The Remains of Our Day

Lectionary OT Reading: Isaiah 49:1-7

In the movie The Remains of the Day, Anthony Hopkins gives a touching performance as Mr. Stevens, a butler in an English manor who is effective, efficient and amazingly dedicated to his job within the servant class. Mr. Stevens serves the Estate of Lord Darlington, a well meaning English gentleman who unknowingly is duped into becoming a Nazi sympathizer. In order to serve his house with excellence Mr. Stevens blocks out the needs of his father, ignores his desire for Miss Kenton, and refuses to see that the policies made at conferences he is serving are empowering Germany to begin the Third Reich. Later, when Lord Darlington is unmasked as a German enabler and stripped of his title, the estate goes to an American who asks the aging and lonely Mr. Stevens what he must have thought when the conferences that brought the horrors of World War II were being held in that very house. Mr. Stevens replies, “I was doing my job, Sir. I was too busy to listen to the speeches.”

It’s a tragic cautionary tale about being a servant who does not know the Master’s business, and is powerless in the role of servitude. It’s a good movie for Christians to see because we are, afterall, servants of God called by Jesus Christ. We are the opposite of Mr. Stevens in some ways. We rarely strive for the gospel in a dedicated way, and appease our servitude by showing up to church on Sunday where we just listen to the speeches, and never do the work. The lectionary scripture from Isaiah 49 – describing the call of God to a servant – helps us to remember that although we are serving, we are not blind or helpless pawns of fate. We have responsibilities too.

We are not Powerless

Verse 2:
He made my mouth like a sharpened sword,
in the shadow of his hand he hid me;
he made me into a polished arrow
and concealed me in his quiver.

We tend in our day and age to think of the servant as a powerless person – lower class, with no will of their own. However, in the days of this writing (and even into the first century) being a slave or servant could afford the person tremendous power and ability. Slave owners kept slaves in their houses and depended on them for everything from chores and work to banking and message giving. A slave who was trusted and truly wanted to serve his or her master well, had a world of power and privileges at their command.

As God’s servants, we are given tools of great empowerment. We are given the word of God to learn by living it, and share by showing it. We are given the Holy Spirit to guide us into God’s will and into the paths of those who need to see God. We are given community to make one another stronger, more able and more equipped. We are given free will, that we may choose to do God’s bidding, and we are given gifts so that we may give them back to God. Never think yourself weak or unable to further the gospel in this dark world. Christ is the light, and you hold the lantern.

We are not Purposeless

Verse 4:
But I said, "I have labored to no purpose;
I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing.

Sometimes we feel like our work has been in vain. Maybe someone we witnessed to seems to make no change at all. Or maybe the lifework we do isn’t showing a lot of good fruit for the hard work we are investing. Maybe we aren’t even sure what we are doing anymore. The servant in Isaiah certainly feels discouraged. Perhaps its because the servant sees the lack of purpose that servant has had in the effort. Sometimes we can put a lot of effort into something and not have any purpose behind it. Sometimes in trying to make something better all we do is tear it apart.

In Chuch Palahnuik’s novel “Choke”, Ida Mancini is a woman who spent most of her years as a liberal “activist” in the 60’s – working to draw attention to a number of causes. When she gets old she begins to lose her mind to Alzheimer’s. On one of her last days of clear thought she gives a speech that describes where her empty life has led.

“I’ve defined myself, all my life, by what I was against. I fought against everything, but more and more I worry that I was never for anything. Oh, I can criticize and complain and judge everything, but where does that get me? Rebelling isn’t rebuilding. Ridicule isn’t replacing. My generation! All we did was make fun of the way the world was. We didn’t make it any better. We spent so much time judging what other people created we didn’t create anything of our own. We took the world apart, but had no idea what to do with the pieces.”

As God’s servants we need to have purpose in what we do. We need to do more than judge, tear down, complain and re-hash our ideas. We need to see our lives, words and actions serving God and triumphing the healing love of Jesus. That is our purpose and that is how we serve.

We are not Private

Verse 6
he says:
"It is too small a thing for you to be my servant
to restore the tribes of Jacob
and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make you a light for the Gentiles,
that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth

So the servant tells the master about his lack of purpose and his failure to bring the One God to the nation. What does God do? God says “Its not your fault you didn’t to do the job – it was TOO SMALL a task. I’ll give you a bigger one. Now you’ll bring everyone to me!” – So imagine that you manage the produce section of a grocery store. You go to the boss and say “I haven’t done a very good job with my department. The fruit is rotting, and my sales are down”. Then imagine the boss saying “You know – the problem is produce is only a small part of my business – so here’s what I’ll do – I’ll put in you charge of the WHOLE STORE!” – AH! But that’s God. Where we see our failure as servants to promote the gospel, God sees us as valuable loved children who can shine the light of Christ to the whole world. God believes in us. We should too.

Our work isn’t mean to be private – but vibrant. We aren’t just for the “chosen few”, we are for the whole world. So don’t think if you let God down, you’ll get an easier job. What you’ll get is mercy, empowerment, and a bigger job next time!

Isaiah’s odd scripture here is a reminder that we are not supposed to be standing in a room listening to the speeches while the banquet goes un-served. We are not supposed to be so busy serving that we ignore the world or God’s words. We need a balance of spiritual empowerment, purpose and public witness of Jesus to help us be a servant worthy of the Kingdom of God. Then, when we hit the remains of our day we too will hear, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

Hearing Your Vocation

Lectionary Passage: Matthew 3:1-3, 13-16

One of the neat structures in the Old Testament is the many forms of poetry that exist between the pages. There are acronymic poems in proverbs and psalms (each verse starting with a letter of the Hebrew alphabet in succession), cuplets, doublets, and something very close to the idea of a sonnet. However, that poetry isn’t just found in the pages of the people of Israel. The New Testament has some poetic elements in it as well. Matthew 3 is a perfect example. It starts and ends in a circular pattern. It begins with John’s voice calling (Latin – “vocatio” or “de voco”) and it ends with God’s voice calling (Latin “de voco”). The first call is fulfilling the scripture “Repent. Prepare the way for the Lord”, the second call is “This is my son, whom I love.” (in another text we are also called to listen to him). It is clear in the beautiful circle of God interacting with people that we are called. We are invoked (invoco). But to what?

It’s not hard to see how we get confused. The same word used in these scriptures is the root of the word we use for the word “vocation”. But the meaning of the word “vocation” has been irreparably damaged by both secular and religious language. It is up to us, in the story of Jesus’ baptism to find its true meaning.

Vocation: It’s not your job!

In the secular world “vocation” (verb of invoco) is a word we use to describe the job we have. We even use it to describe a type of schooling that teaches job skills over academic accomplishments. Remember Grease? “If you can’t pass high school, there’s always hair school!” We have begun to think of the word “vocation” as an every day working word or descriptive of “career”. This brings us into great confusion – suddenly we mix our identity with our job and lose huge chunks of our self, our time and our sanity. I’ve heard it from many professions:
“Nursing isn’t what I do, it’s who I am!”
“I don’t teach for a living, I’m a teacher!”
“The accountant in me doesn’t rest, even on Sundays!”
and something I was told after I retired from pulpit ministry
“How can you retire from who you are?”

But vocation – the call of God - isn’t about that thing we do because we have a contract, or a pay check, or a schedule. Vocation is to be called of God and hear that voice telling us who we are – defining us by our relationship with God. It is not telling us to define who we are by what job we do. Jesus comes to John the Baptist as a rabbi – a teacher. But just as John’s first call was to “repent!” – Christ’s response is to come to him for baptism – to repent of the past, and start anointed with a public witness of the fact he is a child of God, first and foremost. Although John points out Jesus doesn’t need to repent, Jesus says he needs baptism and as a child of God wants to start out like the rest of us.

Notice God didn’t say “This is my teacher” or “This is my healer” or “This is my minister”. God said “This is my son, whom I love.” Jesus would be a rabbi, healer, minister, savior and so many other things but first his vocation was to be God’s son.

So it is with you. You are God’s daughter. You are God’s son. You are beloved of God. That’s your calling. That’s your identity. That’s your job. The places God puts you, the jobs God will give you, are guided and blessed because you are God’s child.

This may sound like semantics, but in our world it can have very serious consequences. Mixing up your identity with your employment can have lasting and bitter effects. I have known many people who lost their jobs, and nearly lost their minds. Suddenly without their work they seem to lose so much of themselves that they begin to treat their partner/husband/wife with hostility, they either ignore their children or become hyper-critical of them – pressuring them to “do better than I did” or “go into nursing/teaching/computers/funeral directing so you will always have a job”. They sink into depression, despair, and chaos. Why? Because they have lost a part of themselves. In counseling folks in that situation, I have frequently used this scripture of Christ’s baptism to bring them back to the starting point – to who they are. God's child. Don’t lose that. Don’t forget it.

Vocation: It’s not your religion

The clergy have done just as much damage to the word vocation as the secular world. We throw that word around to mean “religious life” (if you’re catholic), or to have a calling to work in the church – minister, missionary, youth worker, musician. We talk about ministers being “called” without remembering that teachers, nurses, army folks and the unemployed are also “called”. I have a friend who is very proud of being a pastor. He talks incessantly about it and claims, sometimes unaware he’s doing it, “pastoral” privileges. I once heard him start a sentence by saying “Jesus was talking to the pastors…” My first thought was “who the heck are they?” Jesus talked to fishermen, tax collectors, lawyers and gatekeepers. There weren’t any “pastors” until much much later. The problem with such thoughts is it creates a hierarchy that destroys the common beautiful witness of God’s people.

Being called to a “religious vocation” makes you no more holy, correct, or spiritual than any one else. Relying on and triumphantly praising professional ministry gives people an opportunity to ignore their vocation as God’s children and bearers of Christ’s light. “Well, I wasn’t called to the ministry so I don’t have to witness,” we say. Or one of the more interesting things I was told once in regard to a person misquoting the bible and causing damage to her family in the process, “Look, Rev. correcting scriptural issues is your job, not mine.”

But we are all called of God, and we are all responsible to shine the light of love and mercy to one another. Don’t downplay your part in bringing the kingdom of God to earth (as it is in heaven). John doesn’t really want to baptize Jesus. It seems silly to him to use a symbol of repentance on someone with no sin. But John is called to baptize and Jesus wants not only to fulfill his ministry but fulfill John’s as well. Jesus didn’t need to be baptized half as much as John needed to baptize him. Supporting the mission and witness of a pastor is a beautiful thing, and clergy add a lot to the spectrum of faith. But the job doesn’t belong simply to the clergy.

One of my favorite old hymns is “Softly and Tenderly” – it reminds us that invocation (which is the act of calling to someone, not just the prayer we say before a fancy dinner or religious event) is not only coming to us from God who calls us son or daughter, and the Holy Spirit who calls us to our job, our gifts and our worship but also from Christ who offers us the greatest vocation of all: coming home.

“Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling,
calling for you and for me;
see, on the portals he's waiting and watching,
watching for you and for me.

Come home, come home;
ye who are weary come home;
earnestly, tenderly, Jesus is calling,
calling, O sinner, come home!”

May we hear, live and love our vocation, now and always. Amen.

The School of Faith

Read: John 6:22-32

What are the three greatest inventions on the world? That might take a long time for most people to list – considering the scientific advancement from the pulley-lever system, to the wheel, to the internet. But my three are easily available in my head. In my thinking the three best inventions in the world are:

1. The Ziplock Bag – you can do anything with a ziplock bag!
2. Eyeglasses – they are like clothes for your face!
3. The Class Syllabus

Almost anyone who has been through a college course will tell you one of the greatest innovations in higher education is a class syllabus. This beautiful list given at the beginning of the semester detailing what will be discussed each day, when assignments will be due and exactly what is expected of the student is a blessing. It’s comforting to have all of your duties and challenges laid out in a nice organized way.

The crowds who followed Jesus - like college students they were seekers and learners - wanted an organized approach to what Jesus had to offer. He feed them until they were full (also like college students, they went to his lecture with no lunch money in their pockets and had to be fed with free loaves and fish) and they wanted to follow him and his program to the letter. This crowd shows us some things we should know.

When You Notice Jesus is Missing – Look for Him!

The ever observant crowd notices one of those weird things about Jesus – he seems to get around pretty quick for someone who doesn’t have many modes of transportation. The bible says they noticed he didn’t get in the one ship that had left, but he showed up on the other side of the lake! (They did not witness the water walking, and probably could not imagine that explanation – even if Occomb’s Razor reminds us the simplest solution is usually the correct one). So what do they do?

A. Retrace his last steps to see if they can predict his future behavior?
B. Decide that just because they can’t see him doesn’t mean he has left, and act like he is still there?
C. Just sit down and wait for him to come back?

NO! They get in their boats and start looking for him! They know he is missing, and they know they need to be in his presence. So they seek him earnestly and immediately. Sometimes we look around our jobs, life, relationships or family and discover Jesus is missing. When our work feels empty and we aren’t sure why we are doing it, it’s usually because we have forgotten to involve Christ in our calling (through our passion, through our commitment, through our faith that God in us is making a difference even when we aren’t seeing immediate results). Sometimes our marriages or deep friendships start to feel routine or rote. It’s usually because we forgot to include Christ’s love, listening, spontaneity and passion for unexpected loving gestures in our lives. If you notice Jesus is missing. Don’t hang around and shake your head. Go look for him!

Ask Questions

When they find Jesus (and the eggheads in the group start trying to compute how he got there without a boat) the first thing they do is ask how long he’d been there. Later they will ask him about the work of God and what it is they can do to do it. They aren’t shy, or pretending to be so holy that they know all the answers. They ask the questions –easy and hard – and so should we.

We have a tendency to silence our questions of God. We don’t talk about them openly, and we certainly don’t ask the wise people God has placed around us. Many times we don’t even ask Jesus himself. But asking the questions we have – technical and spiritual ones – helps us grow and develops our faith. As a youth minister, I was involved in a van rollover with 2 sponsors and 12 kids in the car. We were headed to a conference in Denver when a back tire of a van I was driving blew, rolling us into the intersection. No one was killed, but there were broken legs, a girl with a broken collar bone, cuts and bruises on all the kids, glass in my head and a soft tissue injury for the other adult sponsor. We ended up in a trauma center in Pueblo – some less hurt kids being flown home immediately, others being taken back after their hospital stay. I was one of the last to get released and back. When we were finally all together again we had a “decompression” meeting where we talked about the wreck. We started with a prayer and then I said, “Who has something to say?” Immediately a boy spoke up and said what they had all been thinking since the moment the van flipped and the screaming started. “We prayed for a safe trip. Why did we wreck? Did God even hear us?” Before I could give them my answer a number of kids said “I’m so glad you asked that! I thought I was the only one who felt like that!” His courage opened doors of healing for many young people that day.

Ask the question. It doesn’t mean you’re dumb, faithless or lost. It means you care enough to want to understand.

Believe in the One who was sent

When the crowd asked Jesus what works God was expecting of them, they were asking for a syllabus. But the Christian life is not so easily organized and the course outline only contains one sentence. "Believe in the One he has sent," Jesus said. Oddly enough, something that simple will take a lifetime of fulfillment.

Our rabbi’s answer illustrates the word "belief" is an action verb. The crowd asked for a work - a job - and the word Jesus gives them is "believe". On the surface it may seem like an easy task. It’s not hard to believe in Jesus. Evidence of his life, death, and resurrection are everywhere. But the part you have to work for is the evidence in your heart of his relationship with you.
When your adolescent daughter lets her math grades plummet just to show you she isn’t happy with her curfew, you have to believe the fact Jesus is alive makes a difference. You have to remember what Jesus taught about grace as you deal with your disappointment and frustration. You have to put aside your desire to hurt back and live his instructions to treat one another with love. It will be an effort. When someone treats you badly, at work or home, you have to believe the facts Jesus died for you and rose again and you are an heir to the kingdom of Heaven makes a difference. You have to act as a member of the chosen, of the priesthood of believers. You can’t just wallow in hurt feelings or frustrated anxiety. Do what Jesus says. Forgive and empower. Believe in him.

It isn’t enough to believe Jesus exists. Your belief must change your life, your church and your world. If we as a body worked on our belief in the One God has sent our world would change. When you are out in the world, can people tell you are a Christian by your acceptance and faith? How does Jesus change the way you live? Frequently ask yourself these questions: How does a person who does not believe in Jesus respond to this situation? How do I respond to this situation? Are the responses different? If not, work to see the changes of Christ more fully in your life.

The seekers from the feeding of the 5,000 come a long way in these short verses. They find the Messiah by seeking him. They ask the questions that will lead them to greater faith and they get the syllabus for the Christian life. That’s the same class we are taking. What’s this semester or season in your life going to require? Believe in the One God has sent.