Old Testament: 1 Samuel 3:1-11 pg. 298 in the pew Bible
Gospel: John 1:43-51 pg. 125 in the New Testament
One of the things I learned in seminary is that most people are not very emotionally mature, and have not learned to value emotional maturity. We tend to over-react to emotional stimuli, and consider the strength of our emotional attachment as a measure of value.
Within families, we often consider sharing anxiety as a measure of love; even when it might be the opposite. If Joey says something that makes me angry, I might tell Martha and put pressure on Martha to get angry at Joey with me. If she does not get angry, I might doubt that she cares about me, if I was raised that way.
The truth of the matter is, Martha is a pretty smart person. She might ask if I understood what Joey was trying to say. Maybe I misheard him, or he was trying to agree with me by being funny. To be honest, I have known more than one occasion, when I was in violent agreement with someone. We agreed, but were unable to talk to each other. If Martha is mature, she will resist the tendency to get hooked emotionally until she is persuaded that there is a reason to be anxious.
If I keep pressing her to be angry at Joey with me, this will expose my lack of emotional maturity, and put her under pressure to either help me grow up, or we may suffer some distance in our relationship, if I am unable to see why she behaves differently that we used to in the family where I grew up. Emotional maturity gives us tools to help each other see things in different ways, and find different and better ways to act and react to emotional stimuli.
It is amazing to me how many people never learn about this kind of maturity, and how many children are raised to react first, and ask questions later. I am amazed and more than a little saddened.
Emotional maturity is great in a church family, because those mature folks offer great inspiration to others to grow in faith and maturity. I know you may find it hard to believe, but there are a lot of people who get angry with God when things go badly for them. They might blame God, or the church, and sometimes even the pastor. They may even pressure their family members to stop going to church, because God doesn’t care about them at all. These folks would really benefit from having a few more mature friends, who can help them through the period of time when their faith is weak.
Emotional maturity is a key to developing our spiritual maturity. We cannot grow to be the person God needs us to be if every time God tries to lead us away from our own narrow set of expectations we throw a hissy fit and drown out the voice of the Holy Spirit. If Eli had reacted emotionally to Samuel waking him, instead of guiding Samuel, much would have been lost. If Philip reacted to Nathanael’s flip comment, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” we may have only had eleven disciples.
We are born into families, and invited to share our faith with a larger community, so that we might have these kinds of helps and advantages. Hey, life is hard. There are times when we bump up against very tough decisions. It helps to have trusted and reliable friends to talk with.
Not every spiritual event comes in the form of a crisis. Samuel was called by God as a young boy, and God gave him some very hard, very bad news for Eli. What a lousy thing to do to a kid. But God knew that Samuel was trustworthy. God had great plans for speaking to the people over a long time through Samuel. God decided Samuel was ready, in Eli’s words, “He is God. Let him do what he thinks is best.”
When we improve our emotional maturity it pays spiritual dividends. We become aware of God inviting us to see the world with fresh eyes. These observations invite us to be a better and more faithful person.
As we become more calm, we increase our awareness of others. We can observe the signs of stress and tension in the folks around us, and offer an encouraging word. Out of that awareness is born the opportunity to provide wisdom and share our ministry.
Samuel was guided by Eli to listen to God’s voice. Eli might well have become angry and sent Samuel away. Eli, who never was able to teach discipline to his own children, was still a good man who served God successfully in many ways.
Philip was a man of faith, who was thrilled to find Jesus and recognized him as the Messiah. This was a different kind of Messiah than most folks were expecting. God often challenges us with the unexpected, but Philip knew the real thing when he saw it. He wanted to share this good news with his friend Nathanael. Who can blame Nathanael for considering some rural preacher as anything but the anointed of God. But Philip persisted, providing the classic invitation, “Come and see.”
You have been given a personal invitation to “Come and see.” Many of us have been faithfully going to church for many years, and yet there is always a fresh invitation to look deeper into the faith, and find the gifts that spiritual maturity brings is able to make us even more effective in loving God and neighbor.
Pastor people receive a “call” to pursue the work of the church as their primary vocational identity. But it is not only preachers who are called. Each of us is called by God to develop and use our gifts of body, mind, and spirit to give God praise. In order to see the new challenges God puts before us, we need the maturity and patience to recognize that when “things don’t seem to be going our way,” that God might be at work. Perhaps “our way” was not the same as God’s way.
There is an old saying that when the door closes God opens a window somewhere else. In order to limit our sense of loss and fear when we hit those tough blind corners, we need the maturity and wisdom to lean on the faith of those who are around us. We need the encouragement from mentors and friends to try something new, respond out of hope and expectation rather than desperation.
We are the people of God. We have been given gifts, often in raw forms, to share the good news of Jesus Christ and the salvation Jesus offers. In order to make full use of our gifts, and the gifts of those around us, we all need to grow in maturity and faithfulness. Part of our call is to be aware of ourselves and look for the work of God when we are surprised.
We are called to be aware of those around us, both within the faith community and along the fringes. We offer them the benefit of our faith and our faith awareness. The wisdom we share with others enables them to grow, and rapidly expands our collective ability to be successful in doing God’s work here in the place where God has called us and planted us.
Samuel was a young boy when God first called him. God called him when God was ready. “He is God, let him do as he thinks best.” Age is no barrier, we are never too young or too old for God’s love to pass through us.
God provides us with friends, both in the faith community and on the edges. We share our wisdom with them, and respect their ministry when they do good works. When we share our love of neighbor with our friends, especially the work we do with and through the church, we provide an important invitation to “Come and see.”
We are called by God to love God and neighbor. We are called to develop and use the gifts God gave us, for God’s purposes. We are called, today, right here and now, to get off of our padded pews, and Do something, for God’s sake.