I’ve been quite busy and just collecting a list of posts I want to write rather than blogging as much as I prefer, but all in good time.  Here’s a bit of insight into what I’ve been up to, however–with great thanks to my Pastor Study Group.

Adam J. Copeland

First Presbyterian Church

Hallock, Minn.

Jan 31, 2009

Called Together

Jer. 1:4-10

I spent a few days last week in Montreat, North Carolina with a group of six other Presbyterian pastors. We had a fantastic time delving into what ministry looks like in each of our very different settings. One of our group members is a pastor downtown in a city of 10 million; another works 20 hours a week in a congregation with about thirty souls in worship each week; another serves a congregation in a declining neighborhood–fifteen years ago the church had 1600 members; now the enormous sanctuary dwarfs the 250 members remaining. As we discussed in the New Members/Refresher class this morning, what constitutes a “church” these days is an incredibly diverse, and sometimes quite complicated.

In preparation for our time together, my pastor study group read the book, “Direct Hit: Aiming Real Leaders at the Mission Field” by Paul Borden. It’s a fascinating read and generated some stellar discussion. Borden is a church mission specialist who focuses on visioning, strategic planning, and systemic change. Big change. It was interesting for us Presbyterian pastors to think about systemic change in the first place, after all you know the old Presbyterian joke, “How many Presbyterians does it take to change a lightbulb?” “Change???” Or, the other punch line: “How many Presbyterians does it take to change a lightbulb?” “Well, first you form a committee to nominate a task force to call a meeting to present to the session what committee may decide whether or not the general idea of change is something they may consider in three to five years.”

Sure, change is really difficult in any organization, especially the church. But most of us, myself included, thought this book of Borden’s suggested going about church change in a really dangerous way. Well, Borden talked about looking intensely at one’s community, about prayer, and careful discernment as to what God has in store for a congregation–that part was great–but, the vision for change, what the church should become, for Borden, is almost solely the vision of the pastor. Us pastors thought that was a really dangerous thing–one person, a mere pastor, developing the vision for an entire congregation. Most of my group just had a different idea of how pastors should lead than what Paul Borden suggests. We didn’t think we had all the answers. We didn’t think we had the clear visions. And we did think, for sure, that we make plenty of mistakes.

Maybe another way to put it, after reading today’s Old Testament lesson, is to say that my pastor group shared Jeremiah’s initial hesitancy to his call. And we, like Jeremiah, heard a response and call from God. But the specific words are hard to hear. My group members, and I in particular, do not hear a specific ten-point strategic plan in response to our prayer requests. While God speaks clearly to Jeremiah–even putting words in Jeremiah’s mouth–it’s rare for me, at least, to hear God’s voice directly. Instead, I find that God’s call for me, and I expect God’s call for most of us, comes in quieter tones. God speaks, but in indirect ways, through community, through experiences, through trial and error and never-ending love.

These verses of Jeremiah are usually referred to as “The Call of Jeremiah.” And they do follow some regular patterns of God calling folks in the Old Testament. God usually calls God’s prophets through an encounter with God, and God speaks to them–remember Moses and the burning bush, this story in Jeremiah and the story of Isaiah, and Gideon, and Ezekiel. God calls, and in most cases, the prophet rejects God’s invitation.

It like every time God picks out the fancy paper for an invitation and goes to the bother of writing everyone’s names real pretty-like on the envelope, God gets rejected with some excuse.

Moses says he couldn’t speak well. Jeremiah says in verse 6, “Ah, Lord God, truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy.” But then God speaks again–and when God speaks directly to you, it’s hard not to listen–and then the prophet gives in and responds to God’s call. In most prophet’s call stories: the prophet resists, and God persists.

It’s hard to know what to do with these prophetic call stories, because most of our lives just don’t work like that. We can be as faithful as can be, we can pray plenty and seek God’s direction, but God’s voice may not present itself as clearly as it did to Moses and Jeremiah. Isn’t that so true: many of us long for a clear word from God and end up waiting a very long time, if ever, for that explicit word.

So what do we do when God’s voice is hard to hear? Well, we could give God an ultimatum, “If God does not speak directly to me by noon next wednesday, then I will forget God; If God doesn’t tell me the perfect day to plan my wheat, reveal the perfect major for my grandchild in college, then I will move on from this God thing.” That’s one option, I suppose. Even a compelling one at times when we pray and pray for God to make a way clear and seem to hear no clear response.

But I think most of us have a bit more complexity to our faith. We know that God’s call may be difficult to discern. And that’s almost the fun of it. If our lives were only some sort of divine connect-the-dot puzzle, they’d be the worse for it. God calls all of us, it’s just a bit more complex than comfortable sometimes.

This book of Paul Borden’s that my pastor group read seemed to assume that all pastors would hear a clear call from God for each and every church. And that the pastor’s vision for the church is necessarily the right one. Well, I might as well be honest and upfront with you all: God has not dictated a clear strategic vision to me for our congregation. I pray. I remain open to God. I check my email and text messages every day. But I haven’t received God’s plan for First Pres Hallock. I am not Jeremiah.

If you want speedy drastic change for our congregation, I guess this is a bad thing. I don’t have all the answers. I am not one of the super pastors Paul Borden writes about. And, sure, I guess you could say that this will delay a possible valuable ministry in Hallock right here right now.

Or–and I suspect this is where most of us fall–you’re not the Paul Borden type. God calls prophets, surely, but you did not expect a prophet to be called to Hallock. Instead, you just wanted a pastor. Someone not to tell you what change you must make, one not to proclaim God’s strategic plan, but one to invest in the challenge of ministry together. So, rather than a facebook message from God, here’s what this Jeremiah text might be mumbling to us, might be reminding us, about our call together. Our call that we will work out as a community.

Jeremiah 1 reads: 4 Now the word of the Lord came to me saying, 5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.” Jeremiah’s worth is not based on what he does with his life. God loved him before God even formed him in the womb.

In our society so built on success and failure we sometimes make God out to be just another judge in the rat race. But God’s word to Jeremiah is of a different sort. Jeremiah was consecrated–made holy–even before Jeremiah said could say a word or took his first steps. God’s love isn’t contingent on Jeremiah’s leadership, but came before he made his first speech. God knew Jeremiah would not be perfect, and God called him and consecrated him anyways.

In the same way, God doesn’t depend on us to respond to our call in just the perfect way before God loves us. God knows we’re going to screw things up plenty often, and God loves us anyways. That love begins even before we were formed; it stays true even when we don’t.

So Jeremiah responds to God trying to avoid the call, saying he’s to young. But God sets things straight, “Don’t say ‘I’m too young,’” says God, for you’ll go where I send you. You can speak the words I give you, and “Do not be afraid, for I am with you to deliver you.” Those were words to Jeremiah but they are ours as well.

Do not be afraid.
Do not be afraid, when God calls you to a task.
Do not be afraid, when the economy slows.
Do not be afraid, when the terror threat level rises.
Do not be afraid, when the census tracks another population decline.
Do not be afraid, when the state of our union is less than stellar.
Do not be afraid, when the likelihood of a spring flood rises.
Do not be afraid, when our denomination declines.
Do not be afraid, when our vision for the future is as yet unknown.
“Do not be afraid, for I am with you,” says the Lord. “I will deliver you.”

God declares that Jeremiah is appointed, “over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.” We are called to our own tasks, here at the church, here in Hallock, and beyond. But I doubt many of us has received that explicit word from God with a prophetic vision or strategic plan. And that’s great news if you ask me, because we are called to work things out together.

It’s often said, “It takes a village to raise a child.” But we could also say, “It takes a village to respond to God’s call.” We’re not Jeremiah, but we are a community striving to live out God’s call together. I’m not the pastor type that Paul Borden is looking for, bringing a clear vision and ten-point strategic plan to our congregation. But that doesn’t mean we’re not called to new things. We’re just called to figure out the plan together, to journey together, to make mistakes and be forgiven together.

And as we discern what new places God might be taking us, we can rest assured in the old old news that God loves us and consecrates us even before we are born. So we need not be afraid. God is with us, each one of us, calling us to live and work together. Amen.