"CALLED BY NAME"

Sermon Preached at Scarboro United

By Judy Chapman

January 18, 2009

1 Samuel 3: 1-10; John 1:43-51

The two lessons that Renee just read are both on the theme of "call." The other two lessons from today's Lectionary that we didn't read were from Psalm 139 (1-6, 13-18) which speaks of God's complete knowledge and care of us and from Corinthians 6 (12-20) which speaks of us as temples of God's Holy Spirit. Both of the unread passages speak of how God's spirit is embodied in each of us in a unique way. So we have two distinct themes for this Sunday: "call" and "uniqueness."

I am going to focus on "call," knowing that "call" is different for each one of us because we are all unique human beings. Please consider our individual "uniqueness" as a kind of underlying assumption for this sermon.

I believe that "call" is not something that is experienced only by a chosen few or only once in a lifetime. The Bible focuses on the stories of those who were called to do God's work of a religious, political, communal or military nature. And we know, of course, that people experience a call to all walks of life. We are summoned or we experience a strong inclination toward a particular vocation or course of action. In the Biblical context, people generally were called to put love at the centre of their lives - and sometimes they were called specifically to lead others in that endeavor. For example, the prophets were called or summoned to lead the people into a way of living that put love - and therefore, justice - at the centre of communal life.

I think it is always a good exercise to look back over our lives and see where God has nudged us in a particular direction. So this morning I am going to tell you how God nudged me toward the Christian life in general and ministry in particular. I am going to start by talking about my own call experience. I apologize to those who have already heard this and I promise that this is my last time to tell this story in this place. I don't consider my story any more special than anyone else's - but I have permission to tell it. That's important. Maybe my story will twig some of your own memories of call. All of our stories are unique, just as Samuel's and Nathanael's stories were unique to them. My call story is really a series of events - of awakening consciousness, of serendipitous experiences, of surrender and of synchronicities.

My first awakening to God was through awe and wonder as I suspect it is for many others. In an era before television entered our household, my first memory of Sunday School was thanks to the miracle of a 16 mm projector. One Sunday we were shown a film - a movie - that told how amazing our Creator God was. There on the big screen were pictures taken through a giant telescope - of the vast expanses of the universe - and also pictures of beautiful microscopic flowers that bloomed in the desert. It left an indelible impression on me. After seeing it, I would often lie in the field behind our house at night and look up at the stars and talk to God. In the daylight hours I became all the more fascinated with the beauty of the earth and the miracle of life that this great God had somehow orchestrated.

We had a wooded area that I liked to walk through each day on my way to and from school. One day when I was lingering in the woods after school, I clearly heard the words, "Look out." I looked up to see a tree falling towards me. I jumped out of the way and the tree fell to the ground beside me.

I don't know if that was the voice of "intuition" or a "guardian angel" or "God." I only know that I felt I had been saved from injury or death. I had a sense of gratitude, and a sense that there was some invisible force watching over me.

The next awakening I had was when I was taking my first communion after being confirmed as a teenager. I remember that this confirmation and first communion took place in the evening, not in the regular morning worship service. I assume that was because the United Church Minister came out from town, from his regular congregation, to the Protestant Chapel on the Air Force base to receive new members into the United Church. My mother and older sisters had joined the United Church a few years before and I was following in their footsteps. Our current Padre was a Baptist Minister of whom I thought very highly. I remember that he presided at the communion and that he told the story of a woman at a communion service who had hesitated to come to the table because she felt that she had lived such a sinful life that she was not worthy to come to Christ's table. She sat in the front row and the minister could see that tears were streaming down her cheeks. He said gently, "Come. Everyone is welcome. This table is for sinners."

Lo, these many years later, we hardly ever talk about "sinners." We prefer to define ourselves by our health rather than by our unwellness - and perhaps rightly so. We prefer to use other Biblical terms: we are children of God - sons and daughters of the living God; we are the temple of God's Holy Spirit: we are the beloved. But way back then, when I was a teenager I got the gist of the message. I understood what was meant by that invitation: we don't have to be perfect for God to care about us. God knows us well and loves us still.

The next step in my call experience happened years later. By then I was married and had three children. Having been home with them for nine years, I was thinking about returning to work. Often I would look through the want ads - just trying to keep abreast of what was happening in the work force. Formerly I had been an Employment Interviewer so I was always interested in that. After going through the want ads and the career section in some detail one afternoon, I closed the paper and announced out loud, "I don't want any of these jobs, God. I just want to work for you."

Within a week I got a call from my church. Would I consider applying for the job of Christian Education Director? I said "yes" to applying - and a little later, I said "yes" to the position.

After I had been working at the church for some time, a colleague said to me, "I don't mean to embarrass you, but I think you have the gifts and skills needed for ministry in the church. Have you ever considered going into ministry?" My immediate response was "I am in ministry. I'm in lay ministry."

Well, apparently God had something else in mind. Sometime later I was on my way to a healing circle at St. Stephen's Anglican Church. Now, Dave and I were married at St. Stephen's but we hadn't darkened the door (as they say) since. I had returned to the church of my confirmation - the United Church. Anyway, I set out for St. Stephen's that night without bothering to take the address with me or check a map, and once downtown realized that I was completely lost. In those years I lived and worked totally in the suburbs. I rarely ventured downtown.

For a split second I thought about forgetting the whole thing and going home. But another part of me knew that I had to be there that night in the circle. I stopped at a phone booth to get the address. I knew I was going to be late getting to the church, and that made me uncomfortable, but something within me said, "Go. You need to be there."

When it was my turn to be prayed for in the circle, I asked for prayer for three things - the first two requests were for people I knew who were in need of healing, and the third request was for me - I wanted a deeper commitment to Christ.

The group worked their way through the first two petitions and then started praying for me. As they did an older woman who was sitting back in what seemed like the corner of the room started speaking in a very loud voice. She began to prophesy, "I have called you forth, my daughter, from your home and your family to minister to many, and I will give to you my Holy Spirit to empower you to be a witness for me in the world."

The tears began to flow because I "knew" what this meant - and because I felt that God had just spoken directly to me.

The community - the church - of course, always has to confirm the "calling" of one of its ministers. It is the church that helps us discern if the call is genuine, and if the person does, indeed, have gifts and skills for ministry in the church. So that is basically my call story.

In the story of Samuel's call, we see something of the way it often works. The boy Samuel hears God calling but doesn't recognize the voice at first. He thinks it is Eli calling him. (It must be a person. Who else would call? Who else would call him by name in the middle of the night?) But Eli knows Samuel and knows God's ways, so he helps Samuel discern the call. It takes three times, mind you, before Eli realizes what is happening but eventually he does. It takes many of us a long time to recognize that we are being called. Often others recognize our call before we recognize it ourselves.

And oftentimes we need our elders to help us discern the call. When we see young ones in our midst who appear to have a heart for God at a young age, we can help them to discern whether God might indeed be leading them into a life of service - in the church or in some other vocation where they can serve. And I can think of more than a few children and youth in this congregation that we could be encouraging along that path. Some adults, too.

I want to say something about Nathanael, too. Nathanael is one of my Biblical heroes. Imagine, any one of us walking toward Jesus, and Jesus saying "Aahh. Here comes a real Canadian in whom there is nothing false!" What a compliment to be instantly recognized as one who is genuine and authentic - someone in whom there is no pretense!

Now, we know that Samuel became a great prophet in Israel, but you might wonder - whatever became of Nathanael? He is not listed as one of the twelve disciples in any of the other three gospels - the synoptic gospels, so what about that? What does that mean?

I think that in John's gospel Nathanael represents the ordinary person of integrity who gives of himself or herself without ever becoming a famous, without ever becoming a household name. He wasn't destined to be a great philanthropist like Doc Seaman or a great leader like Martin Luther King Jr., or a great statesman like Barak Obaman or a great healer and mystic like Jesus. He was just one of those "salt of the earth" people who make the world a better place to be at the ground level. Nathanael represents the best of our common humanity.

So what happened to him?

His name appears only once more after his call story. It appears at the end of John's Gospel in the story of Jesus appearing after his resurrection to some of his disciples on the shores of Lake Tiberias. Nathanael was one of the faithful ones. He was one of the ones there at the end -- as you might expect.

I have one other thing to say about "call" and that is that sometimes calls come to individuals and sometimes calls come to groups. Both individuals and groups have a unique purpose in life. Take for example, Scarboro United Church. It doesn't take much imagination for me to hear God saying "Scarboro, I have called you by name. I saw you before you were born. I put you together in the womb of two other churches and brought you into being. I know everything about you and I am always with you. Rejoice in the unique gift you have to offer the world. Help those who are oppressed and wipe away tears with an outstretched hand. Give yourself away and you will find renewed life. Fear not."

There is no question in my mind that God has need of us - of Scarboro United - in this time and place. Our work is to discern how we will respond to God's call in these times of transition - what unique gift or gifts we will give to the world. It may take awhile to do the discerning that is necessary but we can trust absolutely that God will guide us in the process.

Amen.