Listen: The Mystery of Ministry - Eph 4: 11-13

We spend our lives listening to a lot of people and things that talk at us. We listen to our parents. Our spouses. Our friends. Our bosses. To the TV. The radio. To music. But how often do we take time to listen to God? Yes, we certainly talk to God in prayer, but how often do we slow down enough to listen to what God is saying, even if it is not exactly what we expect God to say. 

Whenever we enter into the waters of baptism, promises are made. Promises that folks will look out for us and raise us to accept Jesus for ourselves. Promises that as people as part of the body of Christ, we will nurture people to come to experience the grace of God and lead Christian lives. 

Then when the time comes to become a professing member of the church - either through confirmation or as an adult, we ask this question: According to the grace given to you, will you remain faithful members of Christ’s holy church and serve as Christ’s representatives in the world?

We essentially ask folks how they are going to serve in ministry in such a way that they are the hands and feet of Jesus in the world. 

But in order to enter into that mystery of ministry we need to have one ear to the ground to hear the rumble of opportunity and one ear to heaven to respond to the call of God on our lives.

The apostle Paul as he writes to the church in Ephesus is reminding the people there of something very similar - we all have gifts and calls upon us in order to build up the church and proclaim the name of Christ. And none of those gifts or callings are more important than another. Some are to be apostles. Other’s prophets. Some evangelists. Some pastors. Some teachers, but they all work together for the common goal of building up the body of Christ. 

Growing up, it wasn’t just pastors who spoke into my life, friends. I think of so many other people, who were called for such a time as they served. I think of Paul and Debbie who taught my third grade Sunday school class. In third grade in my home church you were given your adult Bible, but that did not mean that it was easy for third graders to read. Yet, week after week, they encouraged us to show up with those Bibles and taught us how to read them, encouraging us as we stumbled over hard to pronounces words and talking to us about what the text truly means. They were called. 

I think of Sandy and Rita, who invited me to come and teach my first Sunday school class as a high school student. Week in and week out I would watch these faithful women prepare materials for Kindergartners, who were sometimes rambcious. Sometimes not really interested. Sometimes captivated by what they were saying. They were called. 

I think of people I’ve met throughout my time as a pastor who embodied what it meant to be the body of Christ. I think of Mrs. S who spoke words of prophecy over me at my first church, both when I really needed a word from God, but also needed to be encouraged. I think of Steve and Karen who dreamed of a place where college students could not just come and worship, but where they would be deeply cared for and had a home away from home. Of Bill, who started building looms to make prayer shawls. They were called. 

And where did all of those calls come from, Church? From the Lord who has called me and the Lord who has called you. 

The problem is, sometimes we just forget to listen for the call and respond. 

Paul tells the followers in Ephesus that they are to live a life worthy of their calling. Here’s the thing about calling - we all have one - we just sometimes choose to ignore it. While pastors may have a very specific calling to lead the church, everyone who calls them-self Christian are called to some time of servanthood and ministry by way of their baptism. Its just that the calling varies. But in this scripture passage we are told that we all have gifts - its just that the gifting and calls vary.

Have you ever taken time to pray about why you are part of this local body of Christ? Because you aren’t here by accident. You are here, because Christ gives us every gifting we need in each local body to thrive, THRIVE, for the Kingdom of God. Not just get by. Not just meet the budget. But to make a difference in transforming the world.

  Whenever I start to talk about the church, I get passionate. Because the Church is both visible and invisible. Is here in this place and around the globe. Its any place where the Word of God is preached, the sacraments are administered, and there is a presence of people of faith. Not just people but people of faith. People who faithfully want to be the Church. Want to be about something bigger than themselves. Want to be about the mission and work of God. Want to be about reaching new people about Jesus Christ - and move past want to action. In fact, people of faith live a life of holy, active expectancy, meaning that we are aware that God is using us to work in the world for something so much bigger than we could ever grasp.

  Then when I start to talk about how local churches are living into that mission, that vision of being the Church of Jesus Christ I get really excited, and often really loud. While there are many places and organizations that do good in this world, the church is the only one that exists to transform lives both here in the present and in the life to come. Amen! That’s why we reach out beyond our walls - not make more members, but to make more disciples. To connect more people to the person and message and power of Christ! 

  But the Church universal and the local church can also break my heart when we put the wrong things first and don’t listen for the call of God on our lives. When we make it all about us. When we make it about selecting whether we are going to listen to the call fo God. When we make it about what we want instead of about the heart of God.

At Annual Conference this past year, we heard the powerful words that baptism is the ordination of the laity. What was being said? That by virtue of being part of the body of Christ, you are called. Every single one of you. That’s not even a question. The only true question is if you are listening and responding to the call on your life. 

Friends, we are simply going to take time this morning to listen. To listen for the call of God and prayerfully consider our response. Is there something you have felt tugging at your heart that you’ve been avoiding. Bring it to God in prayer. Is there something you are not sure how to take the next step with? Bring it to God in prayer. If you have been making excuses about why you can’t be the one called. Bring it to God in prayer. Trusting that as we open ourselves to listen, God will surely speak….

“Listening to God: The Mystery of Silence and Prayers” James 4:8 Matthew 6: 5-15

Sometimes I worry we don’t talk about the mystery of God enough. We talk about it around communion when we proclaim the mystery of faith -that Christ has died. Christ is risen. Christ will come again. We talk about it around baptism - as God’s presence passes over the water and we welcome the ones being baptized into the family of God.

But there is so much more to the mystery of God.

In reality we struggle to put our human words and concepts behind who God is and what God means to us as those who are part of the Church. The truth is, as much as we may try, our human words are going to fall short of describing all of God because God is bigger than our humanness. 

Case in point - prayer.

In the sixth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew, we find Jesus talking to the disciples about a lot of things - things that they would have known from their lives like prayer and fasting and giving alms for the poor. But Jesus, like much of his teaching in the Gospel of Matthew, takes what people think they know about God and the Kingdom, and turns it all on his head. In effect, Jesus is re-teaching his disciples how to pray. 

Jesus is saying its not about how eloquently you pray, what words you use, or how loud you are. Instead, its about the relationship with God that is posted in prayer. 

Perhaps, we too, need to re-learn how to pray today. I think we understanding that it isn’t about the words or volume we use. I think we get that prayer is about being in relationship with a Holy and Loving God. But today, I think we need to relearn what prayer means if we seemingly don’t get the answers we would like as quick as we want. 

Have you ever had a time in your life when you felt like you weren’t as close to God as you would like to be? I think part of the lie of our time that we have bought into around our faith is that it is all about mountain top experiences. Do you know what I mean? Those times when you just feel like you are on fire for Jesus and that you are deeply connected to the heart of God. 

I’ve had mountain top moments at camp and at the Creation Festival. At school and in church. It’s not where the mountain top experience happens that makes it meaningful, but the connection you feel like you have with God. Like you are on top of the world. 

But the reality is we don’t spend the totality of our lives on the mountain tops. We travel through the mundane and the every day. At times we find ourselves in the valleys. So when we think that God is only listening to us or responding to us when we are on the mountain tops, we will be sorely disappointed. 

Jesus is telling his disciples that they need to learn how to pray in the midst of the everydayness of life. About every day things. That God’s will be done in things great and small. That we have what we need each day. That we are forgiven. And yet, even in the everydayness, prayer is also intimate. Because we know God and because we are known by God. 

But what about in the dry seasons of our lives along our spiritual journey? What then? I remember years ago going through a time when I was coming off of the mountain top, and thought that every day should be like that with God. As a result, I found it really hard to pray in dry seasons, because I kept comparing everything to the mountain top. 

We don’t talk enough about the dry seasons. And what it means to keep on praying even when you don’t feel that same strong connection. Yet, that is one of the beautiful and mysterious things about prayer. 

Another mystery of prayer - have you ever came to God time and time again, but seemingly not got the answer you would like? Another lie we’ve bought into about prayer is that its like coming to God with a cosmic wishlist and as long as we are sincere in our requests and in a right place with God, then we will get whatever we ask for. 

But here’s the thing church - when Jesus taught his disciples to pray he told them to pray that God’s will be done. Not our will. God’s will. Yet sometimes we confuse the two. We think that we should get our way over God’s way. We also get deeply distressed when God doesn’t answer us within our time frame. Once again, though - we are praying for God’s will.

Another thing that we need to re-learn about prayer is that is requires that we listen. In fact, prayer requires us to ask the hard questions of when and where we fail to listen? Where are the places where we have a tight grip on what we desire and refuse to surrender to God? 

In order to learn to listen, there are going to be places where we simply sit in silence. Not filling it with our own words. But instead just sit with God. One of the ways that I know that I am truly comfortable with someone is that I’m willing to just sit with them. We don’t feel like we need to fill up every moment with speaking - but instead the silence is seen as a mark of familiarity. 

Should it not be that way in our prayer lives as well, church? That we are so close to the heart of God that’s okay if we sit in silence, waiting for God to speak? The problem is as we try to strip the mystery from our relationship with a Holy God, the result is using our human relationships to define the most important relationship. We think of the people in our lives who have weaponized silence and as a result, when God does not speak immendiatly, we see it as rejection, not familiarity. 

The truth of about silence is that it invites us to listen even more intently. Leaning lean. Think of the prophet Elijah. When the presence of God came to him it was not in the wind or in the fire, but in the stillness. 

Part of prayer that we often disregard is waiting in silence. It’s drawing close to God. It’s recognizing this gift of grace amongst the clutter in our lives.

This morning, we are simply going to make space to pray, church. Pray in a way that you find meaningful. Whether you on on top of the mountain or in the dry valley. Pray to the one who loves you. For perhaps that is the greatest mystery of all with prayer - that our God loves us enough to want to be with us through prayer. So church, let us pray….