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When I was a boy, our family used to have a parakeet. The bird's name was "Beauty." Beauty was a bird like most. She spent her life in the cage poking at a mirror and whistling while my mom played classical music. She was quite tame, and we all loved playing with her. One special skill that she acquired, however, was whistling. In fact, she was able to perfectly copy the whistle that my dad used to call our pet dog. It was amazing. You really couldn't tell whether it was my dad or the bird whistling. Neither could the dog. Often, two or three times a day, you could hear that shrill dog whistle come from the living room. The dog would jump up and run looking for my dad, only to find the room empty. Well, mostly empty.

Okay, so the dog wasn't too bright. But one day, finally, the bird whistled, and the dog came running. Only this time the dog skidded to a halt right in front of the table that hosted the birdcage. He looked up, cocked one ear, and it was as though you could see the light going on -- albeit a little slowly. That was the last time that dog got fooled by that bird.

I guess it's important to know who it is that's calling you. Otherwise, things could get a little sticky. For that very reason, I have to admit that I like this new thing on the telephone that shows you what number is calling you. With all the ridiculous sales calls coming in these days, it's great to see your sister's number on the little screen. It's good to know who it is that's calling.

One time a friend of mine, who was a pastor in New York City, got a call in his office. He picked up the phone and answered in his usual combination of pastoral welcome and professional wariness. The voice on the other end said, "Hello, Pastor Jones? This is the White House calling." Assuming it was one of his jokester friends, he said, "Sure," and he hung up. The phone rang again and the process repeated itself, not once but twice more, until on the fourth try the voice on the other end said, "Please don't hang up! This really is the White House calling!" It turns out that my friend was being invited to the White House for an important consultation on urban concerns. It's good to know who's calling.

This can be important in our day-to-day lives. As I said, things could get sticky if you don't know who you're talking to. But the stakes get a little higher when God enters the picture. What happens when you start hearing voices? What if it is God? What if it is not God? There are whole wards in hospitals filled with people who think they hear God. A friend of mine once said that those folks really gave him cause for concern, because "what if one of them really turns out to be talking with God? What do we do then?"

Today, we encounter the boy Samuel as he apprentices under Eli. In those days, like today, "The word of the Lord was rare, and visions were not widespread" (1 Samuel 3:1). In the temple, Samuel lays down to take a nap. His mentor does the same in another room. Then, scripture tells us, "The Lord called, 'Samuel! Samuel!' " Thinking, as most of us would, that Eli was calling from the other room, he jumped up and ran to him and said, "Here I am, what do you want?" Eli looks up from his nap and grumbles at him. "I didn't call you. Go lay down again."

As we know this process went on for a while, with God calling and Samuel thinking that it was Eli. The third time this happened, it began to dawn on Eli that maybe somebody special was trying to get in touch with our friend Sam. So Eli told him to go back to his bed and if he heard the voice again, to simply say, "Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening." The rest, as they say, is history. God announces to Samuel that he's going to do a new thing in Israel that will "make both ears of anyone who hears of it tingle." Indeed, it really is good to know who's calling.

I wonder if any of us would lay claim to hearing God like that? Scripture points out that the word of God was rare, and visions were few. I have to wonder, though, if that's the case. Could it be that perhaps God's Word was present, and the ability to see visions was there, but people weren't necessarily open to it? Could it be that God's sacred Word rings always in and around us, and it's we who really aren't listening? It would certainly appear that God was the one at fault. After all, if no one is hearing God, how could God be speaking? If there are no visions, then how could God be stirring them up in people's hearts?

I think it's so important that Samuel said, "Speak, for your servant is listening." Because you can't hear if you're not listening, can you? I know, if I'm working on a sermon in my study, someone could be knocking on the door, or even opening the door and walking right into the room, and I wouldn't hear them because my listening was focused elsewhere. Speak, for your servant is listening.

It may be good to know who is calling. In fact, I'd say it's a necessary part of the equation. But sisters and brothers, if we aren't listening, we'll never hear anything, and then we'll miss the chance to try and figure out who's speaking.

We also live in times where we think that the word of the Lord is rare. We live in times where people who have visions are spurned and cast aside as being dreamers, unrealistic, or just plain crazy. Again, I say that I think that we're simply not listening.

Where in our lives does the voice of the holy come to us? Where, in our relationships, in our comings and goings do we encounter the very voice of God? And how, we are led to ask, can we develop the ears for the hearing? Let's look at the way we live today. In the United States, the average worker works many more hours per week than they did a generation ago. Ten-, twelve-, fourteen-hour days are commonplace for many workers. We offer the shortest vacation periods of any "industrialized nation." The economy has moved in such a way that most families require two incomes to survive. Our lives are filled with extracurricular activities, and when not filled with those things, we numb ourselves with the passive delights of television.

Let me test this on you to see if you agree. My sense of things is that we are so busy today that we wouldn't notice God if God stepped in front of us with a bullhorn. We're so busy that our relationships with one another suffer. We're so busy that families don't eat together, couples don't date, old friends don't sit to chew the fat. How can we possibly make time to receive God's Word in our lives?

I really think that in order to hear God you need, like Samuel, to chill out and take a nap. When you've had five cups of coffee, and are juggling sixteen different tasks, and you're running against deadlines with too little sleep do you think you can hear the whispers of the divine flow into your heart? I don't think so.

It's a good and wonderful thing to be able to know who's calling us, my friends, but I fear that our ears are not open to the one voice that matters. It's a good and wonderful thing to know who's calling, but it is easy for our focus to be elsewhere. It becomes something like the tree in the forest that falls when no one is around. We will think it didn't make a sound.

I don't have to tell you that each one of has many voices calling to us. Too many, perhaps. We feel stretched and pulled by the demands and cacophony they make. My hope, my prayer is that we will all make a reasoned, intentional effort to slow down enough so that we can actually hear God's voice. My not so secret desire is that we will step out of this world's hyper achievement mode long enough to tell a joke, or listen to a child's story. My yearning is for not just quality, but quantity. Time for us to love, to play, and to listen. Then when we hear the voice, we'll have someone to go to, as Samuel did, to test that voice. And then we will know who it is that's calling.

It is good to know who's calling.

So let us step into the hearing process so that we can respond in joy to God's loving call.

Amen.