THE PERILS OF SLEEPING IN CHURCH

(Preached on Sunday, January 18, 2009)

Then the Lord said to Samuel, ASee, I am about to do something in Israel that will make both ears of anyone who hears of it tingle.@                -1 Samuel 3:11

 

A pastor was preaching one Sunday when she noticed a man asleep on the front pew.  She tried to ignore him but he started snoring.  So, continuing with her sermon, she made her way slowly toward the man.  Using gestures as she spoke, she lightly struck the man on the shoulder.  But he did not wake up.  She did it again, with more force.  Still no results.  Finally, she gestured more vigorously, striking the man int he back of the head and sending him tumbling off the pew onto the floor.  He woke up still groggy and said, AHit me again!  I can still hear her!@

 

Sleeping in church can be a perilous thing.  All preachers have sleeping stories to tell, even the great apostle Paul.  In the Book of Acts we read how a young man named Eutychus was sitting in the window while Paul preached away until almost midnight.  The young man fell fast asleep and promptly fell headfirst out the window.  They thought he was dead since the room, and the window, had been on the second floor of the house.  But Paul went down to check on him and announced that life was still in him, and returned to finish his sermon!

 

My best sleeping story is nothing so dramatic.  It took place in little Joshua, Texas where I was serving a little church, about 35 in worship every Sunday, one summer during my Seminary training.  There was one couple, each in their 80's, newlyweds (a real cute couple), who often would have one or the other drift off to sleep during my sermons.  One Sunday they both fell sound asleep.  The woman woke with a start, looked around, looked at her husband sound asleep, and started laughing to herself, realizing they had both drifted off in the middle of church.

 

In today=s story from 1 Samuel we hear snoring in the sanctuary of God.  It was not during worship, but the young boy Samuel was sleeping in the shrine at Shiloh, where the tabernacle (the tent that had accompanied the Israelites wanderings through the wilderness with Moses following their exodus from Egypt) was kept.  Samuel was stretched out right next to the famous Ark of the Covenant, because he was apprenticed to the priest/prophet Eli.  As such, it was probably his duty to guard and attend to the Ark.

 

So, asleep in the shrine, Samuel is awakened by a voice calling his name.  He thinks it is his master, Eli, and runs to attend to him.  But Eli says he didn=t call him.  This happens two more times before Eli realizes it must be God calling the boy.  He tells Samuel what to say next time he hears the voice.  Samuel follows his guidance and boy, does he get a message from God!

 

See, we usually tell only the first half of this story, in which Samuel learns how to hear and respond to God=s call.  That leads to an assumption that all we have to do is respond, ASpeak, Lord, for your servant is listening,@ and everything will be easy once we hear and respond.  But it is almost never easy.  Because God=s call often leads us into areas where angels would fear to tread.  Just imagine what was going through young Samuel=s mind and heart.  Here he is receiving a bad news message from God for his mentor, his boss, the man who had been like a father to him.  How he must have wriggled and squirmed to avoid passing that bad news along.  For not only may he have desired not to hurt him, but as Samuel=s guardian, in the social values of that time, Eli had complete and total authority over Samuel.  He could beat him, fire him, even put him to death.  Children and slaves were property, for the master to dispose of as he wished.  The real peril of sleeping in church isn=t that you will fall out of a second-story window or be embarrassed by your pastor.  The real peril of sleeping in church is that you might just have an encounter with the living God, who loves to communicate with us through dreams.  Actually, the real peril is just in coming to church, where you might have such an encounter.  For when you encounter the living God, you may Awake up@ to the sound of a voice making claims on your life, calling you to difficult tasks, expecting you to make a difference in the world around you.

 

Tomorrow is Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday.  The Rev. Dr.. King was called to an overwhelming task.  It was not a task he accepted easily or embraced eagerly.  Dr. King went into the ministry because his father was a pastor.  But Martin wanted a quiet life as a professor.  He had earned a Ph.D. at Boston University and hoped to possibly be President of Morehouse College in Atlanta someday.  He certainly never intended to be a national civil rights leader.  But fate, and history, and the Spirit of God, had other plans for Dr. King and as young pastor he was thrust into the forefront of the Montgomery bus boycott.  In Montgomery his youth and inexperience were tested.  After a contentious series of public meetings and confrontations he came home late one night, tired and frightened.  The phone tang.  An angry voice on the other end said, AWe=re gonna get you, Nigger!@  Martin Luther King stood in the kitchen, frozen with fear.  He wanted to call his father for reassurance and advice, but his father was not there.  Then he said it was like a voice spoke to him: AMartin, you do what=s right.  You stand up for justice.  You be my drum major for righteousness.  I will be with you.@  He had heard his name called.  He knew what God wanted.  His resolve and faith were strengthened.  His life was changed forever and through his life, so was the world.

 

The task did not become easier.  It cost him his life.  But he found the strength through his answer to that call.  He was transformed by his calling and the world with him.  It did not happen overnight.  It did not happen in his lifetime.  But the day after we celebrate the life and witness of Dr. King this week we will inaugurate the first African-American President of the United States of America.  Barack Obama is facing his own perilous calling.  I remember one colleague commenting later in the week after the election on what must have gone through President-elect Obama=s mind the morning after the election.  Perhaps it was something like, AWhat on earth have I gotten myself into?@  But again, perilous as the task is before him, the testimony of his amazing story is that he was ready and willing to answer the call that came to him and he knows that he moves forward in response with the grace, companionship, and power of the Spirit of God.

 

The one unmistakable trait of God made crystal clear in the Bible is a desire to communicate with us.  Through dreams and visions, written word and spoken, signs and angels, and hundreds of other means, God keeps reaching out to us, trying to connect with us, striving to communicate with us.  The messages vary (though the overarching message is God=s great love for us), but clearly God wants to communicate with us, work with us, work through us. 

 

We view this desire with mixed feelings.  We worry just what God will ask of us and we fear we are not up to the task.  The witness of scripture, again, over and over again, is that the task is often difficult, but God always provides what we need to accomplish it. 

 

I came across a story about an immigrant to the U.S. from Argentina named Aldo.  Aldo spent most of his adult life teaching in public school.  For years he saw the need for someone to create positive opportunities for underprivileged children in his city.  Repeatedly, Aldo suggested that someone should do something to help the children.  Then one day it became clear to him that he was that someone.  He started a soccer clinic at a nearby elementary school, which evolved into a team and later formed a league.  To date, hundreds of children and their families have become the direct beneficiaries of Aldo=s initiative.