Jan. 14 sermon notes, I Sam. 3, John 1:43, Ps. 139 I Cor. on imperfect people

I Sam. 3 Henri Nouwen states, “We live absurd lives.” Then he talked about the meaning of that word “absurd.” Surd, Nouwen says is from the Latin word for “deaf.” When you look the word up in the dictionary you will find, “not to be heard, dull, deaf, insensible, laughably inconsistent with what is judged as true or reasonable.” It is our inability to hear, to listen, that creates the conditions for an absurd life. Nouwen goes on: “A spiritual discipline is necessary in order to move slowly from an absurd to an obedient life, from a life filled with noisy worries to a life in which there is some free inner space where we can listen to our God and follow his guidance.” Absurd living is simply not hearing and not listening to God.eli, is nearly blind as well.Eli as failed priest-sons and Hannah-he did not grasp what she was praying for-and it is Samuel. (see Graham Greene or diary of a country Priest)“But I shall give less thought to the future, I shall work in the present. I feel such work is within my power. For I only succeed in small things, and when I am tried by anxiety, I am bound to say it is the small joys that release me.” Whiskey priest it was too easy to die for what was good or beautiful, for home or children or civilization--it needed a God to die for the half-hearted and the corrupt.”


-this is before the temple-what sort of shrine?


(2)The narrator then adds a brief description of the state of Eli, noting that his "eyesight had begun to grow dim, so that he could not see" (verse 2). As if all of these things were not sufficient impediments to the coming of God to Samuel, the narrator adds one more. All of this happens before "the lamp of God had...gone out" and so establishes that this calling occurred during the night. (The lamp of God burned from evening until morning in the sanctuary, see Exodus 27:20-21.) discernment models???
All of our readings point to the imperfections of God’s gathered people. Samuel is a failed priest and parent. The Corinthian church was marred by conflict, pettiness, and fissures. Jesus called very ordinary local people to his core group, including people who made fun of his home town.
When the church was threatened with persecution in the late 4th century, the Donatist controversy arose. One group argued for clergy perfection for the sacraments to be valid. Augustine understood that the wheat and chaff are mixed together in the church, including clergy. God uses imperfect people toward god’s ends. (Here use new Pauw book throughout.)Variously she calls the church a down to earth creation, an earthen vessel, a place where we make do in the face of the impinging new. The church is yet the interface between heaven and earth where mistakes, false starts, new hopes and risks emerge from very human beings. Yet, “it is not the splendor of the vessel but the treasure it holds.” It is an affront to God to see only the imperfections and be willfully bond to the treasure of faith we hold together.






Ps. 139 Martin Buber, an early twentieth-century Jewish philosopher, offered these words concerning the relationship between God and humankind:Where I wander - You!Where I ponder - You!Only You, You again, always You!You! You! You!When I am gladdened - You! When I am saddened - You! Only You, You again, always You! You! You! You! Sky is You, Earth is You! You above! You below! In every trend, at every end, Only You, You again, always You! You! You! You! In other words, worship is the opposite of our me, me, me culture.