Fourth Sunday after Pentecost: Ch-ch-changes

RCA Texts for this week: Genesis 12:1-9, Psalm 33:1-12 or Psalm 50:7-15, Romans 4:13-25, Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26

The texts this week are rather unsettling. In fact, they're quite literally unsettling. We start with Abram who, at 75, God commands to leave everything he's ever known and set out for a new country.  Matthew tells us today of the calling of one of the disciples. A man with a job and we have to assume family. Jesus walks into his life and turns everything upside down.

I borrowed a book (The Alchemist) from a friend this week. It's quite an enchanting fable about a simple shepherd boy who takes a big risk, leaves everything he's ever known behind, and goes off in search of his own personal treasure. Like Abram, and Matthew, and the rest of the disciples the young boy in this story had things pretty well in hand. He had a job, some stability, and plans for the future. And then someone walked into his life and turned it all upside down. Pretty soon he was off getting into a great deal of trouble and danger and wondering along the way why he'd ever left his comfortable hillsides and friendly sheep behind.

These aren't just Abram's or Matthew's stories; they're our story. Most of us are pretty comfortable, I know I was. I had a good job, a very cozy house, a garden coming along quite well, a circle of friends, and family close by. For the last eight years I've been living the American dream. Guess what, so had Abram, who had accumulated quite a bit of wealth, enough to see himself comfortable for the rest of his days. And the thing about being comfortable is, it generates a great deal of inertia. I wonder if Matthew, James, John, Peter, Mary Magdalene and the rest were comfortable? Did they think they had things pretty well worked out? Often while everything might look right in our lives, and while we might be pretty happy, there is something missing.

We know it's not there, we know there is "something else" but we can't quite put our finger on what it is. You could call that nameless "thing" by a lot of names. You could say it is your destiny, or your calling, or your heart's desire. All sound pretty good, but it isn't usually that easy. Do you think it was easy for Abram, in his old age, to uproot his family and cross dangerous terrain to settle in a new place? The story doesn't give us much detail but imagine what his wife thought of this crazy idea. Imagine his neighbors' whispers: surely he's gone mad!

And the disciples? Called away from their fishing nets some leave their elderly father behind, others leave families, stable jobs, and wealth. They give up everything to follow a penniless, homeless, wandering teacher.

But you could say, God talked to Abram! And it was Jesus calling those disciples to follow him, that's easy! Is it? Do you think God spoke in Abram's ear? Do you really think that God drew the old man a map and laid everything out neatly for him? Do you think Jesus walked around with a glowing halo that let everyone know that this preacher was worth following? The world was full of wandering teachers and healers in first century Palestine, they were everywhere. No, I think it is far more likely that Abram, Mary, Matthew, and Peter all did something far more amazing than accepting hand written instructions from the Most High. I believe they listened to that quiet inner prompting that we too hear. To the tiny inner urgings telling us that God has more for us to do than just get by.  And I don't think it was easy for them to make that change either.

I am turning my household upside down, becoming a landlord, quitting a job I quite enjoy, leaving behind family and friends, not because God stood in my living room and told me to move to Austin Texas and pursue ordination, but because the quiet insistent inner voice kept urging me to something more than the American dream.

The same friend who loaned me that book has expressed a similar feeling of dissatisfaction. She's got a lot of reasons to stay safely in her own land, just like Abram. But like Abram she's beginning to listen to the quiet voice of God within. The voice that tells her there is more for her to do. Abram didn't listen to that voice and get up and go until he was 75! And thank goodness! Because if he hadn't we might despair. We might say: it's too late for me.

Through Abram, who at the end of his life became Abraham and the father of three faiths, God is whispering to us that it is never too late. To pursue our dreams, to work toward the Kingdom, indeed to follow Jesus. For some of us that might mean leaving a job, and family, and everything we have known. For others it might mean picking up an instrument we put away in childhood and making offering again of that part of ourselves. For others it might mean volunteering our time and skills to help others, instead of putting in that overtime at work.  I can't tell you what God is calling you to do, only you can know that. Only you can listen to the quiet voice within calling "Follow me."  But I can tell you that God is calling, no matter who you are, or where you are.  God is urging you to a more faithful, more authentic, more complete life.

Only you can choose to take a chance, and follow.