St. Andrew’s Pictou, February 26^th 2006

 

Our Rejection; God’s Embrace

 

Isaiah 6:1-8

Luke 5:1-11

 

We are not so much governed by what other people think of us as much as we are about what we think, that they think about us.

 

As a result, we waste a whole lot of time and energy for nothing. We expend a great deal of energy on fictitious assumptions, because we seldom really know what another human being thinks about us.

 

As an undergraduate at UPEI in the 60’s my psychology professor had us do a most interesting experiment. Each one of us was to go through catalogues and magazines and cut out an ad or picture that reminded us of each person in the class. There were about 15 students and so we each brought about 14 items that we had clipped to the next class.

 

On 15 pieces of bristle board, each had one of our names at the tops, and we pasted the item we chose for each person.

 

The next step was that the person with the name at the top told the class what they thought those items meant.

 

The second step was for each person to tell the class the real reason as to why they put what they did on each person’s bristle board; which was like a collage of that person.

 

The results were consistent: each person read that own collage negatively, and yet each item had been chosen to represent positive and insightful aspects of the person whose names was at top. (Each person saw themselves negatively and saw the other person in a positive way.)

 

We do we all spend our lives thinking that everybody else is netter than us?

 

Sometimes when a person is talking to me about a feeling that they have about a significant person in their lives, and I ask them if they told the other person how they feel. They say, “No.” and I reply, “Don’t you think that they need to know what you have just told me? Isn’t it more important that they know that piece of information more than me?

 

In other situations, a person will be talking about life issues based on the feelings and perspective of another person, like a spouse. I will say, “How do you know that your spouse feels that way? Did you ask them?” “No.”

“Did they tell you?” No.”

“Why don’t you ask them first, before you make your decision?”

 

At this point, I hope that you are getting the message that for some reason we tend to see ourselves negatively and we give the negative view of ourselves all of our time and energy.

 

The great prophet Isaiah was exactly the same way!

 

Isaiah has this great and magnificent vision of God in heaven:

 

“I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple.

And above him were the seraphs, each with six wings:

With two wings they covered their faces,

With two wings they covered their feet,

And with two wings they were flying:

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty;

The whole earth is full of his glory.

At the sound of their voices the doorposts and the thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke.”

 

How does Isaiah respond to this display of God’s glory?

He exhibits a major self-esteem problem; his insecurities pour out.

He feels inadequate and unworthy; he has nothing to offer.

He can’t function; he has an anxiety attack.

 

Not only does Isaiah see himself as unworthy, but he sees the whole of society as unworthy as well. Isaiah felt like many today, with a loss of faith in political and societal structure; a loss of faith in the body politic.

 

Isaiah is experiencing a clash of his bad feelings about himself and his world, as it meets the beauty and glory of God.

 

What happens next is a moment of grace:

“Then one of the seraphs flew to me with a love coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs from the altar. With it he touched my mouth and said, ‘See, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.’”

 

We have the divine and the human, meeting in a moment of healing, restoring grace. Isaiah is uplifted, restored, made whole; redeemed.

 

Then when we hear the voice of the Lord asking who he will send, who will go for us, he is able to reply with a clear voice, “Here am I! Send me!”

 

We have another example of God calling those who appear unsuitable, inept and incompetent in the reading form Luke where Jesus is calling his first disciples.

 

Just after Jesus had been speaking to some people, he tells Simon Peter to put out his net in the deep water to catch some fish. Since they had been fishing all night and caught nothing they were suspicious about catching anything, but since it was Jesus asking, they did what he said. Simon Peter, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, the whole group of fishermen were astonished to find that there was more fish in their net then they could almost get into the boat!

 

At this astonishing catch of fish in spite of the supposed competence of the ones who were supposed to be professional fishermen, Simon Peter was just like Isaiah, he was mortified: “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!” he said.

 

Just as the seraph blessed and redeemed Isaiah, Jesus did the same thing to Simon Peter:

“Don’t be afraid; from now one, you will catch people.” So they pulled up their boats onto the shore, left everything and followed him.”

 

These two scriptures give us a group of four men who reject their very selves.

 

Not one of them had any self-confidence and appreciation of the gifts that God had given them in themselves.

 

And yet… God embraced the very men that had rejected themselves.

 

What does this mean for us?

 

Does this mean that you and I don’t have any faults?

Does it mean that we are in some way, perfect, when you and I might think that we have all kinds of faults and shortcomings?

 

Both Isaiah and Simon Peter seemed to be very honest and up front about their character and their inadequate opinion of themselves. Their deficiencies seem to be real, not imagined. Isaiah seemed to know that he and his people were not all that they might be. Peter, James, and John had just spent the night fishing and didn’t catch anything. These issues seem to be real deficiencies. Jesus would be able to see that they didn’t catch any fish.

 

Could it be that God and Jesus have different opinions and views of the very same things that we reject about ourselves as unworthy?

 

Does it not appear in these texts that God embraces the very same things that we reject about ourselves as unworthy?

 

This is a profound notion: that God accepts what we reject, or that God could use for God’s purposes the very same things we see as deficiencies.

 

It might seem preposterous for us to consider that God can use what we see as our limitations and faults: that God could see faults as gifts.

 

If you are not as smart as you would like to be, God says that allows you to be gifted in another way.

 

If you think that you are too old, God says that allows you to be gifted in another way.

 

Think that you are not skilled in a certain way, or don’t have certain experience you think that you need, God says that problem you see means that you are gifted in a different way.

 

This first time that they were going to add additional elevators on a high rise building, (it was a hotel) they had gathered all of the architects and engineers, “on sight” for one… last… inspection before they started with the sledgehammers and the construction workers and crew.

 

The hotel janitor was watching them all as he was leaning on his broom.

 

“Goin’ to make a lot of dirt putting in those elevators.”

(We will just have to hire extra cleaners.)

“Goin’ to be a lot of noise and complaining.”
(We might have to close some of the hotel’s rooms.)

“Goin’ to be a lot of inconvenience and chaos with construction and all. May have to even close the hotel for awhile. You will loose a lot of money.”

(Well if we have to close for awhile, we will have to just bite the bullet.)

 

Then the janitor said, “I know a way to build those elevators so that you won’t have to close any rooms, there won’t be as much noise, chaos, dirt, or inconvenience. You won’t even have to close the hotel.”

 

“HOW?” all the highly educated, well-dressed experts asked looking at the lowly uneducated janitor leaning against his broom.

 

Just build the elevators outside the main hotel wall and then just punch through the doors into the hotel when it is done. Mush easier, cheaper, and saves a lot of money.

 

And so we found the best way to build additional elevators outside of an exisiting building.

 

Can an uneducated janitor pushing a broom be smarter than architects and engineers? Does he know how to same money? Is he an expert?

 

Yes, Yes, Yes.

 

Are you an expert? Yes you are. Every single one of you is an expert in your own right; in your life’s experience in a way that is different and unique to you.

 

This is the Creator’s opinion; the One how knew you before you were ever born, before you were even conceived.

 

The Word of the Lord for you today is to discover the richness and expertise encoded in each of you by your Maker. Remember that God embraces what you reject, so be mindful of the great things that God can do with what you perceive as your inability, just as he did many years ago with Isaiah, Simon Peter, James, and John.

 

AMEN                                   Rev. Alan Stewart