January 28, 2007: IF THIS IS HOW YOU TREAT YOUR FRIENDS . . .
Jeremiah 1:4-10, Luke 4:21-30, Psalm 71:1-6

Eileen Parfrey - Springwater Presbyterian Church

Have you ever heard the sermon title before? "If this is how you treat your friends . . ." How have you heard it finished? The classic ending is, ". . . no wonder you have so few!" The preacher's audacity is that she suggests prophets address this to God. Jeremiah might have. His chronic depression can be traced in part to his prophetic vocation-a rather unsuccessful vocation-a vocation of advocacy on behalf of both God and Israel. But today he receives his call in classic fashion: God calls, the prophet-to-be demurs, God says, "Either you say yes or I find someone else, but my message will be heard," so the prophet agrees. One of my teachers claimed that, if someone wants to be a prophet it's a pretty sure sign they really aren't one. Yet, Jesus claims that job for himself in today's gospel lesson.
What's up with that? Jesus' claim earns him skepticism at first, but when he attacks his homies' sense of entitlement, he gets a trip to the edge of the nearest cliff. No wonder people don't want to be prophets, if that's how God treats his friends--! No wonder Jeremiah claps his hand over his mouth and says, "Not me!"

Jeremiah's call struck me this week as spiritual anorexia. Probably because I recognized it in myself. As you may know, anorexia is not about losing weight. It is a life-threatening mental illness. While we usually think of it as an adolescent girl's disease, it can afflict people of any age, as they become progressively more addicted to their ability to exercise what turns out to be negative power. Often it's the only power available to them, the power to say "no," to keep things out. Literally a getting-smaller disease, the disease is one way to avoid responsibility for an appropriate exercise of positive power. In adolescents it looks like a fear of growing up and taking on adult responsibilities, but adults suffer from this disease as well. When Jeremiah claps his hand over his mouth and says "No!" to God, he also says, "I'm just a kid," in effect saying, "Don't ask me to take on responsibility." It's spiritual anorexia. God, of course, will have none of it, will not tolerate Jeremiah's lessening himself. Because, God assures Jeremiah, "I am sending you." It is God's power, God's authority, that sends. The call to being a prophet is not about the prophet.

Being a prophet is like being an ambassador. An ambassador represents one nation to another, functions as an extension of the president. When I was a kid, Dwight Eisenhower appointed Eugenia Anderson ambassador, I think to Great Britain, but I'm not sure. The important thing was that she was from Red Wing, my dad's hometown, so it felt like part of our family was in Queen Elizabeth's court. The prophet does the same, incarnating God. Jeremiah understands this implication, Jesus claims it.

God's gesture to Jeremiah, touching his mouth, affirms God with him. "With" is the main promise throughout scripture. It's what humanity waited for all along and found in Jesus. God with us, God so with us that God is within us. We make that gesture of touching next week as we lay on hands and ordain two elders. God with them, with us. "With" is the basis of faith. Faith isn't "what you believe." I just heard it defined as "a dynamic, proper relation of people with God." Right relationship I knew, but what intrigued me was dynamic. Old building contractors like the word dynamic, because it means movement. Wishing to be precise, however, I looked it up. It turns out that dynamic does mean movement (as in "not static"). But it also means power-energy, the motive or force in operation. So right relationship in faith means power, it's what gives us the ability to follow Jesus. It's the movement of God's power through us.

When Jesus claims prophetic anointing for himself he shows a singular lack of spiritual anorexia. Maybe that's the whole secret to his ability to work miracles. He knows the power isn't about him. He not only knows the power is about God's authority through him. He accepts, receives, says "yes" to God's use of that power through him. No wonder theologians say Jesus' full title is "prophet, priest, king."

Which has direct application for Springwater. The point of prophetic authority is real, historical, tangible demonstration of God's ability to bring about newness, even to situations that seem hopeless. What makes it possible is dynamic-humans tapping God's power, trusting God for the inexplicable through human agency. God works through humans. As God places words in the mouth of the prophet, the demonstration is that God's word overrules all our human maneuverings, our strategic planning, our shenanigans. But the message requires the messenger. For this congregation, as we make the gesture of God with, we demonstrate that God works, but that God's work requires workers.

We can be spiritual anorexics. We can use negative power to keep the metaphorical nourishment out of our metaphorical mouths. We can claim we're just a little church, we're unimportant, a backwater congregation with limited resources, shrinking membership and an aging population. And we will get what we ask for. We will die. An anorexic adolescent, despite her terror of the responsibilities of adulthood, has a latent desire to grow up. Anorexia only covers up the potential power of adulthood. Healing is possible through intervention and tapping into that latent desire to grow up. Spiritual anorexia ties God's hands, but a latent desire to grow up still exists.

Springwater can take responsibility for what we have heard God calling us to do and be. Like Jeremiah, we can take our hands off our mouths and receive God's gesture of power. Springwater can accept and use God's power in enacting our Mission Statement. We can acknowledge that, yes, it's a scary world out there. Yes, we might even fail. Yes, the potential power of God is totally beyond our control. And that's the good news. A teenager may want the independence and mobility of being able to drive, but most rational kids are also terrified by this. What you drive is not just the means of getting someplace, it is also a potentially deadly weapon. But the responsible exercise of the machine's power also has potential for good.

For the next couple of weeks, the Moment for Mission time during each worship service will explore the implications of that Mission Statement for the exercise of personal discipleship. If there is anything the realities of smaller membership and shrinking session size can teach us, it is that we can't afford to keep doing things the same way. We can continue to struggle with the spiritual anorexia of, "I'm too busy, we're too small, I can't help." Or we can accept the spiritual empowerment of "Thy will be done." We pray that together every week. That prayer is God's call and our promise to respond. God's call invites us to take our hands off our congregational spiritual mouth and receive God's gift of power. May this be so.