Sermon Title:  When God Calls, God Equips

Sermon Text:  Genesis 1:1-2:4

Sermon Date:  January 8, 2006

 

 

“When the LORD God made the earth and the heavens- and no shrub of the field had yet appeared on the earth and no plant of the field had yet sprung up, for the LORD God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no man to work the ground, but streams came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground- the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.  Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed.  And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil…..

The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.  And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." ……

Now the LORD God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. “

            How many of you have heard the phrase “equipping church”?  Good.  That is very good.  For the rest of you, let me explain.

            When I was the 2004 national youth gathering in Estes Park, CO, a book was recommended to me.  It is called “The Equipping Church,” by Sue Mallory.  Mallory was a lay person in her church when she took on the responsibility of being director of lay ministries, in other words, the ministry of the people.  She and her Presbyterian church in California developed this process of doing their best to equip the lay people to do the ministries God called them to.  Meaning that we are all gifted and called into specific ministries.     In October of 2004 I invited about 15 different people to come together to read the book, discuss it and decide if they thought this was worth exploring.  A group of 5-6 have met almost weekly since….for over a year they have read the book and worked through the companion workbook.  They have also been leading the diaconate through the dialogue as well.  And it continues each month.  Now you are invited to attend also.  In February, on the second Tuesday of the month, at 6:30 p.m. all of you are invited to come and learn about how we can be an equipping church.  That lasts for an hour, then the diaconate meeting begins.  Being a place that equips the people to do the work of God is the kind of church that changes lives and the community.  And we as the church want to do our job in helping each of you blossom and grow spiritually “so that” you can please God.

            Now, with that in mind, let’s go back to Genesis:  In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  God made the seas and deserts.  Light and dark.  God made everything necessary to bring into being human and animal.  Out of dust he made the first man – eventually known as Adam. 

            Also out of the dust on the ground God made the animals of all kinds.  Then God gave Adam the responsibility of naming them.  But how on earth could a man just made from dust know how to name the animals, birds, and creatures of the sea?  Well, when God calls, God equips.

            I have to admit that I don’t know how God did that for Adam.  Scripture just isn’t very clear on that.  You might remember the story I told recently from the book, “Does God Have a Big Toe?” when Adam tries to name the animals.  He was overwhelmed by the task.  Numbering them didn’t work.  Calling them by their description failed miserably.  Finally in desperation he cried out for help,

“Then the brown furry woke up, shook Adam into a nearby bush, growled a big growl, looked Adam in the eye, and said to him, “Listen to me!  With all your talking you never once thought to ask us – the animals – what we would like to be named.  …..I don’t know what they call a skinny-hairless-red-earth-foot-walker like you, but they call me BEAR.” 

            In this version of the naming, God equips Adam for the task by not only putting words in the mouth of the bear, but wisdom as well.  He told him what to do and how to do it.  Just ask them and you will get the answers you are looking for.  Sometimes it really is that simple.

            Or when God calls, God equips.  That includes Adam, and you and me.  I’m going to preaching on this theme a lot over this year.  Not every Sunday, but often, I think.  I want to learn how God equipped the people we read about in the Bible.  We aren’t always told exactly how it happened, but my hope is that we can figure out enough to make sense of it.  How did God equip Noah?  Moses?  Peter?  Paul? And many, many others in the Holy Bible.   But today let’s start with Adam.  Not Eve, just Adam.

Let’s face it – God could have just named the animals.  God had the capability of creating them, so they could have just as easily come with names, but we have a God who created us for relationship so just creating man, then the animals, complete with names, could set up the beginning of everything like pawns on a chess board, and the chapter that follows tells us that God wasn’t interested in moving us around on the board, without the ability to make decisions.  The fact that in Chapter 2 we learn that Adam and Eve made a bad decision in the Garden of Eden, to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil, says that God allowed them to make their own decisions, for good or ill.  And since we tend to learn more from bad decisions than we do good ones, maybe ultimately they made better decisions in the future.  Maybe the bad decision equipped them for the future.  For when God calls, God equips.

Theologian James Studer says:  “God does not “deign to create us from on high” and then merely to associate with us, even closely.  Instead w are God’s love affair, and our immortality is divine poetry.”  (Consciousness and Reality:  Our Entry into Creation,” Cross Currents)

Don’t you bask in the idea that you are God’s love affair?  And if God loves you that much, wouldn’t God want you to have purpose in life?  And if you have purpose in life, wouldn’t God want to help you achieve that purpose?  You are God’s love affair.  And when God calls, God equips.

We can’t look at Genesis 1 or 2 and discover exactly how God equipped Adam, so let’s look farther down the road into the New Testament for a bigger picture.

One of the ideas of the Equipping Church model is that “We all have gifts to fulfill our calling.”  It is true.  You and I, all of us, have gifts that will allow us to fulfill our calling, our purpose in life. 

In Matthew 25:14-30 we hear Jesus telling of the parable of the talents.  Jesus wants us to think about it this way:  a man goes on a trip, leaving his property to be managed by his servants.  To one he gives 5 talents, another two talents and the third receives one…each according to his ability.

The one who had five, invested well – putting it to work – and made five more.  The one who had two, did the same and gained two more.  But alas, the one who had one talent, buried it and gave back to the master his one talent.

            The first two servants heard, “Well done, good and faithful servant!”  And since they had done well, they got promotions and raises.

The third man took the easy way out.  He blamed the master saying,  'Master,' he said, 'I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed.  So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.' "His master replied, 'You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed?   Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.

The master said, “You’re fired” and sent him on his way.

As you think about this passage, don’t get caught up in the notion of the hard master being God.  In this parable the master is not God and Jesus is not encouraging us to think that way.  That would be yet another opportunity to take the easy way out.  Jesus says to look at yourselves, not others.

Jerry Goebel in his sermon “Well-done, good and faithful servant” says:  We are judged according to our own abilities; our own efforts. We are not even judged by our results and certainly not by the results of anyone else. The man with two talents is not judged against the man with five. Neither would the man with one talent be compared to the man with two. However, the castigated man’s reprisal was not relative to the amount he returned but to the effort he expended. God is not numbers-driven; God is compassion-driven. God’s accounts are not reconciled by what we’re accumulating but by what we’re distributing.

"The ultimate question of this story is; 'What did you do with what I gave you?' It is not; 'What did you do with what I gave someone else.' Or, 'What would you have done if I had given you more?'  What is my 'one talent' today? How am I investing God’s talent today? What am I doing with what I have NOW?"

Adam was given a task, to use one of his gifts.

Many years later, the Apostle Paul says to us in 1 Corinthians 12:4-12

⁴There are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit. ⁵There are different kinds of service, but the same Lord. ⁶There are different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all people.

 ⁷Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. ⁸To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by means of the same Spirit, ⁹to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, ¹⁰to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues,^[a] and to still another the interpretation of tongues.^{[b] 11}All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.  ¹²The body is a unit, though it is made up of many parts; and though all its parts are many, they form one body. So it is with Christ.”                                                                                                                                 

            Let me close with a word from Pastor Wayne Cordeiro, in his book Doing Church as a Team:  “Getting involved in using your gifts accelerates your spiritual growth immensely!  God designed us that way.  Don’t head for the grandstands when you enter the Kingdom of God.  Head for the playing field.  That’s where the excitement is.  That’s where the action is.  But most of all, that where our Coach is.”