How Do We Know?
Sermon
All prospective Church of England clergy are obliged to attend a three day selection conference to determine whether or not they are suitable candidates for ministry in the Church. This can often cause real difficulty for those candidates who are told at the end of the conference that the selectors have decided not to recommend them for training at this time. The candidates feel themselves to have been called by God, but the selectors don't agree. So by this apparent denial of their call, the rejected candidates can find themselves at a loss as to how to reconcile these two totally opposite points of view of what is God's will. It can result in immense pain, which the candidate's home parish and incumbent are often unable to handle.
Perhaps some of the problem arises because it is so difficult to determine what is God's word and what is simply a human dream. Presumably God can still speak through human dreams as he so often did in the Bible, but how do we know whether God is sending a vision or whether what we envisage and dearly wish is just us and our all too human desires?
In Jeremiah's day, some six centuries before Christ, did the so--called "false prophets" believe that they were relaying God's word and God's will, or did they deliberately deny God's will in order to forward their own ideas? And how did the people know who or what to believe? Most of the prophets forecast doom and gloom, but they were only proved to be true years later, when their prophecies came to fruition. It's easy in retrospect to look back at what was said years before and nod wisely, but it's much more difficult to sort the wheat from the straw at the time.
In today's passage from Jeremiah God says, "What has straw in common with wheat?" But interestingly, there may be many people who are unable to really tell the difference. Country folk can tell wheat from straw without any difficulty whatsoever, but those born and bred in cities who may never have seen either wheat or straw, might be hard pushed to tell the difference.
Perhaps this is the key. Perhaps it's only when we are steeped in God and our being is flooded with God that we can begin to determine what is God's voice and what is our own voice. It needs humility, openness and courage to decipher what God might currently be saying to human beings, because as the true prophets found, God often has tough words to say which human beings aren't too keen to hear. Jesus continued in this mould by warning his disciples not to expect an easy or peaceful life, but to expect struggle and strife and pain.
Perhaps those who find that they always agree with what they think God is saying, should beware of assuming that they are so in touch with God that they know God's every thought. The phrase which is sometimes heard on Christian lips, "God told me" or "God said to me" often smacks more of arrogance and ignorance than of something God might have said.
Years ago, I used to look after the church bookstall. It was just a small selection of Christian books at the back of church, mostly for any visitors who might have wanted some sort of insight into Christianity. I stocked it from a Christian book shop, where the proprietor was intensely and narrowly Christian. After our first conversation together it was apparent to him that I didn't share many of his views. On my next visit he fished down a video from a top shelf and pressed it into my hands. "God told me to give you this," he said. I didn't want the video and had no interest in it, but I rather reluctantly I took it, because who was I to question God's voice? But when later I watched the video I discovered that it reflected exactly the shopkeeper's views and was far removed from my own views. Had God really spoken to him? Or had he decided in his own mind that I needed to be converted and that he was the one to claim the scalp? Had he "heard" from God exactly what he wanted to hear by actually hearing only his own thoughts?
Many of those who eventually become priests in the Church of England have a reluctant beginning. Often the response to any notion of becoming a priest is, "Not me!" and this response seems to reflect the difficulty of hearing and discerning God's voice. How do we know that God has spoken? How do we know that we have heard God's words rather than our own dreams and desires?
For many Christians, it's often only in retrospect that we realise that we have been following God's guidance all along, when we look back and see the steps which have so neatly and perfectly mapped our way. Some of those steps may at the time have been hard and painful and life may have felt as though everything was falling apart, but looking back at the end it becomes clear that even the most painful of events concealed God's hand.
As a rule of thumb, it often seems that God calls us to the difficult and challenging way rather than the easy way. God stretches us. God calls us to climb mountains rather than to be always by still waters, so if our immediate reaction to our own thought or a word from somebody else is, "I couldn't possibly do that!" then it may be that God is calling us and challenging us and stretching us. God's call can be tested further by prayer. We should pray for clarity then stay alert for any signs which God might give us.
Sometimes even after signs which seem to point in a certain direction, we're still not sure whether or not this thing, whatever it is, is God's will. In that case we probably need to take a huge leap of faith and just go for it, not knowing at this stage whether or not we are right. Looking back years later it will seem obvious, but at the time faith is often necessary.
Sometimes what God is suggesting seems so ridiculous that we dismiss it out of hand. I was talking to someone recently who suggested to a church committee meeting thirty years ago that they should ban smoking at their meetings. She was laughed at and derided for such a stupid suggestion. But now, thirty years later, it would be very rare indeed to see a smoker at a church committee meeting and he or she would be regarded with great disapproval. Perhaps God whispered to her thirty years ago that she should make that suggestion and she had the courage to follow God's suggestion. It needed pioneers like her to change the public attitude to smoking.
God's suggestions may seem ridiculous or scary, but we need to find the courage to hear them and to follow them, for God says, "let the one who has my word speak my word faithfully." This is unlikely to lead to an easy life and may well bring trouble and pain and suffering, but it will certainly bring Life with a capital "L", life in all its fullness, abundant and eternal life with a real closeness and a love for God.
That's what Jeremiah found, that's what Jesus found and that's what we too can find.
Perhaps some of the problem arises because it is so difficult to determine what is God's word and what is simply a human dream. Presumably God can still speak through human dreams as he so often did in the Bible, but how do we know whether God is sending a vision or whether what we envisage and dearly wish is just us and our all too human desires?
In Jeremiah's day, some six centuries before Christ, did the so--called "false prophets" believe that they were relaying God's word and God's will, or did they deliberately deny God's will in order to forward their own ideas? And how did the people know who or what to believe? Most of the prophets forecast doom and gloom, but they were only proved to be true years later, when their prophecies came to fruition. It's easy in retrospect to look back at what was said years before and nod wisely, but it's much more difficult to sort the wheat from the straw at the time.
In today's passage from Jeremiah God says, "What has straw in common with wheat?" But interestingly, there may be many people who are unable to really tell the difference. Country folk can tell wheat from straw without any difficulty whatsoever, but those born and bred in cities who may never have seen either wheat or straw, might be hard pushed to tell the difference.
Perhaps this is the key. Perhaps it's only when we are steeped in God and our being is flooded with God that we can begin to determine what is God's voice and what is our own voice. It needs humility, openness and courage to decipher what God might currently be saying to human beings, because as the true prophets found, God often has tough words to say which human beings aren't too keen to hear. Jesus continued in this mould by warning his disciples not to expect an easy or peaceful life, but to expect struggle and strife and pain.
Perhaps those who find that they always agree with what they think God is saying, should beware of assuming that they are so in touch with God that they know God's every thought. The phrase which is sometimes heard on Christian lips, "God told me" or "God said to me" often smacks more of arrogance and ignorance than of something God might have said.
Years ago, I used to look after the church bookstall. It was just a small selection of Christian books at the back of church, mostly for any visitors who might have wanted some sort of insight into Christianity. I stocked it from a Christian book shop, where the proprietor was intensely and narrowly Christian. After our first conversation together it was apparent to him that I didn't share many of his views. On my next visit he fished down a video from a top shelf and pressed it into my hands. "God told me to give you this," he said. I didn't want the video and had no interest in it, but I rather reluctantly I took it, because who was I to question God's voice? But when later I watched the video I discovered that it reflected exactly the shopkeeper's views and was far removed from my own views. Had God really spoken to him? Or had he decided in his own mind that I needed to be converted and that he was the one to claim the scalp? Had he "heard" from God exactly what he wanted to hear by actually hearing only his own thoughts?
Many of those who eventually become priests in the Church of England have a reluctant beginning. Often the response to any notion of becoming a priest is, "Not me!" and this response seems to reflect the difficulty of hearing and discerning God's voice. How do we know that God has spoken? How do we know that we have heard God's words rather than our own dreams and desires?
For many Christians, it's often only in retrospect that we realise that we have been following God's guidance all along, when we look back and see the steps which have so neatly and perfectly mapped our way. Some of those steps may at the time have been hard and painful and life may have felt as though everything was falling apart, but looking back at the end it becomes clear that even the most painful of events concealed God's hand.
As a rule of thumb, it often seems that God calls us to the difficult and challenging way rather than the easy way. God stretches us. God calls us to climb mountains rather than to be always by still waters, so if our immediate reaction to our own thought or a word from somebody else is, "I couldn't possibly do that!" then it may be that God is calling us and challenging us and stretching us. God's call can be tested further by prayer. We should pray for clarity then stay alert for any signs which God might give us.
Sometimes even after signs which seem to point in a certain direction, we're still not sure whether or not this thing, whatever it is, is God's will. In that case we probably need to take a huge leap of faith and just go for it, not knowing at this stage whether or not we are right. Looking back years later it will seem obvious, but at the time faith is often necessary.
Sometimes what God is suggesting seems so ridiculous that we dismiss it out of hand. I was talking to someone recently who suggested to a church committee meeting thirty years ago that they should ban smoking at their meetings. She was laughed at and derided for such a stupid suggestion. But now, thirty years later, it would be very rare indeed to see a smoker at a church committee meeting and he or she would be regarded with great disapproval. Perhaps God whispered to her thirty years ago that she should make that suggestion and she had the courage to follow God's suggestion. It needed pioneers like her to change the public attitude to smoking.
God's suggestions may seem ridiculous or scary, but we need to find the courage to hear them and to follow them, for God says, "let the one who has my word speak my word faithfully." This is unlikely to lead to an easy life and may well bring trouble and pain and suffering, but it will certainly bring Life with a capital "L", life in all its fullness, abundant and eternal life with a real closeness and a love for God.
That's what Jeremiah found, that's what Jesus found and that's what we too can find.
