I Know Who You Are

Jeremiah 1:4-10
Faith United
August 25, 2007

Jeremiah was a pastor’s kid
Well, not in the traditional sense of the word
he was the son of a priest in a town where there were
mostly priests living
So he had a first hand look at what being a priest was like
how it was often a thankless job
how priests were set apart from the community
it wasn’t an easy job
It was very likely, that as a boy,
who is the son of a priest
that that would be his likely vocation
but maybe in his heart of hearts,
he hoped something would change
Nobody ever said to me,
So, you gonna grow up and be a preacher
like your Dad?
Nobody ever said that to me.
I had three older brothers, who all had that asked of them
along the way
but they made it very clear by their actions
and lifestyles as teenagers
that the answer was NO WAY….
I’m not that old,
and yet expectations were very different for me even then
I remember one pastor’s wife suggesting I go to seminary
not to become a PASTOR,
but to meet a pastor that I could marry…
She meant well
I was fine with no one asking me that question
My view from the parsonage was enough to convince me
it wasn’t an easy job by any means
and nothing in my experience made it obvious to me
at the time, that that’s where my own life was headed
It first occurred to me at the age of 15
that God might be calling me into the ministry
It was at summer camp, after a very emotional worship service
that left many of us crying and hugging and feeling close
to God
But then I came to my senses and pursued other goals
It was two years out of college
where I’d worked at several different jobs
struggled to pay the bills on my own apartment
and groceries
and reached what felt like a dead end
It was Annual Conference, of all things
that changed everything
I accompanied my parents to the worship services
at Annual Conference in Ocean City, NJ
to hear a preacher from Kansas City, Missouri
That sermon changed my life
scared the you know what out of me
and pulled the rug out from under me
all the expectations of my life that I assumed
were blown apart
Two months later, I was headed to seminary in New Jersey
and written in the front of my new Oxford Annotated Study Bible
were the words of God to Jeremiah….
“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you
and before you were born I consecrated you;
…. Do not say, I am only a youth;
for to all to whom I send you you shall go
and whatever I command you you shall speak,
Be not afraid of them,
For I am with you to deliver you, says the Lord.”
I had no idea what all was ahead of me,
and I’ve often said that it’s a really good thing
or I would have run the other direction
God seems to communicate on a need-to-know basis
and that’s a good thing
Jeremiah was only a teenager when God called him
and as you imagine, Jeremiah was adamant
Hey, I’m only a kid! Why would you call ME?
What can I do?? They’ll laugh at me!
And God says, yeah, they will
But that’s ok
I’ll give you what you need
I’ll give you the words that you need to say
and the ability to do what I need you to do

All the good ones argued with God
Moses said, ‘hey, I can’t speak, I’m no leader…
You got the wrong guy…’
Mary said, ‘what are you talking about, me having a baby?
I’ve never been with a man, and I’m just me… just a peasant girl…’
I’m JUST
I’m JUST…
I’m just a youth, I’m just a stuttering old man
I’m just a young girl, dreaming of my wedding…
Then there was Peter, who said, I’m just a fisherman, man,
I’m a rough character, you don’t want me…
Or Abraham,
Ï’m just an old man, near the end of my life,
and my wife, she’s just an old woman,
her womb has never worked, and it ain’t gonna work now
Don’t you think you might have gotten the wrong number, God?
King David…
I’m just boy, and he’s a giant, are you kidding??
St. Paul,
Hey, I’m just a guy with a really bad temper,
and I don’t even like Christians, what do you want from me?
God has a crazy way of calling people to do what God wants
It’s actually quite ridiculous if you think about it
God calls the most unlikely people
to do what seems impossible
Jeremiah was called to be a prophet to the people of Jerusalem
at a time of crisis
When everything was falling apart
when they would all end up in captivity
of a foreign country
and be helpless to know how they could keep
worshipping God in a foreign land
that has taken their people captive
Thanks a lot, God
God calls Jeremiah to bring the bad news over and over again
they didn’t listen,
they beat him up, they threw him in prison
they threw him into a deep, dark hole
If you read the book of Jeremiah,
You’ll find a guy who yells at God a lot
What are you doing to me??
Is THIS what you had planned for me?
This isn’t going well!!
And time and time again, he quit
I’m done, he said, I’m not gonna proclaim your word anymore
But it was really really annoying
Jeremiah discovered that he couldn’t just keep him mouth shut
that God’s word was so much a part of him
it burned inside of him
the more he tried to keep it down
It tortured him
Because he was, in fact, a prophet of God
He was born to speak God’s word, the good news and the bad
and when you go against who you truly are…
you find that life can be torture
Have you ever tried to be something that you’re not?
To please other people?
You pretend that you’re happy
You say the words people want to hear
and yet it’s killing you inside,
because you’re not being true to yourself?
Answering the call of God
is not just about finding out what God wants you to do for a living
You may be called to work a job
that seems to have so little to do with your Christian calling
and yet, as you work in that capacity,
you have the ability to touch lives, to be an example
to make a difference
Being called by God is being called to be a child of God
in the world
We’re often called into difficult situations
painful situations
called to simply BE with someone
as they go through a hard time
We can’t fix it, we can’t even make it right,
but we can be a peaceful, healing, life-giving presence
in the midst of chaos
Hanging in there with a kid who’s gone wrong
believing that they will find their way
Some of us are called to be parents
sometimes to our own children
sometimes to children who don’t have parents
or whose parents gave up
Sometimes we’re called into lives that are broken
and we feel inadequate to help
But God may be calling us to simply love that person through
to trust our gut,
to trust that God will give us what we need
to be a blessing
God calls us to be with a loved one who is suffering
and to do things in caring for them
that we never imagined that we could do
but we do it because we love them
and love gives us the power to do the impossible
Sometimes God calls us to drop what we’re doing
and to make a change
People rarely stick to one job throughout their lives anymore
the world has changed
and is changing all the time
and so, too, our lives change
Larry feels called to be a Hospice Nurse,
after 25 years in the pastoral ministry
He knows that if he didn’t pursue it,
it would burn inside of him
but it’s not easy starting all over at 54
When God calls us to something,
there is no guarantee anywhere
that it will be easy or smooth or always rewarding
Just because what we bring to the world
out of God’s love
is something so different, so opposite sometimes
that people will often react in anger or hate
I’ve been in some tough situations in ministry
and there have been many, many times
that I’ve shaken my fists at God and said
What do you think you’re doing???
Are you paying attention??
Larry and I were both called to a church in Pennsylvania
whose pastor of 18 years was abruptly removed
because of sexual misconduct
It was just plain nasty
It was like being called into a live hornet’s nest
That year was probably the most painful year of our ministries
and we may never know what good we did by being there
for that time
but I still believe somehow, that God wanted us there
for that year
I still don’t know why
and it took time to recover from it
it still comes back to haunt me at times
God doesn’t punish Jeremiah ever
for questioning God
God never gets angry at Jeremiah’s rampages
at his frequent bouts of depression and despair
God never scolds him for giving up in the worst of times
God just hangs in there with him
brings him through
I’m just a boy, Jeremiah said at the beginning
But that boy, by God’s power, became a prophet
A prophet who kept giving the people of Israel
words from God in the midst of their crisis and bondage
He helped them remember God’s promises
even when there was no evidence of those promises
in sight
Who are we in this foreign land?
Who am I now that my parents are both gone?
Who am I now that I have this illness?
Who am I now that my child is in trouble?
Who am I now that I’m out of a job?
Who are we, the people needed to know,
who are we now that we’ve been captured by the enemy
and defeated?
And Jeremiah comes to them with a word from God saying,
“You are still mine.
You are still my people. I formed you, I made you,
I called you. The story is not over..”
You are still YOU
And in the midst of Jeremiah’s worst despair
when he wants to die,
when he does his best to run away from this call of God
that has become a torment,
He remembers what God said to him
in the beginning,
“before I formed you in the womb, I knew you,
and before you were born I consecrated you…”
It’s an intimate kind of knowing
no one else can know us the way God knows us
And we’ve been known and loved since before we were born
In other words, God says, in the midst of chaos and crisis
I will not leave you
I will never leave you….
Frederick Buechner, a Christian writer and preacher
Once wrote,
“The place God calls you is to the place
where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger
meets.”
You’ll never know, fully, how much you have filled someone’s hunger
and that’s ok,
We go forward, trusting that God will use us
to fill a hunger, to be a blessing
You may say, “We’re just Gibbon.
We’re just a small town, we’re just… we’re just…”
And yet… God says, no, you’re not JUST anything
You are my people, called to be my followers
Called to be my lights in the world
to shelter the broken,
minister to the grieving,
comfort the despairing
give joy to people who have not known joy….
Do not say, we are just a small town or a small church …
For God says, to all to whom I send you you shall go
and whatever I command you you shall speak
be not afraid of anyone,
for I am with you to deliver you, says the Lord
It doesn’t get any better than that….