Texts: 1 Samuel 3:1-10; 1 Corinthians 6:12-20; John 1:43-51
Last week in my sermon at Holy Trinity I talked about baptism; and I took the opportunity to talk about how our baptismal practice is going to have to change in the future. I pointed out that it is now generally accepted that Christendom has finished; there is no longer a belief that certain nations are Christian and that any child born in them is Christian by birth. That was a widespread belief during the heydays of Christendom; that's what underlay our practice of "christenings" – nobody ever talked about adults being "christened" – only infants and children were christened – and a very large percentage of them were. It was not thought of as a major spiritual event; a christening was simply a glorified naming service, a ritual recognition that the child was one of us by birth.
But all that is passing away. The canon law of the Church still stipulates today that a wedding may only take place in a church if at least one of the parties is baptised; so when a couple approach me about having their wedding in the church the first thing I have to check with them is whether or not either of them has been baptised. When I started in 1990 I never struck a couple where that was a problem; in all cases both parties had been "done" as infants. Twenty years on that has already changed, and my guess is that today only a minority of infants born in this country are baptised. Which leads us to the obvious question: if we become members of the Church by baptism, where are the members of the Church to come from in the future?
And the answer, if there is one, must be through adult baptism, a practice that predominated in the Church for the first three hundred years of our history, but almost fell into disuse during the centuries of Christendom, except, of course, where missionaries made converts in some distant non-Christian land. So the challenge of the Church in the post-Christendom future will be the same as it was in our pre-Christendom past – to convince adults of the truth of the gospel, to convert and baptise adults, and to encourage adults to share their faith with their children. So how do we go about that? Well, today's readings are a good place to start.
The first lesson this morning is one of my favourite comedy sketches in the whole of our Scriptures. The author, whoever he was, obviously had great fun telling this story of the call of Samuel. Let's just picture the scene. We're told that this scene is set in the temple, but, of course, this is not the great Temple built by Solomon. This is a sort of proto-temple; it may even have been a tent. It was wherever the Ark of God was being kept at the time. Eli the priest was attending it, and Samuel had been given to him by his mother, Hannah. The story takes place at night. Samuel, a young lad at the time is lying down in one part of the temple, and Eli in another. The author tells us that Eli's eyesight is failing; but since there is no further reference in the story to his physical sight, this may be a veiled reference to his lack of spiritual awareness.
Then God calls to Samuel by name. Samuel hears his name called – but he naturally assumes that it must be Eli calling him, and so he goes brightly to his master and presents himself. Eli sends him back to bed. It happens again, exactly as before. Then, when it happens a third time, the penny drops for Eli. Why did it take so long? Well, the author has already told us: In those days the word of the Lord was rare; there were not many visions. Eli the priest was not used to hearing or seeing God.
Nor, of course, was Samuel. He was too young. Now Samuel did not yet know the Lord. The word of the Lord had not yet been revealed to him. So Eli had to tell Samuel what was going on, and how to respond if it happened again. And it did happen again. God had a message that he wanted Samuel to tell Eli. It concerned Eli's children, and Eli's failure to discipline them. His sons made themselves contemptible, and he failed to restrain them. It seems that God had already warned Eli about this, but Eli had not done anything about it.
So what have we got in this story? We have an old priest who has failed to listen to God directly. So God needs a messenger to speak to Eli for him. The only person to hand is young Samuel; but Samuel doesn't know God's voice. Eli has to interpret for him, so that Samuel can give Eli a message about his awful children! As I said, it's a great little sit-com; but what message does it have for us? Following on from last week's theme, it says quite a bit about how adults and children come to faith. It says that Eli has been falling down in his responsibilities as a parent. It says that God can speak directly to children, but children need the guidance of adults to recognise God's voice, to understand what is going on, and to respond appropriately.
Above all it says that institutional religion, represented by Eli, is in itself inclined to blindness and deafness. It requires the direct intervention of God – the prompting of the Holy Spirit – to breathe fresh life into the Church. It requires obedience to the Word of God, however awkward that may be. We can understand Samuel's reluctance to pass on God's message to Eli. But passing on the message is precisely what the Church is called to do.
We meet variations on that theme in our other two readings. St John is already dealing with the identity of Jesus; and in this first chapter of his gospel he has already said some amazing things. Frankly, it is most unlikely that John the Baptist said of Jesus in those early days: "Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" It is much more likely that St John the great theologian put those words in the prophet's mouth. They are part of his struggle to make the relationship between John the Baptist and Jesus clear, a struggle which went on for some time in the infant Church.
Be all that as it may, when we get to the calling of the first disciples an interesting pattern emerges. According to St John, it was John the Baptist who first pointed Andrew in the direction of Jesus, and we know what happened next. The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, "We have found the Messiah" (that is, the Christ). And he brought him to Jesus.
We find this same pattern in today's story; and this time, apart from another comedic touch, a point of interest is how often the word "find" is used. Jesus is leaving for Galilee, and, "finding Philip", he calls him into discipleship. Philip then "found" Nathaniel, and told him, "We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote – Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph." We should notice in passing how down-to-earth this description of Jesus is, in comparison to the words attributed to Andrew. But above all we should notice that the first task of a disciple is to seek and find others and share the good news with them; and bring them to Jesus so they can see and hear for themselves. Nathaniel is unconvinced by Philip; he has the same view of people from Nazareth as we have about people from Auckland. But when he meets Jesus he is quickly convinced.
St Paul reminds us of the ongoing need for teaching in the Church. Evangelism is not enough. Having brought people into the faith, he continues to teach and encourage. And his exhortations are the sort that Eli failed to give to his sons. True belief should be manifested in our way of life, our lifestyle, as we might call it today. That is not a matter of law: we are free to make our own choices, but the choices we make reveal the sincerity or otherwise of our faith.
In March our diocese is having yet another conference to consider our future. We could start by recognising that we are rather like old Eli; still faithfully doing what we've always done, but with little expectation of hearing God or seeing visions. We could start by recapturing confidence in the gospel, boldly and consistently preached, to convince and convert adults. We could start by reviewing our lifestyle in the light of biblical teaching. We could start by learning from our own past history, the good and the bad.
That's how we could start. Or we could play it safe and have another conference like all the others we've had in recent years. Eli would have enjoyed those, but Samuel would have run away.
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