Proper 16

Preparation

    Please begin by reading Jeremiah 1:4-10 in your Bible. If you do not have one at hand, we have provided that text for you at the end of this reflection.

Reflection--Who? Me?

Jeremiah lived in perilous times.  He would live to see his country, Judah, overrun, her people exiled, and Jerusalem, her ancient capital, destroyed.  All the while there was intense conflict between Judeans faithful to God and those drawn to pagan religions of the time.  God called Jeremiah to tell God’s people the truth about their situation during this period of struggle.

We are not all called to be a controversial prophetic figure in the middle of great historical conflict (praise God!¾it’s a tough role!), but we are all called to something.  God has given us all gifts and God expects us to use them “for the common good.”  (Read 1 Corinthians 12.)  Sometimes we need time to heal and grow first, but the time eventually comes when God expects us to move forward and use our gifts too.  What does that look like?  Typically, as with Jeremiah, God calls, we make excuses, and God reassures and confirms.

You may be called to teach; formally or informally spreading the word of God’s love and faithfulness to those you encounter.  God may grant you a healing touch, or gifts of administration to make an organization doing God’s work function effectively, or gifts of hospitality to make others feel welcome and cared for, or the ability to see through the surface of things to bring clarity to what is really going on in individual and community life, or musical or speaking gifts, or a prophetic voice raising consciousness about important issues of justice, or a host of other things; each an essential element in building up God’s reign.  All gifts, great or small in human eyes, are equal before God and equally vital to God’s reign.  God expects us to use them.

Typically, our reaction to God’s nudging is an excuse.  For Jeremiah, it was his youth.  You can imagine many others (I’m too old, busy, disabled, shy, undereducated, poor, nervous, unworthy, oppressed¾you name it). 

God is not particularly interested in our excuses.  As with Jeremiah, God knew all about every one of us before God formed us in our mother’s womb.  God says to us, as God said to Jeremiah, “Forget that and don’t be afraid.  I am with you to deliver you.”

Ø       Do you know that God knows your weaknesses just as well as you do, and may know your strengths better than you do, and calls you in the middle of it all?

Ø       Do you know that God has a role chosen for you that only you can fulfill?

Ø       Do you know that when God calls you success is in God’s hands, that God will go with you and enable you, that you need not be afraid?

Ø       Do you know that God is able?

revclay

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Jeremiah 1:4-10

    Now the word of the LORD came to me saying, “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.” Then I said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy."

    But the LORD said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am only a boy’; for you shall go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, says the LORD.”

    Then the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the LORD said to me, “Now I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant.” [NRSV]