Sermon Title: "Who Will Serve For Us?"
Date: June 7, 2009
Ministers: Rev. Charles Ensley

Lesson:  Isaiah 6:1-8

I imagine that there were moments in your schooling—perhaps it was high school, college or graduate school—when something so memorable was said that decades later you can still remember it vividly, as if it happened only yesterday. 

For me, today’s lesson is one such example.  It was 1970 in my first course in worship during seminary.  Our preaching professor, the late Harland Hogue, said that Isaiah 6:1-8 is the model for how all of worship—as we traditionally know it—is laid out.  There is first the call to worship:  “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” (vs. 3)  Next comes the confession, just as we offered a prayer of confession this morning:  “Woe is me!  I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips…” (vs. 5)  Then comes the absolution, or words of assurance as we call them:  “Now that this [live coal] has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” (vs. 7)  Then comes the call to action:  “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” and the response:  “Here am I; send me!”  (vs. 8)

So, 39 years later, I still remember Dr. Hogue offering an explanation of that text.  And to be honest, every time I see or hear that lesson, I can hear him explaining it to us.  But I would like us to look at it today in another light, that in which it was originally intended:  the prophet who senses a call, considers himself unworthy, and then is prepared to respond.

This text, famous for its account of the call of Isaiah, was a favorite of missionary enterprises of the 18th and 19th centuries.  God is a God who sends.  That’s a remarkable notion, especially given the awesome vision that Isaiah’s just seen.  The God of this vision would not seem to be a God who needs to send anyone to do anything.  This God is a God who accomplishes what God wants to accomplish by a mere word.

Yet God utters the remarkable question, “Whom shall I send?”  God has a mission for which a messenger is needed.  As if to reinforce this idea, the first question is followed by a second: “[W]ho will go for us?”

Isaiah responds exactly as we assume God hopes he will.  Why else would Isaiah be having this vision?  Isaiah, his mouth and lips still burning with redemption and absolution, is now eager to be of service.

I wonder if those who respond each year to a call by our Nominating Committee feel the same eagerness to be of service to the church?  After all, we have several officer positions and dozens of commission slots to fill each year.  Why do we need so many?  Well, our church, like all congregations within the United Church of Christ, is a representative democracy.  Call them committees, commissions, boards, whatever—their purpose is to be filled with persons from the congregation who will broadly represent the congregation, and make responsible decisions on the congregation’s behalf to guide us all in our mission and ministry.  We understand if you don’t have a particular interest in the commission you’re first called for.  Maybe another is where you feel you can be of service.

And it’s not all about taking care of business here at the corner of The Toledo and Granada Avenue.  One of our commissions is named the Worldwide and Homeland Missions Commission—a mouthful to be sure.  Their outreach happens on our behalf not just here in Long Beach, not just in Tijuana at Emmanuel Orphanage, but as far away as the child we always sponsor at Rawdat El-Zuhur School in Ramallah, Palestine.

Not everyone feels equipped when called, just as Isaiah did not feel ready.  Many a person who is asked to step into the position of moderator-elect and ponders whether they are equipped for the job will say, “I was surprised to be asked. … I didn’t think I had been a member long enough.” … or words to that effect.  But, you know, they do remarkably well as they move up to become the chief lay officer of our congregation.  And even more remarkably, I have never experienced a church that recycles their moderators so well!  On our new Worship Commission, seven of the twelve members are former moderators!  Two others serve on other commissions, four on standing committees, and, per tradition, the entire Nominating Committee is made up of past moderators.

We always want and encourage new members to serve on one of our commissions, but looking at today’s list, I also see a number of people who have served on another commission prior to the one they’re on today.  I don’t believe any of them feel coerced to do so, but do it willingly out of a sense of duty; might I even say a sense of call?

Our God is a sending God.  And if God has not sent you, then perhaps a) you’re in want of a vision, b) you’re awaiting the touch of a hot coal or two, or c) your hearing isn’t so good, because God is still saying, “Whom shall I send?”  Or, as I like to paraphrase, “Who will serve for us?”