Turning humility into a competition is dicey. It’s a contest to the bottom, because — keeping one’s eyes on the prize — the getting to the bottom is how one gets to the top! The first shall be last…the meek shall inherit the earth. It reminds me of a playground argument I overheard years ago.
“I was so dumb I flunked kindergarten!”
“Well, I was so dumb I didn’t start kindergarten until I was six and then I flunked it!”
“That’s nothing. I wasn’t born till I was five!”
Do we have a winner yet?
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The authentic call — anti credentials
Simon was just a fisherman; Isaiah was filled with sin, and so were his people; Paul was a persecutor of the church. If the Lord wanted the gospel to be spread by influential people, the Lord could have done a lot better.
A member of a church I used to serve interviewed for a new position with a different firm, but decided not to accept their offer. It did not make any sense to her as a career move. The opportunity continued to nag at her, even after having declined it. After a few weeks though, she contacted that firm again, found that the position was still open and accepted the job. Two weeks later the job she left was eliminated in a corporate restructuring. She is convinced that she was called to this new position…and her call was authenticated in her mind because it didn’t make sense.
Another colleague interviewed for a position and after looking at their history and her credentials, she was quite honest in explaining to them why she was not the person for the job. She was the one they accepted.
When “church shoppers” visited the churches I served I would always ask them what they were looking for: worship style, size, denomination, architecture, music, and liturgy. I would suggest churches in town that sounded like they might be good fits for them and their families. Frequently that conversation convinced them to affiliate with the church I was serving. I was shocked that it was uncommon to put the needs of the worshippers ahead of the need to find a potential member of the choir or youth group.
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Popeye?
Paul says “by the grace of God, I am what I am.” God said it first, when issuing the call to Moses. (Moses was on the lam, tending his father-in-law’s sheep — a bonus pun, blame the Polar Vortex). Popeye made this line famous.
Try this: title your sermon “I am what I am,” and see which of the three speakers the congregation recognizes.
WORSHIP
by George Reed
Call to Worship:
Leader: Let us give thanks to God with all our hearts.
People: Let us sing before all creation the praises of our God.
Leader: Let us sing of the ways of our God.
People: Great is the glory of our God.
Leader: God is high and lifted up above the heaven.
People: Yet God always regards the lowly with favor.
OR
Leader: We present ourselves to you, O God, this day.
People: We have come to listen for your call.
Leader: Let us quiet our hearts and minds before God.
People: We still the noises of the world to hear God’s voice.
Leader: We come to listen and to obey.
People: All that we hear that will we do.
Hymns and Songs:
Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah
UMH: 127
H82: 690
PH: 281
AAHH: 138/139/140
NNBH: 232
NCH: 18/19
CH: 622
LBW: 343
ELA: 618
W&P: 601
AMEC: 52/53/65
God, Whose Love Is Reigning O’er Us
UMH: 100
Here I Am, Lord
UMH: 593
PH: 525
AAHH: 567
CH: 452
ELA: 574
W&P: 559
Renew: 149
Lord, Speak to Me
UMH: 463
PH: 426
NCH: 531
ELA: 676
W&P: 593
Jesus Call Us
UMH: 398
H82: 549/550
NNBH: 183
NCH: 171/172
CH: 337
LBW: 494
ELA: 696
W&P: 345
AMEC: 239
Take My Life, and Let It Be
UMH: 399
H82: 707
PH: 391
NNBH: 213
NCH: 448
CH: 609
LBW: 406
ELA: 583/685
W&P:: 466
AMEC: 292
Renew: 150
Every Time I Feel the Spirit
UMH: 404
PH: 315
AAHH: 325
NNBH: 485
NCH: 282
CH: 592
W&P: 481
STLT 208
Where Cross the Crowded Ways of Life
UMH: 427
H82: 609
PH: 408
NCH: 543
CH: 665
LBW: 429
ELA: 719
W&P: 591
AMEC: 561
Lord, You Give the Great Commission
UMC: 584
H82: 528
PH: 429
CH: 459
ELA: 579
W&P: 592
Renew: 305
We Are His Hands
CCB: 85
God, You Are My God
CCB: 60
Music Resources Key:
UMH: United Methodist Hymnal
H82: The Hymnal 1982
PH: Presbyterian Hymnal
AAHH: African American Heritage Hymnal
NNBH: The New National Baptist Hymnal
NCH: The New Century Hymnal
CH: Chalice Hymnal
LBW: Lutheran Book of Worship
ELA: Evangelical Lutheran Worship
W&P: Worship & Praise
AMEC: African Methodist Episcopal Church Hymnal
STLT: Singing the Living Tradition
CCB: Cokesbury Chorus Book
Renew: Renew! Songs & Hymns for Blended Worship
Prayer for the Day/Collect
O God who gives gifts as is needed for the Body of Christ:
Grant us the courage to heed your call to use those gifts
and the wisdom to know when the call is our own wish;
through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.
OR
We bless you, O God, for the generosity of your gifts. You supple all that we need as the Body of Christ to do your will. Give us the courage to use those gifts when you call upon us. Give us discerning hearts that we may understand when it is our own ego that is urging us forward. Amen.
Prayer of Confession
Leader: Let us confess to God and before one another our sins and especially our failure to seriously listen for God’s call to service.
People: We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You speak to us each day and yet we are listening to other voices as miss your call so often. We consult with all kinds of folks about what we should do and forget to ask you. When we have an idea of what to do we rush into it without checking the source of that idea. We fail to ask if it is your will or just our own ego’s desire. Help us to draw closer to you and listen more intentionally for your call to service. Amen.
Leader: God is speaking to us and desires that we listen. God seeks our good and the good of all creation. Receive God’s grace and by the power of the Spirit given to you, listen for God’s voice.
Prayers of the People
We praise you, O God, for the wondrous ways in which you bless us with the gifts we need to be a blessing to your creation. You supply all our needs.
(The following paragraph may be used if a separate prayer of confession has not been used.)
We confess to you, O God, and before one another that we have sinned. You speak to us each day and yet we are listening to other voices as miss your call so often. We consult with all kinds of folks about what we should do and forget to ask you. When we have an idea of what to do we rush into it without checking the source of that idea. We fail to ask if it is your will or just our own ego’s desire. Help us to draw closer to you and listen more intentionally for your call to service.
We give you thanks for those who have listened to your call and have shared your love and grace with us. We thank you for your Spirit that dwells with us and speaks to us.
(Other thanksgivings may be offered.)
We pray for all your children in their need. We pray that as you move among us seeking to bless us and bring us salvation that we might be attentive to how you are calling us to be a part of that work.
(Other intercessions may be offered.)
All these things we ask in the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ who taught us to pray together saying:
Our Father....Amen.
(Or if the Our Father is not used at this point in the service)
All this we ask in the Name of the Blessed and Holy Trinity. Amen.
Children’s Sermon Starter
Talk about when you were a child and would hear your mother or father call you home. Sometimes we don’t want to hear it because we are having fun. Other times it sounds good because we know we have a home and food to go home to. God calls us, too. Sometimes we just know what God needs us to do: to be kind, to share. Sometimes we see someone who is in need and God speaks through their need for us to help them.
CHILDREN'S SERMON
You Made the Team!
by Bethany Peerbolte
Luke 5:1-11
Kids will be able to relate to trying out for a team and the need to prove your skills in order to make the cut. When Jesus put together his team of disciples the qualifications he used were surprising. Instead of smart people who knew a lot, Jesus chooses people who were willing to continue learning. Instead of worldly people who have seen a lot, Jesus chooses people who are still able to be in awe. Instead of people who were fully qualified, Jesus chooses people who have potential….and that’s all of us!
Say something like:
Have any of you ever tried out for a team? Maybe it was a sports team, or a drama team like a play, or maybe it was a math team, or a dance team. Can anyone remember what you had to do to get on the team? (allow a few kids to tell you what they did to make the team)
Have you ever had to do something silly while trying out? In football there is this silly exercise where you run really fast in place then jump down and lay on your stomach then quickly jump back up and run in place again. (if you have the time/space you can demonstrate or have a child try it) Silly right? But even the silly exercises help coaches see our skills and if we would be good on the team.
Tryouts are supposed to help us show our skills and prove we deserve a spot on the team. Often coaches don’t pick everyone for the team, only the ones who are the best make the cut. Trying out for a team can be scary, and sometimes if we don’t think we will make the team we don’t even try.
Adults still tryout for teams, too. When they want a job they have to do an interview. In an interview the boss asks you lots of questions so they can get to know you. Then they decide if you are qualified, or good enough for the job.
Jesus put together a team too, we call them the disciples. This team helped Jesus as he traveled around teaching. Jesus wasn’t the only teacher with disciples. Most rabbis or teachers had disciples. Other rabbis would go to the local schools and quiz the students on what they knew about God and religion. Only the best of the best students were chosen to be disciples. But Jesus picked his team a little differently than the other rabbis.
To form his team Jesus doesn’t go to the schools, he goes to normal places, and does a kind of interview. He either tells someone he meets something amazing to see if they say WOW or “yeah right.” Or he asks them to do something they might think is silly to see if they are willing to try.
In the story we are reading today Jesus asks some fishermen to do something a little silly. These fishermen have been fishing all day, and you know how many fish they caught? Zero! Jesus tells them “try fishing on the other side of the boat.” How many of you have ever been fishing? It is kind of silly to think fishing on the other side of the boat will help. After all the fish can swim under the boat! What does it matter what side of the boat you fish on? Well guess what?! The fishermen listen to Jesus, even though they think it’s silly and WHOA are they thankful. They catch so many fish they almost tip the boat over!
One of the fishermen is so amazed he tells Jesus to leave because he does not think he should be on Jesus’ team. The fisherman has made lots of mistakes and knows he is not the best. Jesus doesn’t agree. Jesus wants him on his team because Jesus knows this fisherman is exactly who he needs. Jesus is looking for people who are still able to be in awe of God, and are willing to try and help make the world a better place. That’s what Jesus team is all about. Their “goal” is to show love to everyone!
This story reminds us that even when we think we aren’t good enough Jesus picks us for his team. Because to be on Jesus’ team we don’t need to know a lot of stuff, or have seen a lot of places, we just have to listen to Jesus and be willing to try and make the world more loving.
Let’s say a prayer about being on Jesus’ team:
Jesus, Thank you for picking us to be on your team, even though we make mistakes. We really want to help you make the world more loving. We can’t wait to help this week! In your name, Amen.
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The Immediate Word, February 10, 2019 issue.
Copyright 2019 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to The Immediate Word service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons and in worship and classroom settings only. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
