God’s Phone Number

Given by Linda M. Sterthous at EFM Graduation, May 2, 2009

I’d like to start with a confession. I was raised Roman Catholic.  Back then, we just thought of ourselves as just plain “Catholic”. Everyone else was “public”, because we went to Catholic school and “they” went to public school. After four years of EFM, I now understand all the finer distinctions among world religions.  So, Roman Catholic I was.  I attended 12 years of parochial school, and attendance at Mass was a regular part of our educational experience.  During my years in first and second grade, the mass was still said in Latin.  I remember some of the Latin prayers quite well.  So, here’s a bit of Latin prayer and response – if there are any other pre-Vatican II Roman Catholics here, feel free to pray along: 

Dominus Vobiscum, meaning "The Lord be with you"

The response is Et cum spiritu tuo, meaning "and with thy spirit":

Roman Catholic second graders in 1962 knew these words by heart. We hadn’t a clue what they meant. But we knew the words Dominus Vobiscum, Et cum spiritu tuo.  If you’re a bit older, you may remember that telephone numbers used to start with words, like

8-2929.  [You may know where this is going….]  Little Roman Catholic school children in the early sixties found this joke hysterically funny and told it often in the schoolyard:

            What is God’s telephone number?   Answer:  Et cum spiritu tuo

So God’s telephone number is et cum spiritu tuo. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we really had God’s telephone number??  How great would that be, to be able to call God on the phone? To program God’s number into your blackberry, to have God in your speed dial, or if you are less tech-savvy,  to write it in your address book?  It would be great to call that number, whenever you needed a chat with the almighty?  But it isn’t like that, is it?  You cannot call God.   The truth is…..God calls you.

Those of us graduating from EFM today have finished a four year intensive course.  One year of the Hebrew bible.  One year of the Christian Bible. One year of church history. And one year of church theology.  So let’s do a short review of EFM through God’s phone calls….

• God calls Abraham. Abraham says, Here I am.
• God calls Samuel, three times.  Samuel says, Speak, for your servant is listening.
• God calls Moses out of a burning bush, Moses, Moses!  Moses says, here I am.
• God calls Mary thru an angel saying, Hail Mary! And Mary says, let it be to me according to your word.
• God calls to Paul, saying “Saul, why do you persecute me?”  While the Bible doesn’t say what Paul replies, we know from his actions what Paul said.  He said, send me.

What do these calls from God mean to us here today, for those of us graduating, for those here who have supported us through these four years, for those here who have mentored and taught us, and for the clergy who have ministered us?

God’s call to Abraham was one very scary phone call.  God asked something of Abraham that seems horrifying, even barbaric to us today.  He asked Abraham to take his son Isaac, to bind him, and to offer him as a sacrifice.  We know that  God ultimately stayed Abraham’s hand and Abraham did not kill his son. But the story of Abraham tells us that sometimes God does ask us to make sacrifices, to make extremely difficult choices, to do things that we might not otherwise do.  Have you received that call???

God’s call to Moses ---  another scary phone call.  Imagine.  A talking, burning bush.   God asked something very difficult of Moses. Go to Pharaoh, the king of 

, and ask him to let the Israelites go.  As we know from the Bible, Moses wasn’t a great public speaker, and God was asking him to make the speech of his life. If you’ve ever hear about a study that was done about people’s biggest fears, results showed  the number one fear is public speaking, higher than serious illness or death. The same was probably true of ancient Israelites. And yet, God asked Moses – slow of speech -- to visit Pharaoh and ask for something truly audacious.   Have you received THAT call?

God called to Samuel, and if you remember the story, it first seemed like a wrong number.  Samuel was the young student of the prophet Eli, and Samuel kept hearing what he thought was Eli calling to him in the middle of the night. But each time Eli says, nope not me calling. Wrong number.   Finally on the third try, Samuel realizes that it is God calling, and he answers the call by saying “Speak, for your servant is listening”. He becomes a great prophet who provides strong leadership to the Israelites when they have strayed from a right path.  Samuel -- From wrong number to strong leader.  Did you get that call??

God’s call to Mary came through a third party, the Angel Gabriel.  Gabriel asked Mary to do something unusual for the time and place.  To bear a child out of wedlock, in the belief that this child would become something extraordinary.   Mary was initially skeptical, and then, she said okay, according to your will.  Here was was another shy and reluctant person, who ended up brave beyond measure, supporting her son Jesus and his mission -- even to the foot of the cross.  Here I am, she said.   Did you get that call?

And then to Saul, who became the apostle Paul -- God’s call was life-altering.  Most phone calls are not like this one, knocking you literally senseless. But God called Paul, knocking him off his horse in a bolt of lightning, and said, why are you persecuting me?  Persecuting ME?  Paul was not persecuting God; he was persecuting God’s people.  God turned Saul’s head, turned Saul’s life around, and turned him into a leader, re-named Paul, who carried the message of Jesus far and wide.  The word repent, we are told, means to turn.  To turn away from something evil. To turn towards something good.  Did you get that call?

So today, my fellow EFM graduates, our wonderful facilitators and teachers, our supportive family and friends here today, and the members of the clergy ---  have you answered God’s call to you ?   My friend and EFM classmate, Janet Barrett, has said several times during our four years together that she wishes that God would speak to us again in the dramatic ways we read about in the Bible.  She wishes we could come upon a burning bush somewhere. But as we all know, those dramatic calls from God don’t happen very often. Surely some people have huge life altering experiences like Paul, experiences that completely turn their heads and their lives around.  But more likely, we hear the call of God in a small still voice.  It’s the kind of call from God we get when we are pulling weeds in our garden, or deep in prayer or meditation, or sitting quietly looking out the window with a cup of coffee early in the morning, or even more so, the kind of call we get from being among God’s people.  God’s call tugs at our hearts, God’s call tugs at our minds, God’s call asks us to do something different with our lives.  We just have to listen.

God may ask you to sacrifice, like Abraham.  Not your son, tied down, but maybe a sacrifice of time to the local food bank in these times of economic hardship.  Maybe a sacrifice of money if you are able, a larger donation to your parish or to a needy charity.  Maybe a sacrifice of ego, letting someone else be a hero, while you take a backstage.

God may ask you to do something extremely uncomfortable for you – like Moses, like Mary  ---  Perhaps God calls you to speak out against injustice, even if you are afraid to speak. Maggie Kuhn, the founder of the Grey Panthers, said “speak out, even if your voice shakes.”    Perhaps God simply asks you to try to make peace in the many very human squabbles that arise in our congregations, in our diocese, in our denomination. Scary and uncomfortable, but God calls us.

God may call to you like the call to Samuel.  You keep hearing that small still voice calling, and it seems like a wrong number.  You talking to me??? Perhaps some of you feel called to the formal ministry --- to the deaconate, to the priesthood, to chaplaincy.  But you keep doing your regular day job and you ignore that call – couldn’t be me, must be a wrong number.  Listen carefully.  Perhaps God’s call is simpler than you think.  Perhaps God is calling you to use your talents in ministry to cater to the sick in your own congregation, to organize retreats, to teach children or adults in Sunday School.  We heard in today’s gospel that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, the Life.  Perhaps God is simply asking you to provide witness to this Christian message in our increasingly secular culture. 

And, God may indeed call you in a big way.  A burning bush. A voice in the night. A bolt of light that knocks you off your horse.   This may come through a serious illness, a sudden death in your family, a divorce, a job loss.  Some big wake-up call may turn your life around.  Do us all a favor --  Take the call. The world needs people who have had a change of heart or a change of mind.  God works through people whose lives have changed --- to change the lives of others for the good.

Finally, let’s go back to God’s phone number.  Dominus vobiscum. God is with you.  Et cum spiritu tuo. And also with you.  This ancient prayer from our tradition directs us to find God’s call in the call of our fellow human beings. In one of the last chapters in the parallel guide, we read about Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the Lutheran pastor and theologian who was killed by the Nazis during WW II.  He said in one of his letters, “Our relation to God is a new life in existence for others.”  God is with me and also with you – and God speaks to us --  loud and clear. We just need to listen for the call.    It’s ringing.  Can you hear it?  Be sure to answer.

Amen. 

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