A Call to Be
Can be listened to here
Gate Pa – Epiphany 5 or 5th Sunday of Ordinary Time – you
pick
Readings:
Psalm Psalm:138
First
Reading:
Isaiah
6:1-8
Second
Reading: 1
Cor 15:1-11
Gospel:
Luke
5:1-1
What I want to say:
I want to explore the nature of our call in terms of
who we are rather than what we are clled to do. And I want to use Brain
McLarens thoughts on patterns and my thoughts on images to think about being
called to be the image of God in this place at this time – what might that mean
for us? And I want to explore Te Tiriti in light of all that
What I want to
happen:
Invite people to reflect on who
they desire to be, and who God deisres them to be.
The Sermon
1. Introduction:
A married couple in their early 60s
were celebrating their 40th wedding anniversary in a quiet and romantic little
restaurant.
Suddenly a tiny yet beautiful fairy
appeared on their table. She said, “for being such an exemplary married couple
and for being loving to each other for all this time, I grant you each a wish”.
The wife answered, Oh, I want to
travel around the world with my darling husband”. The fairy waved her magic
wand and poof! – two tickets for the Queen Mary II appeared in her hands.
The husband thought for a moment:
“well, this is all very romantic, but an opportunity like this will never come
again. I’m sorry my love, but my wish is to have a wife 30 years younger than
me”.
The wife and the fairy were deeply
disappointed, but a wish is a wish. So the fairy waved her magic wand and
poof!...the husband became 92 years old.
2. Being Careful
[Isaiah]
our desires reveal a lot about us don’t they
a lot of who we really are
the
husband was not all that people thought he was
we have just heard the story of the call of
Isaiah
called
to be a prophet
called to be a prophet to kingdom Judah
southern
kingdom
Judah
thought it was holy and righteous kingdom
kings stood in line with David
worshipped in true temple in Jerusalem
as opposed to those backsliding cousins up
north
-
Abandoned Davidic
kings
-
set up own places
worship
-
now for all their
sins - under serious threat from Assyria –
like husband
their desires revealed who truly were
Isaiah was called be to prophet to them not to
the north
-
own desires for
wealth and security at expense of the poor
o
immigrant
o
orphans and
widows
o
and their
northern neighbours
revealed that not all they thought they were
Their desires
like
husbands wish
betrayed them.
wonder what our desires reveal about us?
Lent is a time to reflect on exactly that
question
–>
what do our desires reveal about us?
3. Call
[disciples]
lot of today’s readings are about call
When talk about call – I often think in terms
of call to do something
Isaiah was called to prophesy
Peter, James and John were called to follow
Jesus and do what he says
I am called to work as a priest
Bonnie is called to teach
others called to play music
work
in Altar guild
run
AAW
work
as vestry members
go
to Synod etc….
Call is often described in terms of doing
things
But Isaiah, Peter, James and John weren’t just
called to do something
in readings we heard today
called
to changed their understanding of who they were.
Isaiah was called to “be” a prophet
involved
radical change in how saw himself
how
he saw his family
his
community
southern
kingdom
radical
change in what he desired
would
change how all those people saw him
changed
his relationships with everyone
Same is true for Peter, James and John.
stepped
out family networks
defined
who they were
what
did with their lives
how
made decisions
their
priorities
their
desires
the
call to follow Jesus redefined everything about themselves
no
longer son of ancestors
now
disciple of Jesus first and foremost
same is true of us
we talk about our call in terms of doing
things
when really we are called to be
be what?
4. Be What?
last week talked about patterns by which we
understand our lives
our
interactions
our
world
used four patterns suggested by Brian McLaren:
remind you what said last week
each pattern has it's own logic.
[logic] McLaren offers three
universal patterns of logic that are applied
as read them I thought about images of God that fit with each one
·
pattern of rivalry -
cosmos is huge battlefield where participants survive by competing, defeating,
displacing, winning.
Image of God the goes
with that is God the Victorious King.
·
pattern of compliance
- where learn rules to live by
Image of God is God the
judge
·
pattern of meaningless
mechanism - just cogs larger system with no inherent meaning
No God
·
4th pattern
or logic is that of God revealed in life Jesus Christ
- logic or pattern of love
5. Call and Patterns
Lets apply those patterns to our discussion
about call
All of us use these patterns to see understand
our lives
whether we like it or not
we
operate out of rivalry, or compliance, or meaningless mechanism
We are called
like Peter, James and John
to see ourselves differently
we are called to see ourselves in terms of
this new pattern revealed in Jesus
this logic of love
that is the call of every Christian
it is a lot harder than it sounds
as our desires reveal
when we feel honest enough to really look at
them.
6. Call of Society
another aspect of call that is called into
question in today’s readings
that we see call as individual thing
Isaiah
was called
Peter
was called
I
am called
stories heard today – those calls have a
communal aspect to them
Call of Isaiah is to be a prophet to kingdom
of Judah
remind
whole kingdom
that
they are to be a community
a
society
patterned
after God’s compassion, mercy, generosity
->patterned
after God’s love
his
call had social, economic, political consequences.
Call of Disciples also had social, economic,
political consequences
Jesus taught and modelled what communities
would look like when
modelled
on love
modelled
on compassion, mercy, generosity
Same is true for us.
we are called to model what communities would
look like when
modelled
on love
modelled
on compassion, mercy, generosity
7. The Treaty
[Te Tiriti] Yesterday we remembered, commemorated, signing of Te
Tiriti o Waitangi
intrinsically Anglican document
-
petitioned for
by, among others, Anglican missionaries
-
argued for in
London by Anglican humanitarians who sought to protect Maori from worst effects
of encounter with settlers
-
drawn up and
translated by Anglicans
-
signed by those
trusted (among others) Anglican Missionaries
o
understood text
in light of what those missionaries taught on other occasions about bible
-
taken by (among
others) Anglican Missionaries around the country for more Maori to sign
our fingerprints are all over this thing
which is why it is at heart of our church’s
constitution.
Sadly
our desires have too often let us down
too often we lost our calling
lost
our identity in God’s love
adopted other patterns
patterns
of rivalry – where Maori were seen as opponents, and then enemies
where
we desired what they had and more
worked
to compete with,
defeat,
displace,
so much of the talk
around Treaty Settlements still uses this language
still comes
out of this logic
patterns of compliance
where we imposed our
rules
meted out
punishment when they were not complied with
so much of treaty talk
still echoes these patterns as well.
Today we are reminded
that we are called to be more
that we are called to
live by another pattern
we are called to join
Isaiah, Peter, John and James
be a reflection of
God’s love, generosity, mercy,
Treaty of Waitangi is
ours
We stand with Isaiah
Our calling today is
to invite our nation to be more than we have been
to honour the dream of
those who first conceived of and signed this document
that our country and
how we relate with each other
might once again be patterned of God’s love
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