Jr 1:4-10
31 January 2010
“I Think I’ll Sit This One Out”
“No way! Absolutely not. Do not ask me to do that. I am lousy at that! If you want to make sure this thing goes wrong, then ask me to do it.” Does that sound familiar? I definitely know I’ve said stuff like that—and definitely on more than one occasion. (Who am I kidding? I’ve said it plenty of times.)
Actually, it should sound familiar. In our Old Testament reading, we just heard Jeremiah try to convince God that he has the wrong guy for the job. And Jeremiah isn’t the only one we meet in the scriptures who says, “I’m just not cut out for this.” That would include no less a figure than the lawgiver himself, Moses.
Right after he encounters the burning bush in Exodus 3, Moses immediately starts coming up with reasons (excuses) why God shouldn’t send him to Egypt for this whole “let my people go” business. Each time Moses issues an objection, the Lord answers it.
First, it’s “who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?” Then he poses this one: “What if they ask me your name? What do I tell them?” The next one is, “What if they don’t believe me? What if they say I’m just making all this up?” Then Moses protests that he isn’t eloquent; he’s terrible at speaking. After the Lord shows him that his excuses are pretty lame, Moses says the thing that he probably wanted to at the very beginning: “Just send somebody else!”
This phenomenon of saying, “Thanks, but no thanks,” appears over and over again in the stories of faith. As I just said, it appears throughout the scriptures, and we see it in the history of the church. In the early 6th century, it’s something that St. Benedict feels is necessary to address.
In fact, chapter 68 of the Rule of Benedict is entitled, “Assignment of Impossible Tasks.” Isn’t that the way we precisely feel sometimes when we get a request? Understanding that the context of Benedict’s Rule is the monastery, we can still draw some parallels between that and our life in the church. Actually, it applies to life wherever and whoever we are.
“Monastics may be assigned a
burdensome task or something they cannot do,” the chapter begins. “If so, they should, with complete gentleness
and obedience, accept the order given them.
Should they see, however, that the weight of the burden is altogether
too much for their strength, then they should choose the appropriate moment and
explain patiently to the prioress or abbot the reasons why they cannot perform
the task. This they ought to do without
pride, obstinacy, or refusal. If after
the explanation the abbot or prioress is still determined to hold to their
original order, then the junior must recognize that this is best. Trusting in God’s help, they must in love
obey.”[1]
Obviously, we haven’t taken the
vows that go along with life in a monastery.
Still, this isn’t without benefit for us. Notice how it says that those who think
they’re in over their heads “should choose the appropriate moment and explain
patiently” their reasons. This should be
done “without pride, obstinacy, or refusal.”
There shouldn’t be a posture of defiance or insolence.
In her commentary
accompanying the Rule, Insights for the
Ages, Joan Chittister helps make this ancient document relevant to us. She notes, “The straight and simple
truth is that in life there are some things that must be done, even when we
don’t want to do them, even when we believe we can’t do them…The reality is
that we are often incapable of assessing our own limits, our real talents, our
true strength, our necessary ordeals.”[2]
There
can be a very strong temptation, when presented with what we see as a daunting
challenge, to just say, “I think I’ll sit this one out. Let somebody else take care of it!”
I
get the feeling that Sister Joan is speaking from personal experience as she
continues: “If parents and teachers and
employers and counselors and prioresses somewhere hadn’t insisted, we would
never have gone to college or stayed at the party or tried the work or met the
person or begun the project that, eventually, changed our lives and made us more
than we ever knew ourselves to be. Benedict
understood clearly that the function of leadership is to call us beyond
ourselves, to stretch us to our limits, to turn the clay into breathless
beauty. But first, of course, we have to
allow it to happen.”[3]
No
one can be coerced into personal growth, into becoming a better person. Slave-like compliance and loving obedience
are not the same things. That’s a lesson
Jeremiah is about to learn.
The
call of the prophet Jeremiah is our scripture text. And even though the Lord tells Jeremiah that
he knew him even before he was born, the young man still thinks God’s agenda is
all messed up. Later on, in chapter 20,
when the young man is grown up and has seen more than his share of trouble, he concludes, “O Lord, you have enticed me, and I was enticed; you
have overpowered me, and you have prevailed.
I have become a laughingstock all day long; everyone mocks me” (v. 7). He feels betrayed.
But for now, God reassures him, “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” (vv. 7-8). We then have the image of the Lord putting
his words into the mouth of his young prophet.
For many, Jeremiah is the prophet who most reminds
them of Jesus. It’s not for nothing that
he’s been nicknamed “the weeping prophet.”
Of all of the prophets, I would probably say that he is my
favorite. I think Jeremiah reveals more
of himself than do the other prophets.
Unfortunately, what we see is a guy who has few friends and a load of
enemies.
He lives at a time when the Babylonian hammer is
about to fall on Judah. People are
nervous. And at the same time, injustice
is widespread throughout the land. As
the prophet of the Lord, Jeremiah is given the task of opposing the
corruption—speaking God’s truth to power.
As true prophets do, his job is to afflict the comfortable and to
comfort the afflicted.
By ordinary standards, Jeremiah does not have a
happy life. His social life is all but
nonexistent. Saying “yes” to God means
dealing with name-calling and far worse:
slander, beating, imprisonment. After
the Babylonians invade, he’s considered a traitor when he warns against fighting
them.
Later in chapter one, God gives him this promise. “I for my part have made you today a
fortified city, an iron pillar, and a bronze wall, against the whole
land—against the kings of Judah, its princes, its priests, and the people of
the land. They will fight against you;
but they shall not prevail against you, for I am with you, says the Lord, to deliver
you” (vv. 18-19).
That still seems like cold comfort to me. The promise of having to be “a fortified city” to withstand the assaults of everyone
probably wouldn’t be my first option! And Jeremiah continues to struggle with his
calling. He confesses in chapter 20, “If I say, ‘I will not
mention him, or speak any more in his name,’ then within me there is something
like a burning fire shut up in my bones; I am weary with holding it in, and I
cannot” (v. 9).
I remember something a
pastor of mine told me years ago. He
said if I could avoid serving as the
pastor of a church, then don’t do it! At
the time, I thought to myself: that’s
some easy advice to take. I had no intention of ever becoming a
pastor. I even went to Bible college for
two years, just to study the Bible and theology.
I went to seminary with
still, no interest in pastoral ministry.
I was nearing the end of my second year—preparing to graduate with a
Master of Arts in Theological Studies (which is more academic than
ministerial)—but I felt no joy, no hope, about life after graduation.
One night, Banu said that I should be a pastor, and
everything seemed to make sense! Within
a couple of days, I had spoken to the pastor of the Presbyterian Church across
the street (of which I was a member), and he explained the process of
ordination. So I spent two more years in
seminary!
Looking back, I know that
the Lord had presented me with what I thought was an impossible task. And for a long time, I refused to consider
it. But in a way, that sometimes can be
a good thing.
“In the biblical
tradition,” says Bruce Epperly, who teaches at Lancaster Theological Seminary,
“one mark of an authentic prophet is a protest of inadequacy when she or he is
called to speak words of behalf of God.
People don’t run for prophetic leadership as they do for public office;
they are called, often against their will, to speak on God’s behalf in challenging
situations.”[4]
He reminds us of the
apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 13, the chapter on love, when Paul says “we see
in a mirror dimly” (v. 12). There is a
kind of “agnosticism of love” which admits that “we know only in part” (v.
9). We do not yet have the full
picture. Our love is incomplete.
The sense of inability, of failure, may also be a sign of “faithfulness and
spiritual well-being.” Epperly continues,
“When author Madeleine L’Engle [one of her best-known books being A Wrinkle in Time] was asked, ‘Do you
believe in God without any doubts?’ she replied, ‘I believe in God with all of
my doubts.’”[5]
Obviously, we don’t all have the same calling. Not all of us are called to be pastors; not
all of us are called to be scientists.
Not all of us are called to be actors, although we all tend to act up
from time to time! Not all of us are
called to be prophets in the way Jeremiah is.
But all of us are called to obey the Lord, however that plays out.
Believe me: I am well aware how easy it is to abuse that
word “obey.” People have pointed to the
Bible and said, “Slaves, obey your masters,” and “Wives, obey your
husbands.” In the name of obedience,
people have used all manner of control over each other.
And on the flip side, we can go through the motions
while inwardly grumbling and call that “obedience.” Has anyone heard of passive-aggressive?
None of that stuff is
Christian obedience; it’s compliance. As
Sister Joan says, “[becoming] a
living lamentation…[becoming] a lump of spiritual cement around the neck of the
group…is not obedience. This is only compliance and compliance kills, both us
and the community whose one heart is
fractured by those who hold theirs back. Real obedience depends on wanting to listen to the voice of God in the human community, not
wanting to be forced to do what we refuse
to grow from.”[6]
The truth is: we need each other. We need to listen to the voice of God in the human community. As difficult as that can be—as difficult as
obedience can be—the option of compliance, especially the compliance to our own
whims, is much worse.
If obedience means the only one I have to
listen to is myself, then I think I’ll sit this one out.