God is Calling

June 2, 2024 1 Samuel 3:1-20 2nd Sunday After Pentecost Year B God is Calling Prelude Greeting Call to Worship The psalmist declares, “Lord, you have searched me and known me.” Will you open yourselves to be searched by God? Search us, O God, and know our hearts. God searches you, knows you, and loves you, and invites you to search out God in return. Will you seek the heart of God? We will search you, O God, to know your heart. The Triune God who creates all and knows all is revealed in running rivers and fluttering butterflies, in warm sunshine and the smell of the earth. Will you pay attention? We will pay attention, O God, to your fingerprint of love on all of creation. Open our hearts today to encounter your love, holiness, and glory that create and sustain all that was, is, and will be. We come today to enter the dance of the Trinity, the all-knowing Creator and Sustainer of life. (Written by Dr. Lisa Hancock, Discipleship Ministries, February 2024.) Song Open my Eyes that I May See UMH 454 A Sermon for all Ages how children your headphones and ask, Why do people use headphones? One reason people use headphones is to hear something better. If it’s noisy around you, you can put your headphones in and hear what you’re listening to. That’s kind of what we need to do if we want to hear God speaking to us. In the Bible, there was a little boy named Samuel. He lived at the Tabernacle serving Eli the priest. One night, God called to Samuel. “Samuel,” God said. But Samuel didn’t know it was God calling him. He thought it was the priest, Eli. So, he got up and went to Eli’s room. But Eli said he didn’t call him, so he sent Samuel back to bed. God called Samuel two more times, and Samuel kept thinking it was Eli calling him. Finally, Eli figured out that God was calling Samuel. He told Samuel that the next time God called him, Samuel should say… (Read 1 Samuel 3:9.) “Speak, Lord, for Your servant is listening.” God did call Samuel again and when Samuel said, “Speak, Lord, for Your servant is listening,” God talked to him! In fact, God talked to Samuel a lot after that. But he had to learn to listen to God’s voice first. It’s the same in our lives. If we want God to speak to us, we have to listen for Him. We might not hear a voice as Samuel did, but we’ll hear God speaking in our minds and in our hearts. What do you think are some ways we can listen for God’s voice? We can read the Bible and pray and pay attention in church. God speaks to us through all of those things. And when we read the Bible or pray or pay attention in church, it’s like we’re putting our headphones in to listen to God. (Ministry to Children, Stephen Wilson) Responsive Reading Psalm 139. UMH 854 Scripture. 1 Samuel 3:1-20 Sermon. God is Calling The first event that I attended at General Conference was a briefing that was held by The national Women of Faith group, they wanted to encourage the women delegates to pay attention to legislation that affected women. They started out with the general secretaries giving an encouraging and inspiring speech. One of them asks the crowd to think of the women in their lives that inspired them and encouraged them in life. Who was it that mentored you and told you that you were important, the general secretary asks, as the recognizes me and walks toward me to answer the question in the mike. I look at her and shake my head, and say nobody, I cannot think of anyone who ever encouraged me in life. Now of course, there are many people in my life who encouraged me, mentored me, and helped to open doors for me. But at that moment, I had been up the night before packing, I had to catch a ride at 6am in the morning catch a 9 am flight, figure out how to get to my hotel and it was 3 in the afternoon and my day had just begun. Under different circumstances, I would have been happy to answer her question and name all of the important people in my life, but at that moment, I was just too tired and exhausted to even think about the answer to her question. Unfortunately, it happens a lot in life, when there are things going on in life, but because of the circumstances, we are not able to process the information that is given to us. Our scripture for this morning is a story which clearly demonstrates how God is always speaking to us – but we are not able to listen. The passage starts out by saying this this story takes place at a time when the Lord’s word was rare and visions were not widely known. It was a time of corruption, when the leaders were more concerned about lining their own pockets, then helping the people around them. It wasn’t that God’s presence was not around, but the religious leaders had forgotten about their personal relationship with God. In the midst of all of this chaos and confusion, a young mother had put all of her trust in God. She prayed for a son, when he was born she gave him to the temple priest to raise and to mentor. Even though his own sons had turned out to be very bad individuals, she trusted God to take care of her son. One night her son Samuel hears a voice calling him in the night, - it takes his mentor Eli to recognize the God does indeed still care about this world and God still speaks with a voice of justice, peace and healing. Samuel goes on to become a very well respected priest and prophet for the nation, who does a lot of good for his community. But it was the night that he heard God’s voice – that God became real to him. When he was finally able to listen to God, he understood his pathways and purpose for life. He understood his calling. He say how God was leading his life forward. Unfortunately for most of us – when we think about God, when we think about our calling, about our purpose. God is far more willing to speak, then we are to listen. Over 80 years ago, Jed Harris was a successful producer of plays. One of his successful works was the production of Thornton Wilder’s play, “Our Town.” In the middle of a lengthy season mixed with the intense pressure of many details, Harris began to lose his sense of hearing. He could not even hear what other people close to him were saying and so he was missing crucial details during conversations. As a result, Jed Harris decided to pay a visit to a renowned audiologist who listened attentively as the producer narrated the sad account of his declining ability to hear. After a thorough examination of Harris’ ears, the hearing specialist drew out from his vest an expensive gold-coated pocket watch and placed it against the producer’s ear. “Do you hear this watch ticking?” the audiologist asked. “Absolutely,” the producer responded. The audiologist moved farther away and held the watch up to his office door. Harris focused and remarked, “Yea, it is quite audible.” The physician then walked into the next room and asked, “how about now?” “It’s still audible,” Harris replied. The specialist stalked back into the office and returned the watch to his vest. “This phenomenon is quite commonplace,” he said, “especially among successful individuals. Your hearing is excellent Mr. Harris. You’ve simply quit listening.” (1) God speaks to us all of the time, in so many different ways. The most important lesson of those story is to listen for God to speak to you. This story also tells us that we have to have ears that listen, but we also need a heart that has faith and hands that are obedient. When God calls our name, we have to be prepared to respond. If you know who Eydie Gorme is, you’ll know she is a wonderful singer - what we might call a torch singer. On a television talk show a few years ago, Eydie Gorme told some things about how her career got started. Her inspiration and idol was Judy Garland. So Eydie Gorme studied and tried to copy everything that Judy Garland did - the sound of the voice, the style, the mannerisms. Eydie Gorme’s first big break came at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City, where she played to packed houses, and received rave reviews. Her next booking was not so elegant. It was somewhere around Pittsburgh in a not-so-classy nightclub - the kind with beer signs flashing in the windows and a pool table in the back. If that were not a come-down enough, there was a terrible blizzard on her opening night and most people, who might have been there, stayed home. Her second night the weather was even worse. She was there, but there was no audience. The third night she didn’t go either. The owner of the nightclub telephoned her and said, "I pay you to sing, and if you don’t sing you don’t get paid." It made no difference that nobody else had shown up either. She needed the job, so on the fourth night she bribed a taxi driver to get her there through the snow. Besides her there was just the manager, the guy who worked the lights, and part of the band. Some of the players didn’t make it either. When it was time for her to sing, the place was still empty, but the house lights were dimmed, the stage lights came on, she cued the band to play her opening music and she began to sing - to an empty house. She said that she told herself, "If I can sing to a packed house at the Waldorf Astoria, I can sing to an empty house here." Part way through the first song the door opened and in the glow of the lights from outdoors she saw the silhouettes of five people who came in and sat at a table in the middle of the room. So she began to sing to those five people. And again she said to herself that she could sing to these five people as she would sing if this was the largest audience Carnegie Hall ever turned out. She said she sang that night with a richness and a passion and an energy that was as good or better than she had ever sung in her life - to those five strangers. She finished her set, and the spotlight went off and the house lights came on, and she looked out at those five people who had been her audience. Four of them she didn’t recognize, but the one in the middle was Judy Garland, who surely had no idea of the power and influence and inspiration she had been in the life of an aspiring young singer named Eydie Gorme.1 God calls us through one another. God leads us through people who sometimes serve as angels unaware, by simply going about doing ordinary things but with the extraordinary presence of God implicit in what they do. How wonderful that God is not off somewhere ignoring us, but calls us in the common events of every day. That call comes to us in the subtle urgings we glean from things we read or see, in the beauty and wonder of creation. It comes in the simple words and lives of people who point beyond themselves to show us the way to God as John did for his disciples. What a wonderful and awesome concept it is that if we listen God can call us to our own destiny through common people like ourselves, and by that same token can call others through us. We’ve all had the experience of being put on hold. Perhaps that is where we have put the call of God in our own lives. Old Eli’s advice to his young servant Samuel is good advice for us all, to open the communication lines and listen, and say, "Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening." 1. With appreciation to Reverend Robert Morley who brought this story to my attention. CSS Publishing Co., Inc., Why Don't You Send Somebody?, by Frederick C. Edwards Yes, we are images for one another. We are influenced by people who may never know it, and others of whom we have no idea may in turn be patterning their life in some small way upon us. Think of those who become a part of you. Think of those who awakened your ideas, and quickened your spirit and encouraged and inspired you. Sometimes we are called to be the Judy Garlands of the world, sometimes we are called to be Eydie Gome. Sometimes in life we are called to be the Eli’s of the world leading the way and encouraging others, sometimes we are called to be the Samuel’s of the world – listening to God’s call. In all that we do in life we are called to have a faithful heart, a listening ear, and an obedient hand. I can’t stress enough how important it is for us to listen for God’s voice in our everyday lives. God leads us, we just have to be able to listen. I may have given this challenge under different circumstances before, but I think that it fits again today. I have don’t this challenge myself a few times over my years of preaching, but I think it is good to do it again. It is a challenge to engage in prayer – to listen for God’s call to us and to watch it unfold in our lives. John Ortberg is a pastor, who used to work for Bill Hybels at Willow Creek Church, he is now a Presbyterian pastor – his wife is also a pastor. She tells one of my favorite stories. Nancy Ortberg tells of going out to dinner with a man named Doug Cole in Washington D. C. years ago. Doug told her about a 30-year old insurance executive he met at a party. Doug learned that this young man, Bob, was a new Christian. Intrigued, he asked how things were going. Have you found a church? He asked. Yes, Bob said. Have you found a Bible Study? Yes, I have one of those too. Finally Doug asked, How about your relationship with God in prayer? Bob didn’t have much going on there, and said that he didn’t know much about that. So Doug laid out a challenge for him: to pick something to pray over every day for the next six months. The prayers could be elaborate or simple, structured or free form, listening to or speaking to God, whatever. But Bob must pray at least briefly every day. “If at the end of six months God has not done something truly significant,” Doug told him, “I will then pay you $500.” “Hmm,” Nancy told Doug, “That doesn’t sound very biblical.” “No, but I do it all of the time,” Doug answered her. Bob accepted the challenge, but didn’t know what to pray for. Bob and his wife lived in DC. What with the city’s international flavor, they chose a different land to pray for every day. So along those lines, Bob decided to pray daily for Kenya. Not much happened for four or five months. The prayer experiment was yielding little. Then one night he sat next to a woman at a dinner party. She was from Kenya. She ran an orphanage. Bob related that he felt as though ice water was suddenly running through his veins. He had been fantasizing about how to spend the $500 Doug had promised him, but suddenly he had a strong image of a wad of $500 sprouting wings and flying away. He asked for details about the orphanage and listened to her answers for a full intense hour. She told Bob that no one had ever shown such interest. Would he consider flying to Kenya to see it first hand? To make a long story short, Bob ended up providing for the care of those Kenyan children and seeing to the supplying of that orphanage. He made such a splash that the President of Kenya invited him to his palace. There Bob advocated for prisoners of conscience in that country. Later those prisoners were released. The US Secretary of State called Bob and asked him how he did it. The United States government had been unsuccessfully seeking their freedom for some time. It was no mystery to Bob how it came about. God had guided him to pray for Kenya and wonderful things were happening. (6) If you and I were truly listening to God, we would see wonderful things happen in our lives too. If you could think of one thing to pray for six months, what would it be? Without giving it much thought, the thing that comes to mind is probably the area that God is calling you to serve. My challenge is to actually pray that prayer for the next six months and watch how God’s calling unfolds in your life. How is God calling you? Who are the people that encouraged and influenced you in that call? Who are the people that you are influencing, just by being faithful to God? This is the time when God’s words are an every day occurrence and God’s visions are widely known. Listen for God to call your name. Amen. Song. 451. Be Thou My Vision. UMH 451 Prayer A Prayer of Thanksgiving (Ps. 139) God, we cannot escape your love. We can find no place to hide. You search us out wherever we may be. Your love is like a mother’s blanket, protecting us wherever we go. Your love shields us from evil. We may travel to the moon or to the depths of the ocean: your love is there. We may think ourselves to greater levels of sophistication: your love is there. We may fall in the pits of sin: your love is there. Thank you, for steadfast mercy. Thank you for being there, wherever we may be. Lord, on this communion Sunday we come to you to cleanse our hearts and to lay our concerns at your altar. We pray that you will listen to our concerns. Today we pray for conditions, for situations in the world and in our community, we pray for the people in our hearts. We ask for your healing touch upon all that we pray about now. (a moment of silent prayer) Written in part by John H. Danner in Touch Holiness: Resources for Worship, Updated, ed. Ruth C. Duck and Maren C. Tirabassi (Cleveland: The Pilgrim Press, 2012), 277. Lord’s Prayer Stewardship Moment Prayer of Dedication Provider God, we give you thanks for all your good gifts to us: for work and rest, for creativity and play, for this community in which to practice our faith together. Take these offerings that we bring today and use them to meet the needs of those around us. May our work and witness reflect our beliefs in your compassionate care for us and for all you have created. In Christ name we pray. Amen. (Presbyterian Outlook, Ellen William Hensle) Communion Hard hearts have a way of angering Jesus, as we hear in Mark’s Gospel. Just the reverse is recognized when we come to a time of sharing in this simple meal. This communion time is an opportunity to welcome one and all to a feast “in remembrance” of Jesus. He is the host. We are all invited to participate, recognizing the table is large enough for all who are eager to be in fellowship and communion with Jesus. So come, repentant people. Offer your short-comings and your brokenness to the One who is able to forgive and heal. Offer your hard-heartedness to the One who is able to soften our spirits. Offer your yearning for abundant Life to the One who tasted death and was raised up to new life. Come to share in this feast with others who are broken, hard-hearted, full of desire for life. Come, for the table is prepared, and you are welcome. Announcements Closing Prayer for Facebook As we prepare to leave this place, turn to a neighbor or, if you are at home, look in a mirror. Now, look into the eyes of the person in front of you and say, “You are fearfully and wonderfully made.” May this truth be a blessing to you this week: the Creator who knows you better than you know yourself fearfully and wonderfully made you just as you are. Let us go now to speak truth, share love, and recognize the Creator’s fingerprint in all of creation. Amen. Written by Dr. Lisa Hancock, Discipleship Ministries, February 2024. Community Time. – Joys and Concerns Charge and Benediction As you go out from this place, remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. Make time to savor God’s creation, to rest from work and worry, and to bask in the goodness of all God’s gifts to us. Remember that the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit follow you wherever you go. Amen. (Presbyterian Outlook, Ellen William Hensle)