<html><body><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">THE EPSICOPAL CHURCH OF ST. ALBAN, ALBANY<span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>THE SECOND SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">1 SAMUEL 3:1-20<span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>PROPER 4 b</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">2 CORINTHIANS 4:5-12<span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>3<sup>rd</sup> JUNE, 2018</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">MARK 2:23 – 3:6<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="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"> </span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Let these words</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>lay themselves</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>like a blessing upon your head,</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>your shoulders,</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>I think I may have asked you this before, or, at least, something like this. Did you have an easy time trying to determine what your vocation, your calling, was or, in the case of some of you, what it is still?</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Thinking about all the things which spark our interest; thinking about the sort of things that seem to relate to experiences that we’ve had; thinking about family and friends; - all of these can help us set our minds pondering in one direction or another. Of course, there are other factors. Perhaps we went for further education beyond high school, or maybe even in high school itself, a career counsellor or an academic advisor might have asked some probing questions and piqued our curiosity. Another student, or for that matter, a faculty member or a chaplain may have made suggestions which might never have crossed our minds otherwise.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>Coming as I do from a strong faith background, I believe that God uses all sorts of people, and situations, to try to arouse my curiosity and to push, pull, prod, or lead me. God can use an ad, or an article in a paper or a magazine; God can use an internet blog or a radio programme to help us to focus and to exercise our imaginations.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px;"> </span>The opportunities for guidance in our day-to-day activities <b><span style="text-decoration-line: underline;">AND</span></b> our whole vocations are endless. The only requirement in all of this is a mind, a heart, a pair of eyes and a pair of ears that can be awakened to the possibilities of something new and creative going on in our lives.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">Of course, a society that has no time for religious beliefs and principles isn’t going to help you and me much in the way of allowing our particular ethical standards to come into play. When the business model of self-enrichment and the amassing of personal power and control is what drives the world; when this happens, it can be incredibly difficult to hear and apply the sensory stimuli of God’s justice and righteousness to our lives.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">There’s one sentence at the beginning of the first reading today that sends chills of sadness and apprehension, all the more because it’s not a stretch to hear these words as applying not just to twenty-six hundred years ago, but to today also.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">“The word of the Lord was rare in those days.”</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">Remember, we’re reading passage after passage describing the life and history of people whose focus was avowed as being on God and God alone. Everything about the nation, everything about the leadership and the government, everything about the Temple was to be centred on the expression, “In God we trust.” But if the word of the Lord was perverted to accord with human whims; if the word of the Lord was indeed heard rarely in the land, the God in whom the people said they trusted was definitely <b><span style="text-decoration-line: underline;">NOT</span></b> the God who had freed the people from slavery, and led them through difficult journeys, and brought them to a land whose continued cultivation would have provided for them and for all the aliens who came to stay there, as well as the visitors who passed through.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">God, it appeared, no matter how God’s word and direction were delivered and perceived; God had come to the point of being irrelevant to the nation in its advanced and settled state. What’s worse, exactly the same could have been said about religious life, about the Temple, about the staff and leadership of the Temple. God, to anyone who might look in a critical way, did not matter anymore.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">That’s how Eli’s sons understood things. They were in it for the power, for the money, for the security of the pension and other benefits they could seize for themselves. Their vocation, if you remember the history of Israel; their vocation as descendants of Aaron was to approach the altars and to do all in their power to intercede with God on behalf of the people. Compassion and understanding were supposed to be the hallmarks of their lives. Their vocation was to reassure the people that God listened and acted out of justice for all people, and that God would and <b><span style="text-decoration-line: underline;">DOES</span></b>forgive sins.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">But this simply couldn’t co-exist with the life that Eli’s sons chose for themselves. Putting themselves first at the altar and throughout the religious, political and civil environment wouldn’t be possible if they were to be mediators on behalf of everyone in the nation. Eli’s sons had rejected God and spread a climate of fear, and greed, and self-service in place of the righteousness of God.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><b style="margin: 0px;"><span style="margin: 0px; text-decoration-line: underline;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">THIS</span></span></b><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;"> was what the Temple had become. It was little different from an arm of the corruption of the capital. Instead of challenging those in power, it connived with it. The Temple had become a rubber stamp to those whose hearts had left the courts of God.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">Little wonder, then, that things were confusing. I can’t imagine what it was like in the Temple, but, obviously, Eli was <b><span style="text-decoration-line: underline;">NOT</span></b> in control. Oh, I’m sure he went through the motions. He wore the usual vestments; he got the altar fire started and made sure it was stoked up for the day; he would have got the scrolls out and cleared his throat so that he could speak as if he had authority. He may even have run through the motions regarding sacrifices. But his sons were out of control, and he wasn’t that far behind them.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px; margin: 0px;">They were happily ensconced in their hereditary positions, so they had nothing to prevent them from abusing those who were depending upon them. Their priorities ensured that they were safe from criticism. Their power, therefore, was practically limitless. Their father and their connections had their back.</span></p><p style="font-size: 16px; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; line-height: normal; text-indent: 48px;"><span style="font-size: 13.33px;"> </span></p></body></html>