Answer w/ Action or Apathy
John 1:43-51
The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, ‘Follow me.’ Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, ‘We have found him about whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph from Nazareth.’ Nathanael said to him, ‘Can anything good come out of Nazareth?’ Philip said to him, ‘Come and see.’ When Jesus saw Nathanael coming towards him, he said of him, ‘Here is truly an Israelite in whom there is no deceit!’ Nathanael asked him, ‘Where did you come to know me?’ Jesus answered, ‘I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you.’ Nathanael replied, ‘Rabbi, you are the Son of God! You are the King of Israel!’ Jesus answered, ‘Do you believe because I told you that I saw you under the fig tree? You will see greater things than these.’ And he said to him, ‘Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man.’
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Now that I'm not in a pulpit every Sunday, there are weekends when I don't have an obligation to preach. And on those precious Sundays off, I think, "Oh! I get to go to church for fun and for my spiritual well-being." I go to sleep that night with my alarm(s) set, and more often than I would care to admit, when Sunday morning rolls around, I hit the snooze button until it's well past the time of any service. (Let me know if this has ever happened to you.) Life is hard, though. You aren't aware of the week I had leading up to that Sunday, just as I don't know what might have happened to you. It is not always easy to answer the call of God with all the chaotic noises bouncing around in our weary heads that make it so we just want to stay in bed.
It appears the struggle to respond to God's call isn't new. Our reading from I Samuel reveals that "the word of the Lord was rare in those days; visions were not widespread." We might assume that spiritual corruption prevented the people from hearing the word of the Lord, and Eli himself strayed on more than one occasion from the path of the Lord. Even by the time we reach the Gospel of John, Nathaniel isn't buying that anything good is happening (he might fear that his friend Philip got wrapped up in a cult for all he knows). However, we should note that even though the people of God (that includes us) do not always hear God's word or receive visions or prophecies, God didn't stop breaking through into our world with the hope that our hardened hearts might lean in to listen one day.
Assuming that you will (if not already) hear God's voice, how will you respond? Will you rise from a slumber like Samuel? Will your face contort with a look of skepticism like Nathaniel's? Once we acknowledge the call, there is a choice for us to make. We have the option to respond with action or apathy. Apathy, which we will address, will negatively impact ourselves and others, and action, while it might seem right, action becomes more challenging when we see where the voice calling for action, yearning for an answer, is coming from.
God speaks to us from the places we least expect. God speaks to us in the form of people we would least anticipate. From nursing homes to food banks, from children to strangers from a distant land, God speaks, God calls, but do we listen, do we hear? We often label these people and places as "other" as spheres where we might lend a helping hand, but what good, what thing of God can spring forth from them? It's from the places we least expect where God breaks into our world. Apathy does not work, it is not an answer; apathy results in a deadening of our spirits, broken bodies, broken communities, and brokenness all around. How will we answer the call in the face of such plights and injustice? Because even if we sweep our problems under the rug, God still cries out, calls out, and demands a response. God knows we cannot hit the "snooze" button forever; at some point, we must respond.
What I love is that in our readings for today, there is a moment where authentic listening takes place for both Samuel and Nathaniel. And once they realize who it is, who is calling them, they respond. In Hebrew, we hear Samuel call out "hineni," "here I am," but this response goes much deeper, implying that Samuel and Nathaniel, in our reading from John, are ready to embark on a new journey with their whole selves. Hineni, here I am; it is the cry of Moses, Abraham, and Mary in her own way. I am reminded on this day that many in the Civil Rights movement cried out, "Hineni" to the Lord. It was the cry of Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, and Dorothy Height, who said, "Hineni!" "Here I am, God, use me! Use me to correct this corrupt generation filled with hate and contempt." Hineni, here I am; let that be our answer to the Lord this day and every day. Let us be ready to hand ourselves over to God.
God invites us to see the extraordinary, the divine, in the corners of life where no one else is paying attention and even to places in plain sight that are being ignored.
Believe it or not, people here and now have already answered that call. And it took place during one of my favorite occasions: ordination and installation of church officers. Besides the beautiful imagery of the church laying hands or praying over those who responded to God's call, people are invited to answer the question, "Will you pray and seek to serve the people with energy, intelligence, imagination, and love?" In our response to the voice, the call of God, let this be our mantra. Let us act with service, energy, intelligence, imagination, and love. We aren't always going to hit the mark, but it's okay if we continue to take action and decide to live kin-dom (the fellowship) of God. Many of us have responded to the call of God even if we never answered the questions for ordination, so how will you rise and answer the call of God?
In our reading from the Gospel of John, Nathaniel eventually comes around after seeing that Jesus is who Philip says he is, and it sets him on a path as one of Jesus' disciples. Breaking down our misconceptions and skepticism in response to God's call has a cost. Nothing worth doing is without cost. Discipleship has a cost; it may mean we do, think, or say things that cost us social or material capital. And as I said before, we may not always get the call right or know where God's voice is coming from, but it's imperative that we say, "Here I am." There are consequences for us not answering the call, there are consequences for our apathy, and they are real, they are tangible, and they speak louder than any words we might say. In our world, that is hurting, crying out, frequent silence, and inaction are concerning.
Nathaniel asks, "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" Eli probably wondered, "What's wrong with this child?" In a time like today, where the word of God feels faint, where visions are rare, where injustice and oppression run rampant, let us respond to the voice of God that calls out to us, waking us from our slumber, from the unexpected places in our world. Let us rise, let us take action, let us, like Abraham, Moses, and those Civil Rights leaders, respond to God with a robust, "Hineni! Here I am, Lord; it is I. Use me, mold me, make me an instrument of your will, and embody your love." Apathy or action? The choice is ours; how will we respond?