St. George's Episcopal Church
Roseburg, Oregon
Second Sunday of Lent,
February 20, 2005
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Genesis 12:1-4a
Psalm 121:1-8
Romans 4:1-5, 13-17
John 3:1-17
From the Revised Common Lectionary as Adapted for Use by the Episcopal Church
and Authorized by the 74th General Convention of the ECUSA
Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." So Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. (Genesis 12:1-4a)
Heeding the Call
The Rev. Dr. Bill Stroop, Rector
Several weeks ago, I spoke with a man who happens to be a reserve officer in the National Guard. In addition to being a soldier, he also has a full-time career as an insurance broker. He is married and has children. Now in his fifties, he and his wife have begun to seriously plan for retirement. After all, as he explained to me, one child is married and living out of state, and his other child will graduate from college soon. His and his wife's pensions have been growing steadily for many years, and they have a reasonably good portfolio of other investments. Another few years of reserve service, and he will also have a healthy military pension. Retirement seems imminent, and they believe it will be possible for them to retire a few years ahead of schedule.
I imagine that Abram and his wife Sarai were well into retirement when they got the call. Abram – this was his name before he was called "Abraham" (Gen 17:5) – was ninety-nine years old when the Lord appeared to him (Gen 17:1). Sarai – this was her name before God renamed her "Sarah" (Gen 17:15) was up in years too, having reached the age of ninety (Gen 18:11). They had apparently done well for themselves during their working years. The text says he was a rich man; "very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold." He must have had a good broker!
So while resting in their tent, the Lord appeared to Abram and told him that he was to leave his country, kindred, and his family estate, and go to the distant land of Canaan. Although we know where Canaan is, I doubt that Abram had any idea where it was. But God said that he would bless Abram and make of him a great nation, and in him, all families of the earth would be blessed. With apparently no hesitation, Abram folded his tent, gathered together his wife and nephew Lot, and put all of their possessions and slaves into one big caravan. They headed northwest, on the first leg of a trip that would taken them around the full curve of the fertile crescent. Talk about a second career! Abram moved from retirement as a nomadic herder to become Abraham, the father of many nations.
Although the story of Abraham is very old, it is a familiar one that is recast by each generation. For example, in the 2004 movie Hellboy, the main character, a red-skinned fierce some man with broken horns protruding from his forehead, saves the world from ultimate destruction by evil, cosmic forces. "In the final scene from that movie, while Hellboy is locked in fiery embrace with his girlfriend Liz, the narrator speaks, 'What makes a man is not his origins, but his choices. It's not how he starts, but how he finishes'."[1]
It was Abram's choice to heed the call of God that day. And having heard the call, Abram was obedient to the call. His exploits recorded in the fifteenth through the twenty-fifth chapters of Genesis are both vocational and spiritual. And, they are generally well done. "If anyone had a resume of solid credentials to 'boast' about, says Paul [in our reading from Romans], it was Abram."[2]
How do we live out our call? How do we even know we're called? Looking at the story of Abram again, it is hard to see how Abram recognized that it was the Lord God who spoke to him.
But perhaps asking for a detailed description of what Abram saw or heard that convinced him that God was present would be to miss an important point. In many of the encounters with God in the Bible, God is perceived differently. To Elijah, God was both a mighty fiery force (1 Kings 18:38) as well as someone recognized in silence (1 Kings 19:12-13). To Moses, God appeared as a bush blazing with fire, but which was not burned up (Exodus 3:2). To Abram and Sarai, God was made known to them as human beings (Gen 18:1-2), as angels, as a comedian (Gen 18:12-15), and simply as a presence (Gen 15:1). God, it seems, makes Godself known in any number of ways, apparently dependent on our situation at the moment. Perhaps this is another way of saying that God is always present to us, even if we are unaware of that reality.
And God knows how to get our attention. But what gets your attention might be different from what gets my attention. Perhaps one reason we have so many Christian denominations is because it is through varied religious practices God is able to find different ways of speaking to us diverse human beings. But the God who knows us is constantly trying to get our attention. God seeks to know us, and seeks for us to know God. God seeks relationship with us. God seeks to love us, to change us, to employ us as God's hands and feet in this world. None of us ever really feel worthy to be called by God because we think God is perfect. And while God may be perfect, God is not a perfectionist; and God probably wants us because of our imperfections. As the old saying goes, "God doesn't call the qualified, God qualifies the called."[3]
And if we hear God calling what is our response? Abram took his family and headed off to land where he would be considered an alien. And he did so because he had complete faith in the God who called to him; because "Abraham believed in God, it was reckoned to him as righteousness" (Rom 4:3).
As we mature, I think we begin to feel the telltale signs of aging. The eyes don't focus like they used to. Getting out of bed in the morning becomes something that we need a coach to accomplish. We begin to believe the world is more complicated than our old brains can absorb. We might begin to feel increasingly that we are a burden to others and ourselves, and that we are incapable of accomplishing very much. But the story of Abram stands out among all of the stories of faithfulness of the Bible precisely because this old man and his old wife who hear the call decide to follow, despite their age and apparent infertility. And from them springs forth a whole new reality: a people more numerous than the stars, set apart by God for God.
One of the things we are trying to do at St. George's is to grow our church. A part of that process is to develop our collective and our individual ministries so that we can become a more effective Body of Christ that grows because it is a vital force working in the world for God's people. But, for any number of reasons, it might be hard for you to live into your ministry, or even identify a ministry. In other words, it might be hard to hear God's call. And, if you hear anything at all, you might think it is meant for someone else.
The other day I was talking with some pastors about this, and one of them told me that a senior member of his congregation felt the need to do something, but didn't feel capable of doing anything. She told the pastor that she was living on a small and fixed income, and therefore couldn't contribute financially. Her eyesight was poor, and her hearing was bad. She was homebound because of infirmity. She was frustrated and felt like retiring from her faith community. The pastor said to her, "I'll bet you can pray." And from that day forward, that woman became the hub of a giant prayer wheel in her church. Anytime anybody needed prayer, they would call her, and she would get right on it. She often said that if you are awakened in the middle of the night by God, it was probably because she was praying for you. She heard a call and answered. She discovered a gift she didn't know she had.
Soon other members of the congregation heard about this. One member took on writing cards to people who were sick. Another person wrote birthday cards. And so it went.
"Christopher Wren was the architect who designed some of the most magnificent churches in the world – including St. Paul's in London. While St. Paul's was being built, Wren took a tour of the work site and asked various artisans about their labors. As he was leaving the cathedral, he saw an old man mixing cement in a small mortar box. 'And what are you doing, sir?' he asked. The man, who did not recognize Wren, said proudly, 'Why, sir, I am building a great cathedral!'
"Now there's a godly attitude toward ministry. That cement mixer saw what he was doing as part of a larger plan that gave his humble labors incredible significance."[4] He believed he was creating a great cathedral. And he was.
Abram believed God, and he acted upon God's word to him. God calls to each of us differently, seeking to draw us out and to believe in the presence and power of the unseen.
Ultimately, what we believe deep down about ourselves and about God will determine our course of action and how we spend our time, our resources, and our lives in relationship to the world around us. Faith, belief in God's love for us, and confidence in God's gift of grace are all that are needed to enable us to do God's work, whether it is mixing cement, writing cards or letters, praying for one another, or becoming the father of a nation.
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Now the LORD said to Abram, "Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." So Abram went, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him.
1 I lift up my eyes to the hills --
from where will my help come?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
4 He who keeps
5 The LORD is your keeper;
the LORD is your shade at your right hand.
6 The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
8 The LORD will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time on and forevermore.
What then are we to say was gained by Abraham, our ancestoraccording to the flesh? For if Abraham was justified by works, hehas something to boast about, but not before God. For what doesthe scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned tohim as righteousness." Now to one who works, wages are notreckoned as a gift but as something due. But to one who withoutworks trusts him who justifies the ungodly, such faith isreckoned as righteousness.For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come toAbraham or to his descendants through the law but through therighteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who areto be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For thelaw brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is thereviolation. For this reason it depends on faith, in order that thepromise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all hisdescendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also tothose who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of allof us, as it is written, "I have made you the father of manynations")- -in the presence of the God in whom he believed, whogives life to the dead and calls into existence the things thatdo not exist.
Now there was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. He came to Jesus by night and said to him, "Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God." Jesus answered him, "Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above." Nicodemus said to him, "How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother's womb and be born?" Jesus answered, "Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, 'You must be born from above.' The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." Nicodemus said to him, "How can these things be?" Jesus answered him, "Are you a teacher of
[1] Shawnthea Monroe-Meuller. "From Hellboy to X-Men: Helps for Preaching Pop Culture Ethics." The Clergy Journal. 31(4):19, February 2005.
[2] "Faith, Not Fakery." Homiletics. 17(1):63, January-February 2005.
[3] Homiletics, op cit., 63.
[4] Tony Campolo. Let Me Tell You A Story. W Publishing Group-Thomas Nelson, Inc., 2000, 171-72.
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Copyright © 2005, William G. Stroop - All Rights Reserved.
17 February 2005
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