EPIPHANY 3B - Jonah 3:1-5, 10; Psalm 62:6-14; 1 Corinthians 7:29-31; Mark 1:14-20 -

25 January 2009 - A sermon given by The Rev. Peter A. Munson for St. Ambrose Episcopal Church, Boulder, Colorado

God Intervenes, We Decide

INTRODUCTION - God is not always patient and waiting

You have probably heard it said that God is a God who invites, that God is not pushy, not overly insistent, but leaves us lots of room for choice. There is some truth to be found in that way of viewing God. But in my experience, it is not always true that God is patient and waiting for us to act. C.S. Lewis used to refer to God as “the hound of heaven.” Sometimes there is a sense of urgency that goes with God, and what that means for you and me is that sometimes a moment of truth comes, and we need to decide if we are in or not, if we are going to really commit or not, and we don’t always have a week or a year to think about it.

From today’s Psalm you might get the one impression - that God is just calmly waiting for us to come and snuggle up to him, when we’re ready, when we most need that. “In God is my safety and my honor; God is my strong rock and my refuge. Put your trust in him always, O people, pour out your hearts before him, for God is our refuge.” (Psalm 62:8-9) Yes, I have had many days when I have found solace and comfort in Psalm 62. God as refuge, God as that safe place we need, when all the world seems to be crashing down around us. God as the Rock who can be counted on.

URGENT TIMES

But all the other lessons today serve as counterpoint to the Psalm. God has a sense of urgency about the fate of the people of Nineveh, the great city in Assyria. Jonah is not at all interested in being God’s messenger, for then the people who are the arch-enemy of Israel might repent and be saved. So he resists the call of God. God doesn’t have time for such foolishness, and Jonah ends up in the belly of a great fish. Jonah cried out to God, the fish spewed out upon the dry land, and Jonah heard the Lord say, again, “Get up, go to Nineveh, that great city, and proclaim to it the message that I tell you.” (Jonah 3:2) Jonah cried out, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” God wasn’t messing around, the people got the message and repented, and put on sackcloth and ashes, and it started at the top, with their king. There was a real sense of urgency. It was decision time, and they responded.

The new believers at Corinth were in a comparison game about who was the better Christian. “I am more of a Christian because I speak in tongues!” “Oh yeah, well I can interpret tongues!” “Oh yeah, well I have the gift of prophecy!” They were arguing about who was better based on whether their mentor had been Apollos or Cephas or Paul. Paul hears about this conflict and tells them that they are all so full of themselves they have forgotten all about Christ, and that the greatest spiritual gift is love. He reminds them that God’s foolishness - Christ crucified - is wiser than human wisdom. Finally, he reminds them that the “time has grown short”. The Lord would be returning soon - so they thought, so Paul thought - the day of judgment was coming.

And so why were they arguing about such stupid things? Were they going to fully commit to

Christ, or not?

And what about Peter and Andrew, casting their nets into the Sea of Galilee, and their fellow fishermen, James and John, in the boat with their father, and mending their nets? They had a profession, and a good one at that - one based on God’s gracious provision and their hard work. They had been doing this a while. They were established enough to have boats, well enough off to be able to hire men to help them.

Jesus suddenly shows up on the shore. Perhaps they had heard something about him. But on the other hand, this is at the very beginning of his ministry. According to three of the four Gospel writers, Jesus had healed no one before this incident, and had not yet preached in the synagogue. And Jesus calls out to them, “Follow me.” Or, “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.”

He didn’t say, “If you happen to be free on Saturday night, I’m inviting a few people over for a little chat and some wine. Just give it some thought, okay? Maybe I’ll see you there.”

While not exactly an order, either, Jesus’ “follow me” was more like when your young children wake you up, eager and pumped up on Christmas morning, and say, “Come on! It’s time to open presents! Get up! It’s time! Let’s go! We can’t wait any longer!”

COMMITMENT GOES BEYOND THINKING

We are told that Peter and Andrew left their nets that they had just cast - right there in the water - and got up immediately, and followed him. Similarly, James and John left the rest of the net-mending to Zebedee and the hired men, got out of their boat, and joined Jesus and the other two.

We talked last Sunday in the Lectio Divina group about how these four made this decision. What went into their thinking? How could they just drop everything and follow? What about their jobs and families? What about poor Zebedee, left in the boat?

You can let you mind spin around and around with those questions. But you know what? Sometimes the biggest decisions are made in a way that goes way beyond just what we are thinking. Obviously, our minds and reason and being rational are important. But oftentimes the biggest decisions are made on a whole-body level. What does your heart say? What is your gut telling you to do? Does it just feel right “in your bones”, in the depths of your being? Is the timing such, or is your life such a mess that you have nothing to lose, and you’re finally ready to try something new, and risk everything?

David Cartwright reminded us of a similar story, when God told Elijah that it was time to anoint Elisha as prophet in his place. Elijah found Elisha plowing in the field, behind twelve yoke of oxen. Elijah threw his mantle over Elisha and kept on walking. Elisha wasn’t sure what to do at first. He left the oxen, ran after Elijah, and said, “Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.” (1 Kings 19:20) Elijah responded in a way that basically said, “Go back to plowing; you’re not ready.”

Elisha went back to the oxen, slaughtered them, took the wood from the plow and cooked them up, and gave them to the people for a feast. Then he set out and followed Elijah. He was all in. He was committed. There was no turning back, for there were no oxen and no plow left for him to go back to.

GOD INTERVENES

Sometimes God intervenes in our lives, and it doesn’t look anything like him sitting back and waiting for us to come to him. This still happens today. God is actively intervening in the lives of his people. He intervenes through another person who brings us a message that we need to hear. He intervenes when we read the Bible, or when we take a walk, and suddenly we hear a message that we know is from beyond ourselves, and is in fact from God. He intervenes when you finally stop and get quiet. He intervenes when you are in a really low point in your life, and the message is, “Are you ready now to trust in me, and do something different? Are you ready to listen to my guidance? Are you ready to follow me?”

God does not always sit back and wait. God sometimes interrupts our lives, and comes between us and whatever things or people or behaviors are distracting us from a life of fullness and wholeness, and the message is: “Okay, you’ve tried everything else. Follow me.”

SOME QUESTIONS

I have some questions for you today.

Is God trying to intervene in your life - RIGHT NOW? And if so, are you ready to listen? Are you ready to follow?

Are you ready to stop being a victim? Are you ready to stop doing something that you know is not good for you? Are you ready to stop blaming other people for your problems? Are you ready for something better - a more challenging job, a bigger dream, a riskier adventure? Are you ready to take on some new kind of leadership, and move past your fears?

And if God is trying to intervene in your life, are you going to over-think it to death, and come up with all the reasons why you can’t do the thing that you know God is calling you to do? I’m too young, too old, too scared, have too many responsibilities, don’t have the money, don’t have the faith, this could never work, blah-blah-blah... Are you really just coming up with lots of excuses as to why you can’t fully commit to following Jesus?

And finally - what can you and I learn about the way Jesus invited others into the journey of faith?

How do you and I approach others, when it comes to sharing our faith, or inviting them to “come and see” what Jesus and faith are all about by coming to our church? If we are called to share our faith and invite others to be with us, how will we do that?

Will we do it begrudgingly, our of a dreaded sense of obligation, like you might do if you hear a distant relative is in town, and you don’t really want to invite them over, but feel like maybe you should?

Will we invite others in an embarrassed or apologetic kind of way? Well, I’m not really sure if my church would appeal to you - our worship is pretty ancient in its form, we read prayers out of a book, our Peace might overwhelm you and send you running for the nearest exit, our new priest might invite you to start composting or sign you up to go on a mission trip, our old priest talks too much about hiking and climbing mountains - and, oh yeah, I’m not really sure if I’m such a great example of faithfulness... God, who am I to invite someone to church?

Will we invite others in an excited and enthusiastic way? I’d love to pick you up Sunday and bring you to church. You can sit with me and I’ll introduce you to other people so you’re not alone, or arriving at church by yourself. All I can tell you is that a relationship with God and with the people of God has changed my life for the better. What had been missing is no longer missing, and I love my church, and I love God, and I know I am deeply loved by God. Won’t you come and see? I’ll be glad to pick you up on Sunday morning.

CONCLUSION

Jesus said that the time was fulfilled, and called them to repent. He was calling them to a whole new way of life, a whole new way of seeing, a whole new way of being. He issues that same call to us. As Eugene Peterson puts Jesus’s words in The Message, “Time’s up! God’s kingdom is here. Change your life and believe the Message.”

You and I don’t always get to agonize over a decision and weigh the pros and cons for three years. Sometimes we just have to get up off our butts and go. We commit, and see what happens along the way. That is the adventure we call faith. That is what it means to follow Jesus. Are you up for it? Are you coming?