Are Your Ears Tingling? | 1/25/26
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Think about how caller ID gives you a moment to prepare your heart before you answer the phone. What kind of "space" could you create in your daily routine to ready your mind for a conversation with God?
Epiphanies are moments when we realize that God is reaching out to us in our everyday lives. Where have you felt like you caught a glimpse of something divine in the middle of your ordinary schedule this week?
It’s easy to feel like we are the ones playing hide and seek, trying to find a "needle in a haystack" when it comes to God’s will. How does it change things for you to imagine that God is actually the one initiating the connection and longing to be known by you?
In the story of Samuel, it says the word of the Lord was "rare," but the suggestion is that God hadn't actually stopped speaking—people had just stopped listening. What do you think is the loudest "noise" in your life right now that might be making it hard to hear a whisper?
There’s an idea that when God really wants you to do something, the message becomes so blatantly obvious that ignoring it would feel like a conscious choice. Is there anything in your life right now that feels that clear, even if you’re a bit hesitant to act on it?
We often focus on what we need to do for God, but what if you focused entirely on what God is doing in your story right now? What are the specific actions you see God taking in your life today?
Transcript:
You know when the world was a better place? When caller ID came into existence. This simple feature we now so often take for granted gave each of us who were receiving a call just a little bit of space to allow grace to enter into that phone call. Because all of a sudden, you had a little bit of information offered to you as that call came to you, and you were able to ready your heart and your mind for whatever might await you on that phone call. You could squeal with excitement when you saw the name of your best friend flash upon that little screen, or you could groan and brace for impact when your boss, your mother-in-law, or your kid's school was calling you. Or you could even choose to flat-out ignore that phone call, or turn off the ringer with glee when an unknown caller or toll-free number had the audacity to choose your phone number off of that call list that day. You see, knowing a little bit of information about who you are receiving an interaction from gave yourself some space to prepare for whatever might unfold from that conversation.
Friends, this is true of epiphanies as well. Epiphanies are what we have been talking about over the last several weeks, and it's the idea that God reaches out to us—that Christ is revealed to us in our everyday lives—but we are more open and ready for that response when we know exactly who it comes from. Because behind every single epiphany we have is a God who initiates that interaction, a God who speaks, and a God who acts. The fancy theological word for this is theophany: this idea that God shows up in our story. So if we are a people who are to be ready for whatever God might have for us, it is important for us to know a little bit about that God who shows up in our story.
This morning, we turn to the Old Testament, to a story that's familiar to many of us, of how God chooses to show up to Samuel. It is actually one of my favorite call stories throughout Scripture. So often in stories like these, we choose to focus on what Samuel is doing—what that human is doing—because we are human, and that is who we identify with. This morning, I invite us to hear this story a little differently, to pay attention to what it is that God is doing. What are God's actions in this story, and what might we learn about God from the way God chooses to show up to Samuel?
Hear these words from First Samuel chapter three, verses one through 11:
The boy Samuel ministered before God under Eli. In those days the word of the Lord was rare; there were not many visions. One night Eli, whose eyes were becoming so weak that he could barely see, was lying down in his usual place. The lamp of God had not yet gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the house of the Lord, where the ark of God was. Then the Lord called Samuel. Samuel answered, "Here I am". And he ran to Eli and said, "Here I am; you called me." But Eli said, "I did not call; go back and lie down." So he went and laid back down. Again, the Lord called, “Samuel!” And Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, "Here I am; you called me." My son, Eli said, "I did not call; go back and lie down". Now, Samuel did not yet know the Lord; the word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him. A third time the Lord called, “Samuel!”, and Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, "Here I am; you called me." Then Eli realized that the Lord was calling the boy. So Eli told Samuel, "Go and lie down, and if God calls you, say, 'Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.'" So Samuel went and lay down in his place. The Lord came and stood there, calling as at other times, and said, "Samuel! Samuel!" Then Samuel said, "Speak, for your servant is listening". And the Lord said to Samuel, "See, I am about to do something in Israel that will make the ears of everyone who hears about it tingle".
This is the Word of God for us, the people of God. And we say, thanks be to God. Will you join me in prayer this morning?
Oh God, when our spirits feel heavy with grief, with fear, with anxiety about what is happening in the world, we proclaim that you are good. As we shrink before all that is occurring, may you speak to us a new word of life, a new word of love. May our hearts and our lives be filled with the power of your loving spirit. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.
Well, hide-and-seek is a game that has become quite familiar and a frequent player in my household of recent days. I bet you remember the hide-and-seek game. I remember going outside and playing with my neighborhood friends; I would go hide in a place that I thought no one would find me, and I would wait for the person who was it to come and discover my whereabouts. Ansel's version of hide-and-seek is just a little bit different than the one I grew up with, and I have to be honest with you, I kind of like his better as an adult, but inevitably I am the one who is always "it". Ansel will find a spot that he just thinks is the most clever hiding spot, and let me tell you, it usually is not. And so I make a show of going to all the places in our house where I know he isn't, and I make loud sounds as I do. After a few minutes of this, Ansel gets really, really impatient, and he will start saying things like, "Mom! Mom!" Of course, I think this is hilarious, and I keep doing my own search where eventually he will jump out and say, "Here I am, you found me!" It does not take much effort on my part.
But so it is with God. In this encounter with Samuel, to really see the heart behind God's call in this moment, I think we need to go back to the beginning of God's story with us and to see how that whole arc of the story plays into this one small moment. I invite you to go on this journey with me all the way back to the very beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth and all the living beings and humans. God created all that is with the intention of being in complete relationship, complete connection with all that is. And so it was, at least for a time. Then, because of human choice, that connection was severed, and distance was introduced into that divine relationship between God and God's creation. This distance made it ever more challenging for God to interact and for God to be involved in our lives in a healthy and whole relationship. All of this creation was crafted to reflect God's very being. Could you imagine how devastated God was at that separation?
Now, moments of connection between God and God's people were very few and far between. When it did happen, it was usually because God did something big and miraculous and showed up in a major way. Do you remember Abraham, who was visited by three strangers delivering news that Sarah was pregnant in her old age? Do you remember Jacob, who had a knockout, drag-out wrestling match with God that ended up giving him a hip injury? How about Moses? He was almost incinerated by that bush that wasn't actually really burning and yet burning all the same. In each of these encounters, God showed up and revealed a little bit of God's character and rekindled the closeness with these figures.
But it had been a long time since God's people had experienced a connection like the one in those stories of old. At this point in time, it had been over 400 years since the Israelites entered the Promised Land. Eli was the priest overseeing the temple, and therefore, a part of his responsibility was to be that very clear connection between God and God's people. But God felt more distant than ever. I'm not sure if Eli would have even recognized the sound of God's voice, even if he tried at this point in time. The priesthood simply felt like a job, something that he had to do in order to fulfill the roles and responsibilities of his family line.
Earlier in First Samuel, we see Eli in charge of the temple when a woman named Hannah walks through the doors and bows down in fervent prayer. She is sobbing, her body wracked with emotion as she prays for her son, who would eventually be Samuel. But Eli, instead of recognizing it for what it was—honest emotional communication with God—he chastised her and called her a drunk. Then, in the very next chapter, God has a really important word to speak directly to Eli, but that connection wasn't there. So the priest in charge of the temple had to receive a word from God from a random, unknown man of God who was in tune and who brought him a message.
When Samuel's encounter with God begins with the words, "In those days, the word of the Lord was rare," God's word wasn't rare because God wasn't communicating. It was rare because the people who held power and authority in that place stopped listening. So God calls to Samuel in the middle of the night. When God sees that Samuel is receptive and really trying to understand the connection, God calls again and again and again—three times—until finally the Scripture tells us that God came and stood and then spoke. God showed up before Samuel. You see, these are not actions of a God who wants to be hidden or a God who wants us to bend over backwards trying to understand a message in the stars. No, what we see across the pages of the Hebrew Scriptures is a God who longs to be found, a God who longs to be seen, a God who longs to be known and to have a connection with us. So much so that in the fullness of time, we would see that God would come in flesh in the person of Jesus to walk among us so that the connection between God and God's people would be restored.
God wants to be connected; God wants to be known. How many of us here can identify with that feeling, that longing to be seen, to be known, to be connected to other people? And if it's true for us, and we believe that we are created in the image of God, well, then why wouldn't it be true of God as well?
Over the summer, we had the gift of having our pastoral intern, Madeline Windham, with us. Part of my role was to be her supervisor, and that came with a book the conference sent to us to read together called “Finding Your Place in God's Mission” by Jeremiah Gibbs. It walks through a process of helping the reader discern where God is calling them to use their gifts and graces for work in the world. In the beginning, Gibbs offers a vocabulary shift in how we characterize discernment. So often, we understand this process as something we're trying to find—that there's this mystery call we are searching through a haystack to find, or we're playing hide and seek with God's call. But Jeremiah Gibbs offers us something different to ponder. He says when God has something specific for someone to do, God makes the voice that comes to them so blatantly obvious that following it is to be clearly disobedient. God isn't trying to trick us. God is simply trying to connect with us, to be in relationship with us, to tell us something about who we are, and God will use any means available to make that connection.
And so it was with me before I heard a call to ordained ministry. I chose to go to college at the University of North Florida and thought I was going to be an exercise science major to eventually be an occupational therapist. I thought that was what God would use me for because I'd been in therapy offices with my sister all growing up. But as I was driving onto the campus of UNF for the first time, about to move into the dorms, I was in a car by myself. I turned off the music I was trying to make sure everyone knew I was listening to. And as I was driving onto campus, passing the "Welcome to UNF" sign, a voice spoke to me so clearly that it took my breath away. "No," it said, "you're not going to be happy. This is not who you are". That was all the voice told me, but I knew that something had to change. I didn't know what that meant yet, but I knew I had to pay attention. It made me wonder how many times God had tried to get my attention, and it was just that one moment where I made a different choice where I could finally hear God's voice. That was my very own theophany, and it led to an epiphany.
This is what it takes to have an epiphany. What would it look like if we encountered the world expecting God to speak? What if we encountered the world knowing that God is using any means available to connect with us, to speak a word of hope to us? Would that make us more attentive to the rustling of the trees in the wind, expecting that breath of the Holy Spirit? Would it make us more attentive to the hallway conversations at work, or in the grocery store, or here at church? Would it make us more attentive to the way that our bodies feel when we witness an injustice in the news or in our community that makes you want to crawl out of your skin?
What might God be trying to say to us in our everyday lives, if only we were ready and willing to hear? If only we approached the world expecting God to speak. Because, friends, God is not trying to trip us up. God is not trying to hide from us. God genuinely wants to be known by us, just as we long to be known by others. So God is speaking and God just might show up through any means available. Are your ears tingling? Yes. Listen, the Lord is speaking. Thanks be to God. Amen.
