“Our Common Calling”
Rev. David E. Gray                                                                                                  

Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church

February 8, 2009

I Cor. 12:1-11

It’s wonderful to be in worship with you this morning.  I have appreciated the kind welcome you have given me and my family through your notes and good wishes these weeks.  Worshipping with you here last week and working in the office this week, I feel very much at home at Bradley Hills and excited for the future. 

As I prepared for this Sunday, I was reflecting on God’s call, on our ordination and installation of officers and on what it means to be called to serve.  Then I opened my mail and read at the top of one correspondence – “Jury Summons, please bring this paper with you when you report to jury duty on February 10.”  Well, I had been thinking what it means to be called to serve, but a jury summons was not the kind of calling I was looking to for this coming week.

But it helps me remember that the calls we receive to serve in life, like the calls we receive from God, come in different forms.  Sometimes, as with the disciples Marty preached about two weeks ago, we are called unexpectedly and have to drop what we are doing.  Other times, we are nudged by circumstances and we have more time to reflect.   We mostly think of calling in terms of the individual calls we receive from God.  One of my favorite ads from the Super Bowl last week was about the Anheuser-Busch Scottish Clydesdale horse who recalls in a thick brogue how his great grandpa came to America and struggled like a bull in a china shop until he “found his calling” pulling a truck. 

That’s the familiar format – we think about the gifts we have as individuals and about what an individual is called to do, without as much concern for common threads in all our callings and gifts.   That was an issue for the early church in Corinth.   In Corinth, the Apostle Paul found a group of people overly concerned with status.  The Corinthian church was losing its unity and people were becoming competitive rather than caring.  So Paul wrote what is our second lesson today in part to help the Corinthians see that there was a common source of their gifts and their calling.  Reading now from the 12th chapter of Paul’s first lesson to the Corinthians.  

Our theme this month is connecting and belonging.  How and why we connect with each other.  During our adult education time this morning I enjoyed meeting with many of you and hearing your stories about how and why you came to feel called to be at Bradley Hills.  

In our second lesson for today, we read about Corinth, where one of the main problems facing the church was a lack of unity.   People looked to their own gifts.  They looked to favor people whose gifts were similar to their own.  They turned away from people whose gifts were different from theirs.   Individuals became more competitive than cooperative.  The church was divided into factions.  Three factions grew to be associated with different Christian missionaries.  One Corinthian group associated itself with Paul, they were mainly gentiles.  One group associated with Apollos, the great orator.  One group associated with Cephas, they were mostly originally Jewish.  There was too much emphasis on the missionaries and not on the message, that God was the source of the gifts and calling.  The people were getting mixed messages about who to focus on.  

Mixed messages about calling can be a problem.  I think about during the public service announcement that a radio call in show ran during the Los Angeles earthquake in 1990, “The telephone company is urging people to please not use the telephone unless it is absolutely necessary in order to keep the lines open for emergency personnel.’  Now we’ll be right back after this break to give away a pair of Phil Collins concert tickets to caller number 95.”

Martin Luther may have written 95 Theses, but there is only one God, not 95, who calls us.  Paul did not have patience when it came to mixed message about calling.  There was no caller number 95 for Paul.  Paul believed the focus should be on the caller, not the missionaries in Corinth.  Divisions occur when we loses sight of the fact that it is the same God who calls us into being.

Seeing our commonality unites us.  Recognizing this truth, our PCUSA church joined with the mainline Lutheran Church, the Reformed Church in America and the United Church of Christ in 1997 to declare what they termed “a common calling.”  That we are in full communion because, while we have different histories, we are united because we are a “diverse witness to the One Gospel that we confess in common.”

A diverse witness to the One Gospel we confess in common.  That is precisely what Paul was trying to have the people of Corinth agree to.  That there are many gifts, but the same spirit.  Many different ministries, but the same Lord.  Many activities that church members could be a part of, but the same God who is the reason we do them.    

Paul’s truth is just as important for us in our day.  The first section of our Presbyterian Book of Order proclaims that Jesus Christ calls the church into being.  Jesus calls us to be a part of the church.  We have diverse gifts, but truly have a common caller. 

We have individual gifts, but God gives us a common contribution as well.  People wonder if specific words make a difference.  Yes they do.  We saw in the Presidential inauguration that President Obama and Chief Justice Roberts were slightly off in their wording of the oath of office, so they had to meet again privately to redo the oath.  The oath is specific.  One word does make a difference.  

One word makes a difference in our lesson for today.   Paul wrote that “to each is given the manifestation of the spirit.”  He doesn’t say a manifestation.  

We are given different gifts to be sure, but we are all empowered by the same spirit and all of us are heirs to the saving work of Jesus. 

Perhaps we don’t think much of the gifts God has given us.  We might think that God has given more spiritual gifts to someone else.   Many people in Corinth thought that other people had a bigger piece of the spiritual pie than they did or that they had the whole pie.  

Paul used the word “the” on purpose.  God has given us all the common gift of God’s son and God’s spirit.  This manifestation of God is God giving of Godself. 

Through Jesus and through the spirit, God has given us equally the incredible life giving gift of God’s son and of the Holy Spirit.  When we see the equality of the gift God has given us in common it makes it easier for us to share our unique gifts.

We, like the Corinthians, have a common calling to be a part of the church.   Paul writes that the Holy Spirit distributes gifts as the Spirit chooses.   There is present tense recognition on Paul’s part that our callings evolve.  We might feel called to a mission trip one year and called to care for an ailing friend the next.  We discover and develop our gifts better in community than we do alone.   I saw this clearly in meeting with our Bible study group at church this Wednesday.  Many people came to Bradley Hills for one reason, but began to develop and discover their callings as part of the community here.  God’s work is on-going and so we benefit from joining in common to explore our callings.

We have a common caller, who gives a common contribution of God’s son and the Holy Spirit to create a common community of the church.  And why?  To help us see our common calling to minister for the common good.

One of John Calvin’s great contributions to the church was to extend the idea of calling to the secular world.  Before Calvin, the church too often taught that God only calls clergy, but Calvin looked at texts like Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians and concluded that all members of the church, not just clergy, received a calling from God.  Calvin was also influenced by Martin Luther’s ideas of the priesthood of all believers.   In his 1520 letter, Babylonian Captivity of the Church, Luther dismissed the medieval Christian belief that Christians were to be divided among those people who could be spiritual and those who were temporal or non spiritual.   All baptized Christians are "priests" and "spiritual" in the sight of God.   I may be a pastor, but there is a reason the staff directory portion of our bulletin here at Bradley Hills lists the ministers as “All members of the church.”  We have a common calling to serve as ministers here at Bradley Hills.  We are called to visit those who are suffering, to volunteer our time, talents and treasure and to engage in teaching and spiritual leadership.  I have many ideas for the church, but I am coming here to serve along with you, not for you.  And I know you wouldn’t want it any other way, because I see in decisions large and small that you take seriously our common calling to serve as ministers here.

Your history at Bradley Hills is steeped in your common calling.  The history of this church, written in 2005, is entitled “Called by God.”  The personal policies of our church begin with the statement that, “We believe that God's presence is shown in some way in each person for the good of all.”

Paul writes that the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each person for the common good.  It becomes easier to share the gifts we have been given when we realize that the gift of Jesus and the gifts of God are not for us alone.  Nor are our gifts given to us only for our benefit alone. 

 God’s gifts have been given to benefit others as well.  To benefit our church and world.

You are unique.  You have unique gifts.  Use them for the common good.   

This morning, we install and ordain our new class of elders and deacons.  Men and women who have been called by God to serve with you here in leadership, decision making and service.  We remember the various gifts individuals have, but also the calling we all have to serve the common good for the sake of the one who calls us.

Our Book of Order is clear that we are ordaining, installing and setting these individuals apart not for power, but for service.  All of us, regardless of our gifts, are united by the same caller.  Our God contributes Christ’s sacrifice and the Holy Spirit to each of us.  God calls us to be a part of the church and to take our responsibility to worship and care for each other seriously too. 

Paul wanted the Corinthians to know that they had a common reason to come together as a community.  Paul’s broader theme in his first Letter to the Corinthians is unity in the midst of diversity.   Those early groups in Corinth were staying in their own silos and not building up the church.  Paul wanted them to know that they could only build the kind of church they wanted by being involved in it.

I look out this morning and I see the faces of my new friends.  I see the faces of spiritual friends with whom my family will share significant moments over the years, and who will share significant moments in their lives with us.  Friends who care about Christ and friends whom I can care about.  Friends who care about Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church and with whom I will work to care for this church.  Friends who have diverse and wonderful gifts and who are united by a common witness to the One Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Friends who are called to use their gifts for the greater good.

This morning I look out and see the faces of friends.  And behind each of those faces I know there is a story.  A story of gifts, a story of church, a story of God’s calling.  I look forward to hearing your story and to sharing mine.  I hope you will share your story, your gifts, and your sense of calling with each other.  Because when we do that, then together we can write the next chapter of this community’s story.  Thanks be to God.  Amen.