<html><body><div>Here's the first draft.</div><div><br></div><div>Bob</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'>THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF ST. ALBAN, ALBANY<span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>2 EPIPHANY b</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'>1 SAMUEL 3:1-20<span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>7<sup>th</sup> JANUARY, 2018</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'>1 CORINTHIANS 6:12-20<span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>PSALM 139:1-5, 12-17</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'>JOHN 1:53-51</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'> </span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Life is full of surprises! Who’d have imagined who the first followers of Jesus were? Or how and when they’d be called? Or where they were when they were called?</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>How did you end up doing what you’re doing, or what you’ve done through your lives?</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>I’m glad I’m as old as I am! I’ve heard over and over and over again that people of my children’s ages will not only have changed jobs four or five times. The jobs themselves, the areas in which they give their time and their energy, will be in totally different emphases.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>To me that smacks of horrendous instability. I suppose I could try to black out of my mind any thought that I’d be likely to change vocations, and simply apply myself to what I’m doing at any given time. But, still, I wonder how it feels to live in a world and a generation when everything <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u>WE</u></b> know as providing us with a sense of security may be absent.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>I don’t know what this means for those in High School or University, but I’d imagine it might make this life-preparatory season sort of unsettling.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>No one <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:
normal"><u>HAS</u></b> to have a career goal etched firmly in her or his mind at that stage, of course. But it couldn’t hurt. What do you study? Languages? Scientific Theory? Philosophy? Art History? Plumbing? Electrical Maintenance? Welding? I could see myself enjoying any and all of these. In fact, it’s the sort of education which could benefit a lot of people, giving them some of the basic information of who we are as human beings. But what if you invest a lot of time, not to say money, in any one of those academic or technical vocations, only to find out five years, ten years or more out of school that there isn’t much in the way of employment opportunities or emotional satisfaction for you any more?</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Life isn’t straight-forward or easy. No one ever said that it would be, of course. Very few people get to work in that proverbial rose garden. So how do we prepare, how do we function in life?</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Here’s where we may try to rely on becoming aware of whether or not something gives u a sense of vocation, a sense that we are being called into one or other means of engaging with life. And here’s where we may start to see some sort of a connection between the whole concept of vocation and the first and third readings this morning. Everyone in the stories was engaged in something already, and may have planned to live out the rest of their lives in that profession, whether or not it gave them pleasure, satisfaction, or security. Everyone may have been quite happy dong what he or she was doing. So when God spoke, either out of the ether or of a dream, as happened to Samuel, or in the person of Jesus, as happened to Philp and Nathaniel, none of them was looking for another job. They were taken by surprise and, quite possibly, challenged.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>More often than not, this is how things happen to us. If you or I are engaged in a particular pursuit; if you or I, whether or not we’re content or troubled with regard to what we’re doing; you ad I may hear aa voice, get a phone or a text message, bump into someone on the street or in some other place, and, out of nowhere, we may be invited to consider something. It may never be clear what all’s involved; what things may entail change in the way of our relocating, or taking on a certain role that may make us uncomfortable, we simply may not know. Many times, though, there can be a certain amount of excitement in addition to risk, even in thinking about this.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Samuel, Philip, Nathaniel, even Jesus Himself, reacted almost instantly, apparently. At least they listened, though, without dismissing the possibility of changing their vocations out of hand. This was pretty strange when you consider that they’d no idea about who was talking to them, except for Jesus, but the Spirit didn’t affirm Him until <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u>AFTER </u></b>He’d made the decision.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Granted, folk back in their times were more ready to hear God communicate in all sorts of ways, and were willing to accept that that <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u>MAY</u></b> have been God making the contact. We’re too sophisticated for that most of the time, though. We can explain that the internet happens, even if we can’t say how. We’re used to how people talk – or not when we see them around, so often we don’t think twice about what they say.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>But if God speaks today, as I believe absolutely does happen, how are we supposed to hear? How are we supposed to respond?</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>I think one of the first things we need to work on is our sense of faith, not only that God <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:
normal"><u>DOES</u></b> talk, but also that God wants to talk to<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u> US</u></b>. We may tend to feel that this sort of thing is for more important people, for those who’re academics, or ordained, or well-known in their communities – not to say that you and I couldn’t fit into one of these categories, but this is simply not true. We’re <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u>ALL</u></b> important, and we’re <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u>ALL</u></b> loved. And we’re <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight:normal"><u>ALL</u></b> called. It’s simply a matter of discerning what our call is.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>I remember hearing a horrible story about thirty years ago. It was about the leader at a church sponsored high school campy. Towards the end of the week, which had been spent talking about God calling people to serve, the leader asked that young people who felt that God had called them to a specific Christian vocation come up to the stage to tell him.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>One boy went up and whispered what he said he’d heard. The man beamed and said that the youth felt God was calling him to be a pastor. A young woman went up and the leader, with a great smile, announced that she felt God was calling her to be a nurse with a missionary group. Two others were treated with similar praise. Then a shy young man went up and quietly talked with the leader whose face took on a very severe expression.</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>“Oh, no!” he said. “John says that he feels that God is calling him to be a teacher. But that’s not a Christian </span><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'>vocation.”</span></p><p style="margin: 0px; line-height: normal;"><span style='margin: 0px; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;'><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span></span></p></div></body></html>