LIVE A LIFE WORTHY OF YOUR CALLING

(Preached on Sunday, August 6, 2006)

I therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called,...                                     -Ephesians 4:1

 

The Bible is a wonderful book. As we discovered in Vacation Bible School this week, it is filled with treasures and gems.

But nowadays it often feels like one must be an archeologist to discover those treasures.  Not literally, but in the sense of digging through all the stuff that covers those gems: the archaic languages, the ancient stories, the distant cultures with a different view of the world and life.  There seems to be so much covering those treasures that you have to really dig and dig and dig to discover them.

And so we read and read and reread and every so often something begins to make sense and connect with our lives.  Then there are times when I am reading along and the words just grab me and stop me dead in my tracks.  I may not really understand them, but they are real and immediate and they get my attention.

 

Such was my experience this week as I read over this passage from Ephesians.  I didn=t get past the first verse, which doesn=t even complete a sentence, before I was stopped in my tracks.  AI therefore,..., beg you to lead a life worthy of the calling to which you have been called,...@

It prompted me to wonder how do I respond to that admonition?

First of all, what is the calling to which I have been called?

My first thought is about my call to the ministry as an ordained clergyperson and pastor of Christ Congregational Church.

But this letter was not addressed to a pastor.

Not even to a local church leader.  It is addressed to a gathering of people: ATo the saints who are in Ephesus.@

So, Paul is speaking of their calling.  What might that be?

 

Clearly the calling of which he speaks is to follow Jesus.  It is the calling to be who we were created to be, the children of God.  It is the calling to embrace the promises of God, the treasures God offers to each and every one of us.

Those promises which we Adug up@ this week in Vacation Bible School: God loves us!  God knows us!  God treasures us!  God forgives us!  God is with us!  That is the life to which we have all been called and it is a most worthy, wonderful, glorious life.

 

It is a life in which all people are to be honored, respected, and nurtured C because that is the way God treats us. 

No exceptions.  Each person is integral to the whole of life.

Unlike the world around us where people shove and manipulate to get ahead, we are called to a life of loving, caring, treasuring, nurturing.

There are no social classes fixed in layers of importance.

There are no high flyers, no middle management or no lower levels of workers.  In the church there are not first class and second class members.  We are all as one in Christ Jesus.  Without exception. 

The apostle Paul realized how important this was.  He also knew it was unique.  We must honor and take care of each other.  Treasuring each person.  Respecting each gift.  Any church that does not honor the soul of each member nor their gifts, which does not seek the unity of Christ in all things, has lost the plot!

 

How do we live a life worthy of our calling?

For years, Jim Lynch, 55, officially performed behind-the-scenes communications wizardry at the Navy Command Center in the Pentagon.  But most knew him simply as the Candy Man.  He walked briskly through the halls, listening to light rock on his Walkman, and wearing bright orange, red, and yellow ties and tennis shoes.  The Candy Man brought cases of gold-wrapped Werther=s Originals butterscotch candies to work and handed them out each day during his lunch break, a big hearted fixture in the bureaucratic maze.

But on September 11, 2001, when terrorists targeted the Pentagon and crashed American Airlines Flight 77 into the building, Lynch and 188 other people died.  Trish Hackett, an Air Force executive assistant, wrote in her eulogy of him, ATo Jim Lynch, thank you for your bright smile and happy heart.  I only hope you have a very large pocketful of Werther=s Originals with you because I have heard they are the angels= favorite candy.@

Jim Lynch=s reputation among his fellow employees as a loving, caring, and generous man is a model as to how to live a life worthy of our calling as God=s children and followers of Jesus.  He focused on the joy and beauty of life.  He focused on sharing that joy through love and care.  The happiness he radiated remained in their memories even after he was gone.

 

But to live a life worthy of our calling is not just to be a Mr. or Ms. Sunshine in our daily life, though that is a really good thing.

But Paul also talks in this passage about gifts from Christ and the Spirit of God.  Gifts given to us for a specific, special purpose: to equip the saints for the work of ministry and for building up the body of Christ, until we all achieve maturity in Christ.  In other words, a life worthy of our calling is a life lived for the sake of others.  Beginning with the others in the church where we gather to worship God, to learn the teachings of Jesus, and to grow as God=s children and followers of Jesus.  Paul tells us we are all given gifts, but we are not all given the same gift.

Scientists have recently learned that the human genome contains about 30,000 genes; but in the whole vast array of human diversity only 60 genes C two tenths of one percent C differentiate us one from another.  And while we all know there are tremendous difference between us, from a purely scientific, genomic perspective, we are remarkably alike.  There is actually more unity in our diversity than we are used to acknowledging.

 

And yet, we know there are differences and some of us are passionate about the uniqueness which we claim.  Those differences not only make us each unique, they have a very profound purpose: when we bring our unique gifts together the whole is stronger and richer, more capable of becoming what God intended us to be.

So we don=t all have to fit into the same mold, in fact, we should not even try to be exactly the same.

 

Sylvia was asked to serve on a committee at her church.  While she had reservations, having never served on a committee before, she agreed to give it a try.  At the first meeting she said nothing, listening carefully to the others.  As the year progressed, Sylvian was not sure she should continue on the committee.  The meetings left her frustrated, Anothing is ever decided@ she said after one meeting, and what someone wants to do they cannot.  She could not pinpoint the source of her aggravation.

During that same time people in the church were encouraged to take a spiritual gifts inventory, to discover their God-given gifts.  The pastor spoke several times during the fall on spiritual gifts and how everyone has gifts that benefit the entire church.  Sylvia took the inventory which revealed her extremely high interest in gifts of mercy.

She began a caring ministries= team at her church, cooking meals for those recently hospitalized, taking people to doctor appointments, going shopping for people who no longer drove.  The possibilities were endless.  Sylvia resigned from the committee to work in caring ministries.  Sylvia was much happier using her spiritual gifts.  And the church was stronger and richer because now there were more people caring and nurturing other church members in times of stress or need.

 

Everyone is called. Everyone has a variety of gifts.

Not everyone has the same gift, but everyone has a gift to be shared to build up the body of Christ, the Church.