The telephone rings, but you’re right in the middle of something—something important. Somebody answers the phone for you, and asks, “Do you want to take this call?” Well, do you? I mean, you’re in the middle of something important. Or, at least, you’re in the middle of something!

When Jesus comes strolling along the seaside, Simon and Andrew, James and John are in the middle of something important: it’s their livelihood. It’s the family business. It’s what they know. It’s who they are. And he calls them. And they drop everything, leave most of their family behind, and go with him. They take the call. Why on earth would they do that?

God calls Jonah to preach a message of change to the great city of Ninevah. But Ninevah is a city of foreign people, not Jonah’s people, and Jonah hates those Ninevites. If he were to take God’s call, then Ninevah might repent, and God might forgive them, and that would just be unbearable! So, Jonah hops on a boat and goes in the opposite direction, away from Ninevah. . . . There follows a little business involving attempted suicide, and a very big fish . . . and, well, next time he gets the call, Jonah takes it.

Okay, I guess we can see why Jonah takes the call. I read these stories, and I think, Oh, help! Do we need to leave everything we know—all our beautiful things, all our traditions, our liturgy, our cultures, our way of life, our friends and family—everything familiar, and go do something completely different outside these walls, in order to be who Christ calls us to be? What if we do? We might not need to do that, but what if we do? How scary would that be? And why on earth would we do it?

Anne Lamott is a pretty down-to-earth Christian who lives in Marin County. She writes books—maybe some of you have read her book Traveling Mercies? In it, she tells about how she ended up following Jesus. She was living a life of “sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll,” she writes, but it was leaving her depressed, alcoholic, and finally pregnant. She had an abortion, and then spent the next week drinking. Finally, at the end of the week, as she tried to sleep, she had a religious vision:

After a while, as I lay there, I became aware of someone with me, hunkered down in the corner... I knew beyond any doubt that it was Jesus... And I was appalled. I thought about my life and my brilliant and hilarious progressive friends, I thought about what everyone would think of me if I became a Christian, and it seemed an utterly impossible thing that could not be allowed to happen. I turned to the wall and said out loud, “I would rather die” (Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith [New York: Anchor Books, 2000], p. 49).

It sounds as if Lamott is a member of the Jonah school! She turned away, but still she felt pursued by something, and was afraid to open up to it. At last, hung-over and worn out, she attended a local church service:

I stayed for the sermon, which I just thought was so ridiculous, like someone trying to prove the existence of extraterrestrials, but the last song was so deep and raw and pure that I could not escape. It was as if the people were singing in between the notes, weeping and joyful at the same time, and I felt like their voices or something was rocking me in its bosom, holding me like a scared kid, and I opened up to that feeling and it washed over me. I began to cry and left before the benediction (p. 50).

She went home.

I opened the door to my houseboat, and I stood there a minute... I took a long deep breath and said out loud, “All right. You can come in.” So this was my beautiful conversion (p. 50).

--And you? What gets through to you? When, in your life, have you heard a call and taken it? Was it when you went away to study? Was it when you got married? When you had a child? When you served in the military or the Peace Corps? I think that, at some point, most of us have felt called to let go of familiar things, and step forward into something new—“We walk into that which we cannot yet see,” as poet Elizabeth Alexander put it in her inauguration poem. Why on earth do we do that? Maybe, like Jonah, we find that all our clever escape strategies have failed. Maybe, like Anne Lamott, our heart is opened, and we are changed. Maybe we fall in love. Maybe we are convinced of the rightness of a thing. Maybe we want to make a difference in this world.

I remember the feeling of leaving for seminary. Abandoning my job, my dear friends, my church, the home I had made, everything I knew (well, everything except a car-full of possessions!), I cried as I drove, alone, out of Oregon toward Berkeley. But, as I cried, I also felt a growing sense of exhilaration: I felt the Holy One calling me to take that next step, and as tough and scary as that was, it sure was a big adventure! One thing I notice: Jesus doesn’t ask these two pairs of brothers—Simon and Andrew, James and John—to give up who they are. They each get to travel with a brother, and they get to keep fishing; only now, their catch is going to look different. "Come with me,” says Jesus. “I'll make a new kind of fisherman out of you. I'll show you how to catch men and women instead of perch and bass" (Mark 1:17, The Message).

To each of us, the call comes—to follow, and to become more fully ourselves than we ever were before. Church, “become who you are in your heart of hearts,” Brother Roger of Taizé used to say. Become your deepest self. Become the Spirit of God that dwells within you: become a presence of compassion, of forgiveness, of trust, of reconciliation, for this world.

Open your heart, and receive all these things for yourself, Church. Take the call. Become the yeast that causes hope to grow. Back in Berkeley, I think Lutheran Church of the Cross has taken the call. I remember visiting that parish years ago. On a main street like University Avenue, even the church’s sign manages to be invisible. At the time of my visit, the congregation was dwindling, but dedicated; I remember, as I left their sanctuary, seeing above their door a sign that said, “Take up your cross.” Years after my visit, the congregation realized that they could offer something to their community: bravely, they started to open up the doors of their beloved building, to shelter homeless youth at night. They listened to the needs of the youth, and offered them food, and a safe place to talk. In the years since they took those first steps, I think that small congregation must have served many, many hundreds of young people. They took the call. They let go of something, but they grew more fully into who they really were. They have a particular calling.

What is the particular calling of Napa Valley Lutheran Church? I really don’t think we know, yet. We’re a fairly new community, and we’re still finding out who we are. God does lots of good things through us, and we have important goals. But, calling—vocation—is not about choosing a good goal, or an excellent cause, and pursuing it; it’s also not about acting out of fear that you’re going to lose something like your life . . . or like your church. It’s about listening to God. It’s about discovering who we are in our heart of hearts, and letting go of whatever we need to, in order to become that, to become that kind of community. I think we need to put some energy and intention into getting to know one another better, and listening for what the Holy One has placed in our hearts. At the same time, we can listen to and observe our Napa Valley communities, so that maybe we can discover where our gifts and needs connect. Why on earth would we do that? --Because the One who calls us is faithful. Because we are loved, and forgiven, and treasured by God. Because Jesus has come to mean so much in our lives. Because we’re all on a big adventure together. Because, for some reason, Christ Jesus called all of us together, in this big clump, instead of individually.

Pick your reason. Just—when the call comes, let’s be ready to respond, “We really need to take this call!”

Please pray with me.

Jesus, you called Simon and Andrew. They dropped their nets. James and John left their boats, with their father sitting in one. Jesus, we hear you calling us. We want to leave our boats and drop our nets. Help us let go.

(From the Center for Liturgy at Saint Louis University: http://liturgy.slu.edu/3OrdB012509/main.html)