January 20, 2008

The Servants’ Song

Alice M. Trowbridge
Associate Pastor, Fourth Presbyterian Church

Psalm 40:1–11
Isaiah 49:1–7

The dream is the quiet persistence in the heart that enables
a person to ride out the storms of churning experiences.
It is the exciting whisper moving through the aisles of the spirit. . . .
It is the ever-recurring melody in the midst of the broken harmony
and harsh discords of human conflict. It is the touch of significance
which highlights the ordinary experience, the common event.
The dream is no outward thing. It does not take its rise from
the environment in which one moves or functions.
It lives in the inward parts, it is deep within, where the issues
of life and death are ultimately determined. Keep alive the dream;
for as long as we have a dream in our hearts,
we cannot lose the significance of living.

Howard Thurman
A Strange Freedom: The Best of Howard Thurman

The year was 1963 and the setting was at the heart of our democracy, that hallowed corridor where some of the most significant cornerstones of the building of our nation are commemorated. The scene is clear in our minds’ eye: masses gathered in a protest march on the Mall in Washington, focused on the words of a prophet, whose birth churches and civic centers will honor today and tomorrow, to give thanks for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his dream—the dream that challenged a people, unified our purpose, directed our goal, a dream by which we measure our progress as a nation.

On Friday I attended one such commemorative event, the Mayor’s interfaith breakfast, where civic and church leaders from all over Chicago gathered to honor the legacy of Dr. King. The choir soared and danced, and a young girl sang “Precious Lord” with a clarity and insight into the human condition that startled the gathered community; another young girl, no more than thirteen or fourteen, I’d guess, recited Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech in her own voice, word for word. Between rabbis and priests, ministers and business leaders, the gathering was rightfully representative and richly blessed by prayers and words of praise for the ways Dr. King’s dream is being realized today. The keynote speaker was Geoffrey Canada, the founder of the Harlem Children’s Zone, a K through grade twelve charter school in Harlem, and his message was that the real national security issue for our nation is education. Education is the means by which a child can get on a road to promise and possibility.

As I listened to this remarkable man speaking from the podium, as he brought forth his dream, his hope, for our time, I was struck by the setting: on either side of him were two huge banners with the profile of Dr. King, and here was another challenge, another dream, another prophetic voice.

What is it about a prophetic voice? What is it about us that tends to think those voices belong out there in the way beyond? We know of the biblical figures who were called by God; these servants of the Lord went on to do great things. Think of Abraham and Moses, and David and Isaiah, Jonah and Amos. Think also of Ghandi and Mother Teresa, and think about the voices we hear today. There are those who are called from their comfort zones and into something larger and bigger than themselves to a plan God has in store, to a specific purpose for each of them.

Remember the words of the prophet Jeremiah when the people were in exile: “I have plans for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for your harm, plans to give you a future with hope. When you search for me, you will find me if you seek me with all your heart.”

So who are these servants? Are they people of a certain election chosen by God to further God’s kingdom? We might think they are on an inner track to God. But they aren’t. The servants are those who at some point listened to God knocking on the door and allowed God to make a home in them. Interestingly, many of these servants of the Lord attest to a feeling of unworthiness for the task at hand, but in faith and trust, having been inspired by God’s word and promise, they embark upon the path God has called them to follow. And in that faithful act, we see how human beings can bring to their time a prophetic word, a call to service, a grand idea, a dream that raises people up to imagine, even for a moment, God’s great plans for them.

We are mistaken if we look for human perfection in such prophets and servants; we will not find it, for these are men and women fallible, limited, subject to the falterings and failings of our humanity. But this is the good news: that God goes to what we might think are unlikely sources to find people who are willing to be molded and shaped to fulfill God’s purposes. God goes to all people and comes alive in those who are willing to receive such a call. And then, where God has made a home in a human heart, there God can do great things.

Martin Luther King said, “An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.” And God has told us countless times that what God has done with our ancestors, our predecessors, God will do with us if we are willing. We are “heirs of the promise,” as Paul tells us, where there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus, of Abraham’s heritage, and heirs according to the promise.

God has called forth a host of faithful witnesses throughout the ages whose messages point to what God unfailingly is and what we can be. This call, Howard Thurman points out, is “no outward thing, but lives deep within, where we find the quiet persistence in the heart that enables us to ride out the storms of churning experiences, this call is the exciting whisper moving through the aisles of the spirit which gives us hope” (A Strange Freedom: The Best of Howard Thurman).

So we are reminded today to be about looking for God’s call, God’s dream, within us. It is there, in each one of us, but the trick is we have to continually look for it. And when we find it, we’ll feel a nudge, and the nudge can be quite strong, to the point where we can’t not respond and be true to ourselves. And so God asks us to listen, to take the time to listen and to hear God’s call. It is natural to waver at that nudge to be about something larger than ourselves. It is a personal and private process, responding to God’s voice in us, yet we are at our best when we carry it forth in community.

The renowned psychologist Robert Coles wrote an important book titled Call of Service: A Witness to Idealism, and in it he states that now and then we can step out of ourselves, take the hand of others, and walk with them a while into the possibilities of God. Coles writes that faithfulness is, at its core, “engaging in a life that embraces the large intentions of God, which are marked by compassion, mercy, and forgiveness.” He goes on to name the many different and distinct calls to serve. Be it social political struggle, community service, personal gestures and encounters, religiously sanctioned activity, government sanctioned activity, service to country, or charity, there are endless realms to which we may be called throughout our lifetime. And again, the key is to keep looking for God’s dream, God’s call to serve.

Our reading this morning from the book of the prophet Isaiah is commonly dated to the sixth-century exile, and a recurring reference in the book of Isaiah is made to a “servant of the Lord” who obeys the will of God and who effects God’s will for the world. Today’s reading is one of four texts referred to as “servant songs,” four identifiable pieces of poetry with particular concern for the role and work of the servant. Who this “servant” is has been the subject of a great deal of scholarly debate. But for our purposes today, let’s imagine God is speaking directly to us, inviting us to be servants.

We remember it was Isaiah who said, “Here I am, Lord; send me. Use me to be your beacon of light to the world.” We ask ourselves, are we standing as God’s beacons of light? Are we a light to our families? Our children? Our community? Are we willing to enter the divided places and listen, and are we willing to challenge our own assumptions and ask questions that might lead to our growth and change? Are we guided by the principles of truth and justice and love? Or are we caught up in what is temporarily satisfying? Are we more interested in that which will give us recognition or praise? These are the questions at the root of a life of faith. To ask ourselves if we are God’s servants, we can turn to the prophet Micah, who summed it up well when he asked, “What does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

Martin Luther King said, “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is ‘What are you doing for others?’” In a way, service and worship are interconnected. Eugene March, in his study of great themes of the Bible, claims that our devotion to God is best manifested by our worship as well as by acts of compassion and love for our neighbors. We remember the lawyer’s question to Jesus about which commandment in the law is the greatest. Jesus answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” And then Jesus said this: “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” Jesus’ ministry, along with that of numerous other persons in the Bible and those more modern-day servants, demonstrate how these commandments were to be made concrete in the midst of everyday life.

So from our worship comes our inner conviction and our love for God, and there flows our desire to serve one another with generosity and compassion. God gives us the confidence, the strength, and the voice to carry forth God’s work in the world. So service and worship are indeed tied together. Rightly motivated service is at the same time worship unto God.

The community of the faithful looks to each other to understand what God is trying to do and say for our time. We are called out of ourselves to a purpose greater than ourselves. The temptation is to think we are unworthy and to scale back the call, to size it down. But God’s plan requires us to think big.

Listen to these words from a participant in the recent trip to New Orleans: “As hope begins to emerge out of chaos in New Orleans, we begin to see the bigger picture of humanity in all this. . . . There is the gentle reminder that we can change lives, we can make a difference, if we care to share and are willing to receive. It is the great balancing act of our human condition, and it is what connects us to each other and stitches a community’s fabric back together” (Elder Douglas Pond).

In the mission in Cameroon, where those commissioned today will continue the work in the HIV/AIDS clinic, a part of the Presbyterian Health Complex in Kumba, they will participate in this precious partnership in mission—holding a hand, standing with a person, providing medical care, all in the spirit of serving God, all of which brings glory to God.

And right here at home, our Deacons and our volunteers serve supper here in the community, offer the ministry of intercessory prayer throughout the week. The church goes where the need is in our community—bringing meals to those recovering from illness, bringing communion to those who are homebound, meeting people where they are, as was the example of our Lord.

We stand in a long line of prophets, apostles, martyrs, and saints, a true servanthood of the faithful who, despite their initial doubts and fears, have brought glory to God. And we can think there’s a wide chasm between these prophetic voices and our own, these great servants who made manifest God’s will for their time. Or we can realize that the heights of God’s kingdom are right before us. If we listen, God is beckoning us to play our part in the building up of the kingdom—wherever we may be.

So whether it is in voices of protest on the Mall in Washington or in songs of hope we sing together in our worship here, whether it is in the company of a stranger across the globe or among our own loved ones, we might take the opportunity this morning to listen to where God calls us to be, to act, to speak up, to listen, as we stand upon the shoulders of all the faithful servants of every generation who are part of the great story of the building up of God’s kingdom. Where God has made a home in a human heart, there God can do great things. May it be so for us. Amen.