"Speak, Lord, for your Servant Hears"

“Speak, Lord, for your Servant Hears”
Epiphany 2, Year B
I Samuel 3:1-10

Prayer: Come Holy Spirit, come. Take my lips and speak with them, take our minds and think with them, take our hearts and set them on fire with love for you. In Christ’s name, we ask it. Amen.

In 1994 on a Thursday morning my sophomore year in college, I received a call. I use the term morning loosely. I just mean I was still in bed. Anyway, the point is, the phone rang and I answered it. On the line was a close friend, Jimmy Bartz. Jimmy is now an Episcopal priest who is a church planter in Los Angeles…so kinda doing similar ministry to what we are doing here in Austin at St. Julian’s. However at the time of the call in 1994, Jimmy was a fifth year senior himself at UT. Before, I really had any idea of what the purpose of the call was, he quickly said to me, “Miles, I have just been offered the job of youth minister at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church in Houston. I am going to work there for 2 years and then will be going to seminary. That will be about the time you will be graduating. How would you like the job at St. Martin’s as youth minister, when I finish and leave for seminary?” I thought for a moment and said, “Sounds cool…count me in.”

In retrospect, the call was absolutely absurd. Jimmy had not even had his first day of work and he was offering me his job two years down the road, not to mention, the position was not his to offer in the first place. Moreover, he had not even begun the long, arduous process that would even allow him to go to seminary. Therefore, going to seminary in two years, as he said, was far from a sure thing. Nonetheless, at the time, to the two of us, it made perfect sense. The position was Jimmy’s to offer and mine to accept. That morning Jimmy and I planned our future, me a little groggy (I had after all just woken up) and Jimmy a little giddy about his future serving in the church. Sure enough, things worked our just the way we discussed. Little did I know that day, when I picked up that phone, when I answered that call, it would lead to this pulpit, this evening as I share these thoughts with you as an ordained person in the Episcopal Church.

After following Jimmy (just as we had planed) and beginning my own ministry as the youth minister at St. Martin’s and, more to the point, after seeing God’s steadfast love profoundly affect young people’s lives through the ministry I was blessed to a part of, I knew that I wanted work in the church all the days of my life. Professionally speaking, I knew there was nothing else that could offer me the satisfaction and meaning that my heart desired other than sharing with people the Good News that God in Christ loves them deeply and personally (and, just FYI, God does love each or you deeply and personally). Therefore, I sought ordination myself.

After I began this process, I made a visit to my friend Jimmy who was by then a first semester senior at Virginia Theological Seminary. During the trip, I had the opportunity to spend time with a Professor of Theology named Walter Eversly. During the visit, the subject of “call” came up—that is the idea of being called by God into a particular ministry or service in the church or in the world. I, of course, was looking for personal confirmation that in fact I, Miles, was called to follow this leading I sensed in my life to seminary and ordination. And he said to me (Dr. Eversly was from New Guinea and had sort of this interesting accent), “Mr. Brandon, my phone has never wrung.” I quickly looked at Jimmy who was sitting next to me and replied, “Well mine did!”

Despite the fact that I did receive a phone call one day that began to shape the course of my life in ministry, Dr. Eversly’s words have always remained with me, “My phone has never wrung.” Although Dr. Eversly never explained his words, I believe what he meant is that we are all, every single one of us, called by God into some form of ministry and, further, that ministry or service will look different for each of us. Through the waters of Baptism, we are all called uniquely and individually to be a minister who shares God’s love with every person we meet whether friend, family, or stranger. In our Baptismal Covenant, among other things, we promise to share by word and example the Good News of God in Christ and to seek and serve Christ in all persons. Perhaps like most of us, you have never actually heard the literal voice of God or seen a supernatural vision of God that knocks you to your knees. Nonetheless, in a multiplicity of ways, some obvious (like the phone ringing) some not, God is calling out to you…to invite you into service for His world—a world that desperately needs more and more ministers and prophets proclaiming his great and gracious love for everyone…for always. Abraham Joshua Heschel, the renowned Jewish biblical scholar, writes, “God speaks first, eternally, and we answer when we figure out we’ve been called.” In other words, God is calling you and me this very moment into a ministry of love and service—particularly loving and serving those in any kind of physical, emotional or spiritual need. The question is do we have the ears to hear him?

In today’s Old Testament Lesson, we encounter the young man Samuel who for the first time in his life hears the voice of the Lord God calling out to him. Samuel is sleeping on the floor next to Ark of the Covenant the place where God’s presence radiated and dwelt among the people of Israel. Suddenly, the boy is roused from his sleep. He hears his name being called aloud, “Samuel, Samuel.” He jumps up and runs to his old master Eli who is a prophet of God (and, for that matter, the only human being around who could have been calling Samuel’s name). So Samuel says to Eli, “Here I am for you called me.” However, Eli curiously responds, “I did not call, lie down again.” Shortly after Samuel falls back to sleep, the same thing happens again. He hears his name called and runs to his master Eli, and, again, Eli tells the boy that he has not called him and to return to his bed. Then a third time the boy hears his name being called and for a third time he runs to Eli his old master. This time however, the scripture tells us that Eli perceived that it was the Lord who was calling out to Samuel, so he tells Samuel that the next time he hears someone calling his name to respond, “Speak, Lord, for your servant hears.” Sure enough, as Samuel returns to his place of rest a fourth time he hears the voice of the Lord calling, “Samuel, Samuel.” And, remembering what his master told him, he responds, “Speak, Lord, for your servant hears.” And, the Lord God speaks to Samuel. Do you sense God’s call on your life? Do you hear God’s still soft voice calling your name? Do you hear in the sheer silence of your own heart Jesus’ call to minister to and serve His people?

Many things keep you and me from ever really hearing either God or simply the people who move in and out of our lives. Communication specialists call those things, which make us unable to hear the true message a person is trying to convey to us, “noise.” And noise comes to us in a variety of forms. Perhaps we do not hear what someone is saying to us because of cultural noise. We can’t relate to someone’s cultural background or we’re irritated at the heavy accent or broken English that makes it difficult to understand him or her, so we just shut the person out. Or perhaps we turn a deaf ear to people because of sociological noise. We live with a different social status than the person who is trying to communicate with us, so we don’t understand the colloquialisms and metaphors he or she is using or perhaps worse we simply don’t give him or her credit, from the beginning, as having something valuable to say because we consider them somehow less than us. Or we don’t listen because of emotional noise. Perhaps we are so full of anxiety and pain because of some emotional wound that there is no point in even attempting to listen in the first place—we are totally tuned out. Or we may stop listening to a person because of intellectual noise. We so strongly disagree with what the speaker is saying that we simply shut down and refuse to listen further.

The point is that there is nothing wrong with the physical hearing apparatus, but there is often a deep-seeded noise within us that perhaps we are not ever aware of, which prevents us from hearing what someone is trying to say to us. And, again, the same is true when trying to hear the voice of God in our own lives. There is nothing wrong with the spiritual inner ear, which God has given us, but there is a problem with our ability to filter out the worldly and, at times, self-focused noises that prevent us from hearing God speak in our lives. Careful and attentive listening to God’s Word, is what Jesus has in mind when he often asks his disciples and others in the New Testament, “Do you have ears [to hear], and fail to [listen]?” About three centuries ago, the theologian Soren Kierkegaard said that if he were a doctor and were allowed to prescribe just one remedy for all the ills of the modern world, he would prescribe silence. For even if the Word of God were proclaimed, Kierkegaard said, it would not be heard or heeded, for there is too much noise and busyness in our world. Personally, I had an elementary school teacher once say to me: “God gave you two ears and only one mouth, so that you would listen twice as much as talk!” Perhaps some of you, most especially my wife, have, at times, wanted to remind me of that as well.

Our phones may not ring, but God is calling…calling you and me this very moment individually and as a community that we call St. Julian’s into a unique ministry of love and service. That ministry, as we live it out in this community, will look different for all of us and that’s how it’s supposed to be. Some will be called to further our Outreach Ministry among those in need, others to prepare our altar for worship, other to serve on our Bishop’s Committee, others to be constant in prayer for our community, others to give financial gifts that further our mission and ministry, and still others to work with our children and youth…and these are just some of the ways to answer God’s call to ministry in this place. And I am convinced that if we each answer that call as individuals and as a community of the whole that God has incredible things, even miraculous things to accomplish through us who are St. Julian’s in the new year that lies before us. So I ask again, do you sense God’s call on your life? Do you hear God’s still soft voice calling your name? Do you hear in the sheer silence of your own heart Jesus’ call to minister to and serve His people…with his love? If not, perhaps old Eli’s advice to Samuel can be helpful to us today: Stop the noise, clear your mind, go to a place of peace, and then say, “Speak, Lord, for your servant hears.” Amen.