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Holy Voice Mail!

January 15, 2012, 9:00 am & 11:15 am & 7:30 pm
Second Sunday in Ordinary Time
The Rev. Dr. Fred R. Anderson
Pastor

1 Samuel 3:1-20; Psalm 139; 1 Corinthians 6:12-20; John 1:43-51;

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Voice mail–who of us does not appreciate it? It has become all but ubiquitous today. The challenge, however, is when people fail to identify themselves, or the message is cut short, and we are left trying to recognize the voice behind the message. I’ll not forget the Sunday, almost 18 years ago, when I returned to my office after worship to see the red light on the phone illumined. I listened and heard a sobbing woman saying, “Fred, please come as soon as you can, Daddy is dead!” That was it–no name, no phone number, nothing. I played that message back about a dozen times before I thought I recognized the caller. I then phoned and asked, “did you leave a message on my phone just a few minutes ago?” Indeed she had, and I said, “I’ll be right there.” Voice mail: it is important to recognize the voice of the one calling, especially when the one doing the calling is God. How are we to recognize holy voice mail when we receive it and what does it require?

The boy Samuel had been dedicated to God’s service from before his conception.1 When he was about three years of age, his mother Hannah brought him to Eli, the priest at Shiloh, and entered him into temple service. By now the boy is ten, apprenticed to Eli, and yet, we are told, he does not know the Lord. Three times God places a call to Samuel, and three times Samuel confused God’s call as Eli’s. After disturbing the old man’s sleep for the third time, it finally dawns on Eli who this disturbing night visitor might be. After some priestly coaching, he sends his young protégé back to bed, telling Samuel how to respond if it happens again. And, of course, it does. This time, Samuel replies, “Speak, your servant is listening.” Often it takes multiple attempts for God to get our attention. But hear this: if it is God calling, it will continue until you know it and say, “Speak Lord, your servant is listening.” That was certainly true in my case. I look back and see four different times God tried to call me to pastoral ministry before I said, “Speak Lord, your servant is listening.”

One other thing: the word received is not always easy or convenient and is sometimes downright dangerous. Certainly that was the case for Samuel. God reveals to Samuel his judgment against Eli and his son’s stewardship of their own call. The sons have abused their priestly privilege and Eli has simply looked away. It is not as though Eli had not been warned. One chapter earlier, Eli receives an oracle about his son’s behavior and his own culpability in it. Left unchecked, Gods’ judgment will not only remove Eli and his son from priestly leadership, but none of their descendants will live to old age.2 Eli has played the modern Joe Paterno: ignoring the evidence because of the inconvenience of doing something about it, and God’s patience has finally worn thin. How often do we wear God’s patience thin by ignoring his voice? Their behavior is now beyond atonement–sacrifices will not set things right. God will judge and the punishment will be so severe that the ears of any who hear it will actually tingle.3 Both of Eli’s sons will die prematurely–on the same day, and Eli as well.4

God had been patient, giving Eli time to correct and hold accountable his son’s abuses, but even God’s patience has its limits. I know that in this day and age it is not popular to talk about God’s judgment in people’s lives–progressive Christianity has all but abandoned the notion of God’s judgment, far preferring to wax lyrical about God’s grace. But grace not welcomed in obedience turns to judgment, just as the other side of God’s love is God’s wrath. The ethical injunctions in scripture are ignored at our own peril.

The lesson tells us that, “Samuel lay there until morning.” Can you blame him; would you have been able to go back to sleep? Can you see the boy tossing and turning in his bed, wondering what to do, what to say? As I said, God’s call is not always convenient. The message frightens Samuel into silence, and who can blame him? How will Eli respond: anger, outrage, perhaps even violence? Will he discharge Samuel? When dawn finally arrives, Samuel returns to the routine of his daily work, opening wide the doors of the house of the Lord, but keeping his own mouth shut. He is afraid to tell the vision to Eli.

Eli, who has already sensed who the night visitor might be, presses Samuel about it, saying, “What did you hear?” “Hear?” asks Samuel; “O nothing.” Can you see the ten year old in action, scared out of his wits, being pressed by the old priest, and looking for a way out? Eli presses Samuel for an answer, but none is forthcoming. Finally, Eli places a curse on Samuel: “May God do so to you and more also, if you hide anything from me of all that he told you.” It is not a threat; it is an actual curse. And, so, the trembling Samuel blurts out what he has heard.

Will Eli now punish him? That has been the dilemma of prophets from the beginning. When we respond to God’s call, it is often to tasks that are anything but easy. Frequently, God’s word is anything but welcome, for it often involves confronting people with hard choices or worse. Many a king killed a prophet in Israel. Many a subsequent culture has vilified its prophets. The power structures, whether in or out of the church, are not amused when God speaks through a human mouthpiece. Rather, they set in motion actions to suppress, oppress, or even kill the messenger. Yet, God calls servants to continue to speak his double-edged word of judgment and grace. I am reminded of the classic charge given to young pastors at their ordinations: “Comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” We are called not simply to be shepherds, but also prophets. The pastoral office is not simply to care and comfort, but to challenge, confront, and lead in ways that can be filled with risk.

On this Sunday, we have no better illustration of all this than our 20th Century American prophet, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. In the Day School chapel on Thursday, we told the children his story in language they could understand. It is always a moving time for me as I see not only the mixture of children’s faces of various colors on the Chancel–listening wide-eyed as children do to a well-told story–but also I see the mixture of rapt parents who are the beneficiaries of Dr. King’s ministry. This year, though, I was struck by two things: first, that this chapel–probably my most favorite of the three during the school year–is increasingly less well attended. Why is that, I wonder? Have we already forgotten what it was like before King, or are we still resistant to acknowledging the seismic change he helped bring about? After the story had been told and the children were returning to their classrooms, I asked the parents how many of them remembered Dr. King and his work. And I was struck by the second thing: only a few hands were raised. I was startled. Then I realized it: on April 4, 1968, most of the parents had not yet been born; many here had not either.

Dr. King was not simply a Civil Rights leader, an anti-Vietnam activist or a Black African leader–he was all of those, to be sure. But more, he was a prophet, called by God at a critical time in this country’s life. The Civil Rights movement was on the verge of turning to violence. If you have forgotten that, read our own Kekla Magoon’s book Rock in the River.5 There were leaders in the Black community wanting to meet the open hatred and subtle violence with similar violence. Over against the segregation of everything from drinking fountains to soda fountains to busses to churches, Martin spoke God’s word, insisting on the power of God that would emerge through non-violent witness. It got him jailed. It made him a victim of FBI surveillance, the target of not only racial slurs–some even from within the Black community–but accusations that questioned his patriotism and suggestions that he was a communist. But God had called Martin to speak God’s word and he knew it. He also knew what it could cost him, but still he spoke, and turned the violence into peace and a new age in this country.

Martin spoke out of conviction born of faith. Samuel spoke out of the fear of a curse–but then, he was only ten. Old Eli, himself called to God’s service, responded in a most unusual way. Did you catch it? Recognizing the holy voice behind Samuel’s, Eli accepted the judgment: “It is the Lord; let him do what seems good to him,” a version of the sentiment with which the Virgin Mary responded to God’s voice in her life: “Let it be to me according to your word.”

God calls us, sometimes through a night vision, sometimes though an angel, sometimes through a ten year old boy, sometimes through an African American preacher of divine vision and eloquence. At other times, it is not so dramatic, yet still authentic: through a colleague, a friend, or a spouse. When that happens, as the psalmist reminds us today, there is no place we can hide. When God takes the initiative to do something in and through us, God has a way of making it happen. When you and I say, “Here am I; speak Lord, let it be to me according to your word,” we find ourselves in the center of God’s will for us. Can you imagine any better, more blest, and ultimately safer place to be? Martin could not. Where is it, what is it, God is calling you to do?

The Word of the Lord; Thanks be to God!

 

  1. The first chapter of 1st Samuel relates how his barren mother went to Shiloh to ask God for a son whom she promised she would rear as a Nazarite (Numbers 6:1-21), and commit to God’s service for all of his life, to serve God in the sanctuary.
  2. The oracle is in 1 Samuel 2:27-36, and speaks of particular judgment on the sons and Eli, but more, foretells a change in spiritual leadership in Israel–namely, the ascent of the prophet Samuel.
  3. See 2 Kings 21:12, Jeremiah 9:3 and Habakkuk 3:16 for other instances of the use of that phrase.
  4. 1 Samuel 4:1-18
  5. Kekla Magoon, Rock in the River, (New York: Aladdin Paperbacks, 2009). Kekla, an Elder in this congregation, is an emerging author of books written for young people. Beyond being a “page-turner,” the book is a fictionalized, but historically accurate portrayal of the influence of the Black Panther movement, and the invitation and encouragement that it held out to young African Americans to turn to violence, in order to gain their civil rights in this country. It focuses on two brothers caught up in the tensions between that movement and Dr. King’s methods.

 

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