Who
Is Calling?
A
sermon by Brent J. Eelman
Abington
Presbyterian Church
January
15, 2006
I
Samuel 3:1-10
Now the
boy Samuel was ministering to the Lord
under Eli. The word of the Lord
was rare in those days; visions were not widespread.
2 At
that time Eli, whose eyesight had begun to grow dim so that he could
not see, was lying down in his room; 3the
lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the
temple of the Lord,
where the ark of God was. 4Then
the Lord
called, ‘Samuel! Samuel!’*
and he said, ‘Here I am!’ 5and
ran to Eli, and said, ‘Here I am, for you called me.’ But
he said, ‘I did not call; lie down again.’ So he went and
lay down. 6The Lord
called again, ‘Samuel!’ Samuel got up and went to Eli,
and said, ‘Here I am, for you called me.’ But he said, ‘I
did not call, my son; lie down again.’
7Now
Samuel did not yet know the Lord,
and the word of the Lord
had not yet been revealed to him. 8The Lord
called Samuel again, a third time. And he got up and went to Eli, and
said, ‘Here I am, for you called me.’ Then Eli perceived
that the Lord
was calling the boy.
9Therefore
Eli said to Samuel, ‘Go, lie down; and if he calls you, you
shall say, “Speak, Lord,
for your servant is listening.” ’
So Samuel went and lay down in his place.
10 Now
the Lord
came and stood there, calling as before, ‘Samuel! Samuel!’
And Samuel said, ‘Speak, for your servant is listening.’*
Have you ever had someone call you on the telephone by mistake: a wrong number? Most of us understand how that can happen, because we have done it ourselves. We hit the three instead of the four, or read the number incorrectly. But it gets annoying when it persists. The call comes in and we reply, “I’m sorry, you have the wrong number.” We sit back down to whatever you were doing at the time. The phone rings and it is the same person. It is irritating. I have had it happen three or four times, but the worse was when I got my new cell phone and number.
I had just switched companies and somehow I got a very easy number to memorize. I was thrilled and had my business card reprinted, my stationary changed and did all the things that one does with a new phone number. A year later I started getting phone calls asking for Lonnie. He must have been a popular person, because I got a lot of phone calls for Lonnie. Now my cell phone is primarily for emergencies and when the phone rings, I often get a surge of adrenalin. This was compounded by the fact that these calls were being charged to my minutes. Finally I got a call from Lonnie!. He truly believed that it was his number! “Why was I using his number?”
Who is calling? We live in a telephone society. One can’t go anywhere without hearing the phone ring, or play some tune. We are barraged with phone messages from wrong numbers to sales people, from friends to work. They interrupt us when we are driving, when we are sleeping, when we are taking time with family, even when we are sitting at church and forgot to turn it off. Who is doing all this calling? How confusing and chaotic it is.
I believe that God also calls, not on our cell phones, but that the call of God comes to us, just as it came to the young boy Samuel. It comes to us just as it came to Philip and Nathaniel.
Often it comes as an interruption, and at times we don’t even recognize it. There are times when we flee from this call. We are much too clever to say no to God, but there are times when we stonewall and ignore this call. Today I want to suggest three ways that we ignore the calls of God… (and they are much the way that we treat phone calls!) and then conclude with a message about how we can recognize God’s call in our lives.
I
I am troubled by all the drivers that have a cell phone to their ears. They do it in spite of all the statistics that suggest that it is dangerous. I often think about it? What kind of phone call would cause a person to risk life and limb and the lives of other drivers? Imagine that you are at the other end of such a phone call and talking with someone about something that is very important to you. The person with whom you are speaking is driving, and if the truth be known is more concerned with the car that is creeping up behind. They are busy and your call is getting a minimum of attention. We do the same thing with God’s call to us. We are distracted. We are so busy with all the things that keep us busy that we don’t listen to what God is saying. We are so busy chasing after this and after that and we often squeeze our attention to God in with two other things that we are doing. I personally believe that this is a national obsession! I often read that over 90% of Americans believe in God. I guess we should take some comfort in that, but we sure aren’t listening to God. We busy ourselves with so many things that God is squeezed out.
I will be frank. We are also doing this to our children! We schedule them up with so many things that seem important, that they do not have time to wonder, to experience awe. They don’t know what it means to be alone with God. We try to wedge God in between Youth Hockey and Karate.
II
The second way that we avoid God’s call is to treat it like it is a wrong number. This is quite biblical. Moses and other prophets said to God.. “You don’t mean me.” I believe that God calls us to do a great thing. I believe that God is calling this congregation to be a great and faithful congregation, and sometimes we act like God has the wrong number. We act like God is a bother, a burden, rather than the source of life and hope.
III
The third way that we avoid God’s call is by not recognizing who is calling us. Have you ever gotten a phone call from someone who hasn’t identified themselves and they continue talking about something and you can’t figure out who is talking and what they are talking about… It can be quite embarrassing until we finally make the connection. Many is the time that we don’t recognize the voice of God in our lives. We experience a tug.. we hear God’s call to us through the words of someone else… someone says to us, you should consider teaching. “You would be a good pastor.” “You have the gift caring.” Sometimes when those messages are given to us… we don’t recognize that God is the source of it. We play along, perhaps nervously smile, without ever recognizing the voice of God through the lips of another.
IV
How do we know that God is calling? How do we recognize the call of God? The call of Samuel gives us some insight. Two things draw my attention from the Bible’s account. First, God comes at night. And second, God is persistent.
Psychologists tell us that when we sleep, all those things which we have tried to shove out of our day; all those things that we have been to busy to deal with; those things become the fodder for dreams. I personally am not surprised by this story of Samuel. At night we let down our guard. How many of us have not awakened at 3 o’clock in the morning, our sleep troubled, our minds going a hundred miles an hour stewing over something in our lives. The story of Samuel tells us the God is often the great disturber of sleep. I am convinced, partly from my own experience, that when we are in the midst of those sleepless nights, we are, like Jacob and Samuel, in a confrontation with God.
Many years ago, in my ministry, I was going through a very difficult time. I was a new father, making very little money, working very hard, and not getting the joy out of work that I thought was promised. In the midst of this, I was offered a job in the secular world; a good job. It would end my financial struggles and I might even have more time. I must say that I struggled with that on many a night… praying to God to release me from my call, and not getting that message, only troubled sleep until I reaffirmed my calling.
Second, God’s call is persistent. God kept coming back to Samuel until he heard. I don’t think that it is ultimately possible to avoid the call of God. We can run… be we cannot hide. If you are struggling with life choices, there is a sacred dimension to those choices, and I believe that in the midst of that struggle we often find the call of God. This is the good news. Listen for it and like Samuel can you find the courage to respond: “Here I am. Speak for your servant is listening.”?
*The New Revised Standard Version Bible, (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers) 1989.
Abington Presbyterian Church, Abington, Pennsylvania, www.apcusa.org