Loading...Sermon February 21, 2016
The Rev. Rebecca S. Myers, LSW
The Church of the Nativity and St. Stephen, Newport, PA
And he believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness. Genesis 15:6
Please be seated.
Some of you may have heard this story from me about my call to ministry. In 2006, after four years of exploring what to do next in my social work management career, I took a position with The National Association of Social Workers (NASW) in Washington, DC. I had never lived in such a large metropolitan area. I had never worked for such a large nonprofit organization.
Yes, I was familiar with the DC metropolitan area, having visited numerous times for fun and business. Yes, I was familiar with many people at NASW, having worked with them for many years when I was Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Chapter of the organization. I hadn’t lived there though. I was excited and everything was new. I had to find new routines, new friends, new church community.
And now I can see how that opened up my life to new things. At the time, I felt a strong urge to be in church. I ended up at The Washington National Cathedral and I’d often go to at least one morning service, go to lunch nearby, and return for the 4pm Evensong.
One weekday, I attended a business meeting close to the White House. I was drawn to St. John’s Lafayette Square Episcopal Church. You’ve probably heard of this church, because many of the Presidents attend there on occasion. I as interested in this place I’d heard so much about. It turned out they had a noon Eucharist and it fit into my schedule to attend.
The church has enclosed pews and when I knelt during the Eucharistic prayer, I could barely see over the top of the pew. I was watching the priest and when she broke the bread, I heard a voice say, “you could do that.” I was so startled, I turned around to see where that voice came from.
I’m not sure what I thought the rest of the day. I returned to work and what I heard was rolling around inside. The next morning when I woke up to go to work, the first thing I did was plug in my computer and start searching Episcopal seminaries! “I’m going to seminary,” I clearly thought.
And just like Abram, the questions cascaded through me. All of the reasons why going to seminary and becoming a priest was something I really did not want to do. And the tears also came. Overall, my response was, “I don’t want to do this, God.”
I loved my job with NASW. It was the best one I’d ever had, with a boss who was the best I’d ever worked for. I loved living in the DC area. “You’ll send me to East Podunk,” I cried to God. “There are no jobs in the church,” I argued. “I don’t want another Master’s degree. I don’t want to study that hard and I don’t want the debt.” I announced emphatically. “Being a priest is a hard job with lots of demands. Your life is not your own,” I complained.
After about a week, I surrendered. I knew from my experience, that if going to seminary was something God really wanted me to do, God would keep extending the invitation to do it. Yes, I could say “no” right now and God would keep finding ways to ask again and again. I also knew that I didn’t know how things were going to end. Maybe I wouldn’t be ordained in the end. Maybe there were people I was supposed to meet or experiences I was supposed to have that could only be had by following this path. I truly didn’t know what things would look like in the end.
I did believe, because I had experienced it in my life before, that God would give me the next step I was supposed to take…just the next step. I finally surrendered, so to speak, to the call and agreed to listen and to take action on God’s guidance. I agreed to do whatever the next step was to the best of my ability. I knew deep in my soul that I wanted to do God’s Will, wherever that led.
So many things happened in the four years it took for me to begin my first year of seminary and the ensuing three years of seminary. And as you know, I did get ordained and I just LOVE being a priest!
We hear much of the same process in our reading from Genesis. God appears to Abram in a vision and promises Abram a great reward. Abram’s response is to question God. God’s promise seems impossible to Abram. He has no direct heir… how can there be a great reward? Abram doesn’t immediately trust what God is saying. Abram doubts. Maybe Abram thinks God is just a little crazy, even.
And here’s an important lesson about God’s relationship with us: God doesn’t get angry with Abram. God doesn’t punish Abram because Abram distrusts God. It’s okay for Abram to struggle with God. “God, are you crazy?” asks Abram. And God answers Abram question in a vivid and moving demonstration. God assures Abram that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the sky.
God hears Abram. God answers Abram. And Abram’s trust in God is restored.
And here’s another important lesson about God’s relationship with us. We won’t always immediately see how God’s vision will be accomplished through us. We won’t always know how things will end. This is a lesson we see time and time again throughout the story of our faith.
Jesus’ mother, Mary, and Jesus’ followers didn’t know how their ministry would continue with Jesus’ death on the cross. They thought it was all over. We see only what God puts in front of us. We don’t always get to see how it will turn out. Things looked bleak to Abram. Things look bleak and challenging to us. Our hope and our comfort can be in remembering that we don’t know how it will ultimately turn out. Our hope and our comfort can be in remembering that God hears us and God is with us.
We struggle with God. Sometimes we struggle to hear God’s word. Sometimes we struggle to know what God is calling us to do. We may think that this struggle means we have no faith and it really means we have faith like Abram, we want to believe.
When we hear God, we often distrust God. Even when our experience has shown us how faithful, merciful and generous God is with us, we aren’t sure we can believe what God is telling us. Yet, we can trust that God is always working and God is always faithful to us. We may not be able to see how things will turn out. We may only see what’s right in front of us. We see but a little bit of time. We don’t always see into the future. We believe anyway.
Amen
