A Call From God – Sermon – January 18, 2015

Sermon for the 2nd Sunday after Epiphany, January 18, 2015. Preached at St. Peter Evangelical Lutheran Church in Dubuque, Iowa. Texts for this sermon are 1 Samuel 3:1-10 and John 1:43-5.

Sermon video (Note that we were having some sound issues this weekend, so when I tried walking around, I got a lot of microphone feedback. This video starts right when I came back to the pulpit):

As you know, I’m a seminary student. Living and going to school at a seminary means moving to a new place and spending a lot of time with people you meet at seminary. Since you didn’t know them before seminary, you spend a lot of time talking about how you got there, what led you to move from all over the country and end up in Dubuque, Iowa.

Of course, meeting and getting to know new people happens anytime you go somewhere new, but at seminary, we have a special term for it. Instead of saying, “What made you move here?” We say, “What’s your call story?”

The assumption is that to do something as crazy as give up your previous life and move to seminary, you must have a calling from God. Before you can be admitted into seminary, you have to write papers saying how it is that you hear God calling you into a professional ministry career. And as we talk about our callings from God, we look for examples of other times God has called people. Two of today’s readings have those call stories.

First, we hear about Samuel. To set the stage a little bit, this is some time after the Israelites have been led by God out of their slavery in Egypt, but it’s before the time of King David. In fact, the main reason we hear about Samuel at all is because as an adult, he will be the one to anoint David as king. But right now, he’s a young boy, probably about 12 years old, living and working in the temple. One way to describe it would be that he’s an intern. Eli, his supervisor, is a priest in the temple.

Samuel’s doing this internship not because he had gotten some call from God – at least, not yet – but because his mother Hannah had promised to bring him to the temple. The first two chapters of the book are about her struggle to have a child and her promise that if God heard her prayers for a son, she would dedicate the son to the Lord. It’s almost a little like a baptism, as she brings her son to the temple and commits him to God.

Anyway, one night Samuel is lying down in the sanctuary, and he hears a voice calling his name. Naturally, he assumes it’s Eli, but Eli says it’s not him. This happens two more times, and then Eli, the wise supervisor, catches on that something is happening, that this voice Samuel is hearing is actually God, and he tells Samuel to respond the next time it happens by saying, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

As I read this text, I noticed something interesting. Even after Eli tells him that it’s the Lord calling, I think Samuel is still skeptical. Eli tells him to respond, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.” But when it actually happens, note what Samuel says. “Speak, for your servant is listening.” He leaves out “Lord.” I don’t think he entirely believes who he’s talking to.

We know it’s God calling, and Samuel figures it out pretty quickly, but at the time of the first call, he doesn’t quite believe it.

I think when we talk about call stories, about being called by God, this is the kind of thing we think of. At least I do, and I suspect I’m not alone. A voice from beyond calling my name. Somehow in my head, the voice always sounds like James Earl Jones, or maybe Morgan Freeman, from the movie Bruce Almighty. This is the example of a call. This, and stories like Moses hearing a voice coming out of a burning bush.

But that’s not the way God generally works. Of course, we believe God can work that way. I believe the story we just heard. But even the way that story starts points to how rare it is. It begins, “The word of the Lord was rare in those days; visions were not widespread.”

Do you ever feel like that? Like we’re living in a time when the word of the Lord is rare and hard to hear? I’ve heard people say the Old Testament, or even the whole bible, aren’t relevant today. Well, I think it sounds precisely relevant. The word of the Lord was rare, and visions were not widespread. The people felt like they were under attack, like maybe faith wasn’t as important as it used to be, like God was less present than before.

I wonder if Samuel was looking for a call, or if he was just going through the motions because his parents dragged him to church.

Regardless, God does call him, in this dramatic, audible way. And sometimes, that’s how a call story happens.

But what if we don’t have that experience? What if you don’t feel like you even have a call story? What if you can’t think of a time when you heard the Lord speaking to you, directly calling you; or even of a specific moment when you believed in Jesus?

I began that first paper for seminary, the one about my call, with that fear. I wrote that I’d never seen a billboard from God, or been hit by a divine two-by-four, as my pastor likes to say. I’ve never heard God speak to me from a burning bush. I’ve never been woken up at night by a voice. And I think I’m in the majority, even for people here in a church building. Even in a seminary class.

Our gospel reading gives another example of call, and this one is probably more relevant to some of us. This story is early in Jesus’ ministry, two days after his baptism by John, and he decides to go to Galilee. On the way, he finds Philip and says to him, “Follow me.” And Philip does. And not just on Twitter or Instagram, but literally, he follows him. That’s still a direct call from God, really, not unlike Samuel’s call.

Then we hear Nathanael’s call story. He doesn’t get a direct call from God. Instead, Philip finds Nathanael, and tells him he’s found the Messiah, and it’s a guy from the town of Nazareth, sort of a backwater place. Nathanael is skeptical, and responds with one of my favorite lines in the Bible: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” And Philip invites him, “Come and see.”

Nathanael’s life changes because a friend brings him to Jesus. Maybe that’s closer to how some of you got here. If you didn’t get a direct call from God, you’re might be here because someone invited you.

That’s closer to my story, except I have no memory of someone inviting me to faith. I’m a cradle Lutheran – I’ve been in church all my life. In fact, I was baptized the day I was born, so it’s hard for me to describe a specific story of being called to faith. I bet many of you have a similar testimony of being baptized as a child, or brought along to church by your parents, whether you wanted to be or not.

It can be hard to see growing up in a church as a call story, or as a testimony, but it is. When Jesus talks to doubting Thomas after the resurrection, he asks, “Do you believe because you have seen? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”

We believe we are all called. In baptism, God calls us to a life of faith, a life of service to others, a life of following Jesus. We are called to be witness within our many vocations, inviting others to “come and see.” And God doesn’t just call us IN baptism; God calls us TO baptism. Baptized or not, God is calling us to faith, to participation in Christ’s body, the church, which baptism welcomes us into.

God’s call comes in many ways. Sometimes it is through a voice from heaven. Sometimes, usually, I’d say, it’s more subtle. At baptism, our parents and sponsors invited us to come and see. As a church, we continually invite others and each other to come and see. A big part of my call story involves people in the church encouraging me to listen for a call.

So I invite you to consider your own call story. It doesn’t need to be dramatic, like Samuel’s, and you don’t need to know where it’s going. What is God calling you to?

Part of why call stories are hard, I think, is that we can be afraid to claim we have one. Samuel didn’t seem to know he was even being called! We can think we’re imagining things, or misunderstanding. We can be afraid of where we might be being called.

But even as God calls us, God gives us faith to respond to the call. Faith is trusting when we’re afraid to follow. Sometimes we avoid following or listening for fear of where we might be led, sometimes for fear we may not be led anywhere, even for fear there may be no one leading. For fear we might not hear any call if we listen.

But to that, God says, “Do not be afraid” and “I have called you by name, you are mine.” Jesus promises, “I am with you always, to the end of the age.” The one who calls us is faithful, and we respond with Samuel, “Here I am. Speak, for your servant is listening.”