Speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way … into Christ (Eph 4.15).
It was time for Samuel to grow up. The Lord God called to him in the darkened temple and he thought it must be Eli. When at last he was persuaded to lie still and listen to what God had to say, instead of leaping out of bed to run to Eli, the message he received was such a painful one that in the morning he didn’t know how he was going to deliver it. We may suppose that Samuel loved and respected the elderly priest who had been father and mother to him from the time he was brought to the temple as a small child. Powerless to intervene as a child, he may well have been troubled to observe the blasphemous behaviour of Eli’s sons, and the old man’s failure to reprimand them, but now he was being asked to tell Eli that he and his sons were doomed. He will have been apprehensive as he went about his duties that morning, opening the doors of the temple, and Eli will have sensed his hesitation even if he could no longer see well enough to read his face. Somehow the truth would have to be told, even if the love and respect which he still felt for his master made it painfully difficult. But the old man had the grace to help him, as Samuel overcame the conflict between truth and love to deliver his message. It would not be the last time Samuel had to speak an uncomfortable word of truth to God’s people and their rulers. Responding to God’s call, he had taken a large step towards growing up.
And we have been called too. Perhaps not as plainly as Samuel, or as dramatically as Paul, but called nonetheless, and Paul exhorts us to lead a life worthy of our calling to which we have been called (v1). But what does he mean? To what are we called? Samuel was being called to speak the word of God to Eli, and subsequently to speak God’s word to all his people. Paul situates our calling within the context of the church the one body of Christ in which each of us has our own part to play if it is to function as Christ its Head would wish it to do. But do we really believe we are called, or would we be rather suspicious of any such thing? Might we not be more inclined to assert, with the writer of the book of Samuel, that the word of God is rare in our days; that visions are not widespread, and those who do hear voices or start seeing things should probably be advised to consult a doctor.
Yet the truth about the incarnation and the epiphany is precisely that God in Jesus has broken through the barrier between the heavenly realm where God dwells and the earthly realm where we dwell, so that to-day his Spirit, which in the past inspired only a few very special people like Samuel, is to-day present in all who have believed the truth about Jesus, and put their trust in Him.
As members of the church, the body of Christ, we are all called, but the first thing to be said about our calling is that most of us, most of the time are called not so much to do something as simply to be, to be fully ourselves in Christ. We are too often concerned to define ourselves and one another by what we do when in the end it is who we are that will really matter. You don’t have to be a Monarchist to recognise as a matter of fact that this is something which the Queen has thoroughly understood. In her eyes being King or Queen is not so much something you do, as something you are, which is why there can never be any questioning of retirement. She can’t retire from being Her Majesty the Queen any more than I can retire from being Handley Stevens. And the same goes for our calling as Christians. It’s not something we do, but something we are to the end of our days. That’s a comfort, perhaps, as we get older and less able to take a prominent part in doing things. But it’s much more than that it is fundamental to our membership of the body of Christ that the arms and legs which are seen to be running around doing things are neither more valuable nor less valuable than the internal organs of the praying and worshipping community that sustains them in their work. When we are baptised we are exhorted simply to shine as a light in the world, and indeed that may at times be as much as we are able or called to do.
The second point to make about our calling as Christians is that we will never be asked to do anything which is beyond our powers or for which we have not been prepared by our upbringing, our training or our experience. We can all think of Biblical heroes whose training and preparation was far from conventional Joseph in Egypt, David among his flocks, Saul the Jewish rabbi persecuting the church but all were in fact being prepared and equipped by God for the task to which they were eventually called. And this is exactly what Paul teaches us to expect citing Psalm 68 for his authority, he argues that it was always within God’s plan, as indeed it is part of his very nature, to shower gifts on his children, useful gifts that will equip us for our work as Christians, for anything which builds up the church, as well as for our work as the body of Christ in the world he came to serve and to save. If he asks us to do something, he has either given us the skills and the training already, or he will make provision as we go along.
Finally, we need to listen very carefully. Samuel thought at first that he knew who was calling and what it was all about, and we are just as prone to jump to the wrong conclusion if we do not listen carefully enough. So don’t rush. If you think you are being called to do something for God’s sake, take your time, be still and listen carefully, tell God you are listening and really want to know, talk to someone you trust, and listen some more. Does it sound like the kind of thing Jesus might do? If you are not sure, be very cautious about it and listen some more. If you really want to know, either you will become comfortable with the conclusion that you have made a mistake, or the conviction will grow that it is something you must do or say. And then you have to go for it.
So there you have it. Our calling is first to be, and only sometimes to do. Our God delights to give and will never ask us to do anything for which he has not prepared us. If we listen and really want to know, we will understand what we have to do. The Common Worship baptism service includes words of commission, summing up the life to which we are all called as Christians, which are rarely used because they are mainly appropriate to those who are baptised as adults. The commission reads in part as follows:
In baptism God invites you on a life-long journey.
Together with all God’s people
you must explore the way of Jesus
and grow in friendship with God,
in love for his people,
and in serving others.
With us you will listen to the word of God
And receive the gifts of God.
But there is one thing more, for Paul’s remarks are addressed as much to the church as to its individual members. If we all use the gifts we have been given in the service of Christ, then together we shall discover that wholeness and unity of faith and knowledge that is the gift of God when, as a community of Christian people, we grow up, as Paul says, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ (v 13). This is no easy road to unity, nor is it a unity which we can bring about by compromise or clever negotiation, but it grows naturally where we are united in Christ, the head of the Church, who himself promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love. It can surely be no accident that this passage about the building up of the church from its disparate parts ends with a reference to the love which binds all together, and allows even the most painful truth to be spoken. I believe and hope that within this parish community we are able to do that. I pray that the same may be true within the Anglican Communion. Speaking the truth in love and listening when others speak the truth as they see it will certainly be a painful experience, and may look like a blazing row, but the grace to do it in love is one of the gifts and signs of maturity. Speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into Christ