Isaiah 6:1-8; Luke 5:1-11       When Will You Start to Fly?                   DC           Feb. 4/07

1. Imagine one day you’re minding your own business reading a book, or walking down the street, or driving the car.  And suddenly you’re more sure than of anything in your whole life that God is speaking to you.  And God is saying: “Have I got a job for you!  Who will I send and who will go for me?”

1. That’s what Isaiah heard one day when he was going about his job in the temple.  And just in case we think that it would have been way easier to speak out for God or be a faithful servant in those days, the first verse that begins this scripture sets it in political context.  All we need to know is that it was a time of political intrigue and super powers jockeying with one another for control.  Northern Israel has already fallen.  Judah lived uneasily in it’s shadow.  It was not a simpler or less scary time.

1. The first thing Isaiah had to do was listen.  To hear and know God in a special way.  God says, “Don’t feel inadequate.  You can begin again, forgiven and set free.  You don’t need to be afraid that you won’t know what to say or that others will reject you.  I’ll give you everything you need.”  Isaiah experienced the same steps of the call of all Hebrew prophets.  An encounter with God, a call to speak for God, a sense of unworthiness – and fear, and a ritual act to overcome this fear, and indicate there was a new role.

1. When you heard your call, did you feel not good enough, like Isaiah?  Were you young?  Or was it later in life?  Were you telling God you were too busy, or had too many commitments?  Were you afraid that no one would listen, or take you seriously?  Were you afraid?  What will this mean to my well-ordered life?  Or do you wonder when or if, God called you?  I believe God calls each one of us, like Isaiah.  To be a prophet, which is essentially to speak out for God, in all the corners of God’s world.  In our corner.  Like the Hebrew prophets, we encounter God in many different ways, and we are asked to speak for God.  To speak the truth, to live the word of love.  No wonder we’re filled with a sense of unworthiness – and fear!

1. The ritual act to overcome the fear and symbolize our new role is our confirmation for many of us.  We know God is at work in our lives and we want to make a public statement of it.  But for lots of us, it’s a while since our confirmation!  Has our faith life become drab and ho-hum?  A form we go through, and doesn’t mean much?  Do we need a faith lift?  We can join a study, transfer our membership or do a re-affirmation of our vows, or become confirmed for the first time, or throw a party to show to ourselves and our world that our faith is an integral part of our meaningful and exciting life.

1. Which is not to say it will be an easy life, any more than Isaiah’s was.  The verses immediately following our reading tell how difficult his task will be.  The people will not listen or see or understand and be healed.  “How long will I keep this up, God?” Isaiah asks.  As long as it takes is the holy answer!

1. So what tools or gifts are available so we can answer this call and live faith- filled lives?  We’ve been reading during January about the gifts we’re given, and last week heard the beautiful hymn to love we know from 1 Corinthians.  We’d likely all agree with Paul about the importance of love.  I wonder though if we’d agree with the Beatles that “All you need is love.”  Likely not if you’ve had more than two children, or dealt with difficult people anywhere!  I know that if we’d only had two children, I might have!  But one of our children showed me that I needed more.  Two of them simply needed to be loved, and told the limits and consequences would follow, but mostly they wanted to please.  The other needed more wise firmness and clear limits with consistent consequences.  In other words we couldn’t separate the gifts of Ch 12 with the gift of Ch 13.  I needed the wisdom as well as the love.  I needed strength to stand firm.  And faith that God would help me weather the storms.  I needed to believe there were miracles that would overcome hurts and loss and bring family at last.  And all through that I needed love, God’s and mine, or the other gifts wouldn’t have worked.

1. In all of our abundant lives, the other spiritual gifts require the power of love.  Herbert O’Driscoll points out that without love, insight can become judgmental; wisdom, cold head stuff; faith, arrogant sets of rules; generosity, patronizing; self-sacrifice, neurotic or to make me look good.  Love is what shapes and transforms the other gifts.1  If we wanted a challenge for life, we’d need no more!

1. Luke continues from last week as Jesus faces the challenges of living out his call as he calls others.  Did you notice when we read the familiar passage, that Peter’s response is the same as Isaiah’s and Jeremiah’s and the other prophets.   “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man.”  Sound familiar?  “I could never do that.  I’m not good enough.”  He’s recognized something special in Jesus, and feels inadequate.  With more familiar words, Jesus says, “Do not be afraid.”   And he calls them to do the work he has come to know is his.  Helping people to come to know and love and serve God.

1. Puccini, the composer of Madame Butterfly, Tosca and La Boheme, was diagnosed with cancer in his early 60s.  He was working on the last scene of an opera when he died in 1924.  Not long after his death, some of his students pulled together his notes, and going by what they knew of their teacher’s intentions, finished it.  The premier performance was very emotional, especially in the final scene.  When they reached the final notes from Puccini’s pen, the conductor stopped and turned to the audience.  With tears in his eyes he said, “Thus far our master wrote.  Now we must go on with his work.”  Then he turned to the orchestra and cast and led them to a triumphant finish.2  In the Church we say, “Thus far our master lived.  Now we must go on with his work.”  We must answer the call.

1. We’ve heard the call.  It would be way too easy to just walk away.  I was delighted by a story that invites us to do more than that.  Pastor Gander waddled down front one Sunday and demanded, “What kind of birds are we?”  “Geese” shouted back the congregation.  “And what are we to do with these wonderful wings God gave us?”  “Fly, Pastor!”  “That’s right!” He was on a roll now.  “God made us to fly.  Dogs dig, horses run, cows make milk, but we can fly.  Nothing feels like the wind in our feathers as we soar to mountain tops!”  “Amen, we can fly!” honked the congregation.  “If God made us to fly, then what shall we do?”  “We’ll fly, we’ll fly, we’ll fly!” they shouted.  During coffee, the congregation honked softly about how inspiring the sermon had been.  Then they waddled out of the church and walked home.3  When will you choose to fly?