Jeremiah 1:4-10
August 22, 2004
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.
By now you know that I flunked out of Chinese school in Boston. I am a U.S. citizen not by choice but by birth. I don’t have the concentrated focus like Victor Low or James Chuck to regularly study and learn Cantonese. And my Toishanese is what can best be described as “baby talk” or elementary. But when the Friday Night School people, namely Suzanne Mak and others pled for volunteers a couple of years ago, I taught the citizenship class with Bill Leong and Franklin Hom for one semester. On paper, I was unqualified to teach but with the grace of God, the words that I needed to say, they were given to me in moments of need. I discovered that when I answer God’s call and delight in the students, the words will come. And they did.
Frederick Buechner once said, “The place God calls you to be is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” God has placed me not only at Friday Night School but I believe here in San Francisco with you at this church.
Priesthood of All Believers
A familiar conviction that we have as Baptists is the idea initiated by Martin Luther, “priesthood of all believers.” I am a priest, and so is each one of you. I might be the primary priest in this sanctuary right now but in the larger “sanctuary of the world,” you are all priests too.
The word, “priest” comes from the Latin for “bridge.” A priest—in the church or in the world outside—is one who serves as a bridge between the human and the holy. Wherever we find ourselves working and living, these places become the context for our ministry. Ordinary things become sacred. They are signs of grace in the daily stuff of life. When you and I teach at Friday Night School, we would discover the sacredness of helping Chinese immigrants receive the love of God through our teaching, conversations, and Joshua fellowship meals.
We can see places everywhere—places when we are serving as priests—bridging between the human and the holy coming together. These are the altars where God’s daily works and deeds are consecrated. For example, a gardener’s altar may be her garden, where God’s seeds and buds contain the grace of God’s life-giving power. A house painter’s altar may be his big brush and paints that beautify God’s neighborhood. A father’s altar may be his lap where his children receive the grace of God’s love. In the time when I taught Friday Night School, a teacher’s altar was the widening eyes and big smiles of the students when they began to understand that God has blessed them with a new home in the U.S.
The scriptural promise and mandate is that we are chosen by God—whether we want to be chosen or not. Through gifts of the spirit we are set apart for a particular function or role—whether we are ready or not. This is the demand and the promise of baptism, the initial ordination to Christian ministry for all of us. Whatever our particular function or job or role turns out to be, we all share a common vocation—to be God’s person in the world.
Call of Jeremiah
Although Jeremiah was a son of a priest, his justification for being a prophet is that “The word of the Lord came to me.” Jeremiah had not sought for this word but the word intruded into Jeremiah’s life as an act of God. In fact, we are told that Jeremiah’s vocation occurred even before he was born, when he was still in the womb! All of this underscores the point that it is God who validates and authorizes a prophet.
We don’t know how old Jeremiah was when he realized that he was set aside to be a prophet. But the first words we hear from young Jeremiah are words of protest. He says he is too young, that he is not good in public speaking, that he is only a boy. Jeremiah stands in a long line of people who, called by God, do not respond right away but rather tried to get away from God.
God’s response to Jeremiah is a rebuke. God tells the young Jeremiah that he will go with him wherever he is sent, that he will speak through him whatever he is told. God, in fact, says that words will be put into Jeremiah’s mouth. The Lord put out his hand and touched his mouth.
Then Jeremiah is told not to be afraid, for God will keep safe those whom God has called. Moreover Jeremiah is not simply being called to deliver eloquent speeches to attentive audiences, but he is also given authority over nations and over kingdoms. He will pull down empires, uproot, destroy, and build back up new kingdoms, and plant new empires.
This was quite a promise and assignment to give a young man who has readily admitted that he is not good in public speaking! So as we have gathered here today, what are we to learn from Jeremiah?
God’s Call
There are four insights from Jeremiah that we might better understand how God is calling us today. First, God’s call is seldom instantaneous or clear. Jeremiah was just a confused young boy wandering around the hills of Palestine when God called. Jesus was a carpenter for twenty years before God called him to a new phase of his ministry. Paul was a soldier and persecutor of Christians. Moses was an ex-murderer and a sheep-herder. Mary was a teenage girl dreaming about the perfect wedding. None of them immediately understood what their ministry was supposed to be.
When I went to college, I was going to become a psychologist. When I got a D in statistics, I decided that was probably not going to happen. I ended up going to seminary and you know the rest of the story. Our daughter, Lauren started out going to be a creative writing professor, until she realized that she was meant to be a minister.
God’s call is seldom instantaneous or clear. And sometimes it has many chapters. Most of us will transition through several jobs and roles—trying to find the perfect fit—until we discover what Frederick Buechner’s vocational thought is—“our deep gladness meets the world’s deep hunger.”
Second, what God calls us to do and be may not meet the expectations of others—particularly our parents or the biases of our culture. Jeremiah’s father was a temple priest, while Jeremiah spent most of his life criticizing the temple.
Susan Andrews, a pastor in Maryland tells about a friend named Tony who started out as a firefighter, honoring his father’s and his grandfather’s noble profession. But one day, when he was bored, Tony painted a mural on the firehouse wall, and he discovered that what he was meant to be was an artist. Now he became one of the most sought-after portrait painter and mural designers in the state. The deepest sadness of his life, however, is that when his father died of cancer, this proud old man was still not reconciled to the chosen profession of his son. In his father’s eyes, Tony was always a failure. But in the eyes of God, Tony is giving expression to the uniqueness of the Holy Spirit within him.
Third, oftentimes what we are called to do and be is not easy or comfortable. When God touched Jeremiah’s mouth and put holy words on his tongue, God proclaimed that the words will “pluck up and tear down, destroy and overthrow.” Only occasionally will God’s words “build up and plant” new life. Jeremiah’s message against Judah and Jerusalem is filled with the prediction of disasters and judgment against people who have forsaken God.
So the ministry to which we are called may not always feel very good either. Giving up Friday nights to teach new immigrants doesn’t make us feel good after a long day at work. Teaching and working with difficult children in the public schools doesn’t always feel good. Nursing and doctoring for people with life-threatening illnesses depleting you of your life-giving energies doesn’t feel good at the end of the day.
I know many of you have embraced difficult “ministries”—the work that you do—not because you feel good at the end of the day, but because you are doing good things, and because God will not let you do anything else.
Fourth, if we are biblical people, then nine times out of ten we will resist what God is calling us to do. Our resistance will most likely be based on a sense of inadequacy or unworthiness. Isaiah felt he was too sinful. Moses felt that he was too inarticulate. Jeremiah felt he was too young. Mary thought that she was too unprepared. Paul thought that he was too evil.
We all know the excuses when God calls us to live according to his ministry for us. I am only a housewife. I have no education. I have little money and time. I am only a boy or only a girl.
So if you are resisting a ministry or a job or a new direction because you think you can’t handle it, well, chances are that this is exactly what God wants you to do. When I select a passage to preach each Sunday, the text that I am most afraid of is the passage that God has touched my mouth with and God has given me the words to speak.
And we see in the Scriptures again and again that God will give you what you need to do and what you are meant to do. Moses was given Aaron to help him speak. Mary was given Elizabeth to help her prepare. Paul was given a thorn in his flesh, to remind him of his imperfect past. Ezekiel was given a whole book to eat. Jeremiah was given words in his mouth when the Lord put out his hand and touched his mouth. I was given Bill Leong and Franklin Hom to teach Friday Night School.
Too Old
Jeremiah’s excuse was that he was “only a boy.” At the beginning of life, we think that we may be too young for God’s ministry. But at the other end of life, we say that we are “too old.” Some of us here feel that we are “too old” to do anything anymore.
Did you know that it’s hard to find the notion of retirement in the Bible? Sometime ago, Tony Campolo said that retirement is unbiblical. While God called Jeremiah as early as his time in the womb, God also calls people like Abraham and Sarah later in years. Abraham was 100 years old and his wife 90 when Isaac was given to them. Moses was 80 years old when he led the children of Israel out of Egypt. And when the Israelites were ready to enter the Promised Land, 85-year old Caleb said,
“Give me the hill country. The giants are there, and the cities are great and
fenced. But if the Lord will be with me I will drive them.”
That’s pretty good for 85!
I am very blessed to be at this church because you believe that retirement is a false myth in the economy of God’s call. David Wong still teaches the women and men society every Sunday. Dr. Chuck has been theoretically retired over 12 years ago but look at all the ministries that he has been doing ever since. Warren Lee retired from being a stock broker and is coordinating our new Senior Center. Julia Lu still worships the Lord every Sunday right in that seat and because she makes the tiring effort to come, we who are of more able body are inspired to worship the Lord no less.
I know that some of you are about to retire this year. Remember that God calls everyone, without regard to how young you are or how old you might be. There’s a lady in her late 90s who once said to her visitor, “I don’t know why I am allowed to live so long. I am here in the nursing home and not worth anything anymore.”
The visitor noticed her Bible next to her bedside. The visitor replied, “You talk about how the workers here don’t know Jesus yet. Maybe that is why you are here, that they see your faith as you read your Bible daily and confidently living not fearing death but looking forward to the day Jesus comes to take you home.”
It made sense to this elderly lady that her life is precious and worthwhile too. Regardless of how old we are, we are all priests—the bridge to connect the human with the holy.
Only a Boy
For years as you know after I was ordained, I served at our ABC denominational offices in Valley Forge. I knew that I could organize and plan and shape programs. I knew that with my interest in psychology that I can be with people in their deep pain and share in their high joy. But standing up here behind this pulpit to teach and to preach was something that I was hesitant to do. I felt deeply inadequate for the task. I was worried that I won’t have something to say every Sunday. Like Moses, I found it was hard to speak and I prayed that there would be an Aaron to help me out.
Then when I became your pastor, I could no longer resist this terrifying task of speaking the word of God. What I discovered is that I may not preach the same or as well as some other preachers. But when I open up the Bible and the revelation of God is made alive on what is the word of the Lord that is upon us for each Sunday, it is the most deeply privileged and most satisfying part of my ministry. I have learned that when I pay attention, God is with me, holding my heart and shaping my tongue, so that what I say and what I do becomes God’s words and deeds—and not my own—in these holy moments of worship.
This is the bottom line of God’s call and vocation for us. This is the Good news for the day. God does not call us to do and be who we are meant to do and be without also promising to be with us, giving us what we need to be God’s person.
The question for you today is: “Are you listening to God’s call in your life? Would you be God’s priest to join the daily human existence that we have with the holiness of God’s presence?” As surely as there is breath in your body, there is a call in your life—for that is why we are created in God’s image. Whether your calling is new or changing or just being refined, listen this day for God’s special word to you. Then go and live that word with all the joy and courage you can find, knowing that God is both with you and for you in who you are and in what you do.
May this good news be so, for you as it is for me.
Let us pray.
Merciful Lord God, thank you for calling us into discipleship whether we are younger or older. Remind us that you will always provide for us all the necessary resources, confidence, and words to be your humble servants in ministry. Grant us wisdom and courage as we bring your prophetic word of peace and love to the world. Amen.