But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!”

It is no secret that I love football, especially this year since the Mets ended the baseball season back around the 4th of July. Each fall I re-live all of the other falls that I have known, all the joys that come to those who play, even in back yard games of touch, or watch the game; and all of the lessons that I learned, about life and preparation and motivation and how to lose and win graciously, during those long-ago years when I coached HS football in my Leave it To Beaver hometown.

Each fall I realize that the thing that separates football from most other sports is the diversity of gifts and talents that are needed and the discipline it takes to play your own position, to carry out your assignment, to take care of your business and to trust others to take care of theirs.

In baseball, my other favorite game, everyone needs to hit and throw and catch and run, except in the American League where they have that silly DH rule.

In basketball everyone needs to dribble and pass and shoot and, until they get to be professionals, they all even play defense. In soccer, running and kicking are the important and shared skills and skating is the common thread for ice hockey players. And so it goes, except for football.

The skills required, from position to position, are all so different, and the assignments on each play and from each formation are all so different, you don’t want Sean O’Hara and Eli Manning changing positions today when the Giants play, unless you are a Tampa Bay fan.

And you don’t want Debby Fasanello and I to switch places for the rest of this service, the sermon might improve but the music would be a nightmare.

We all have our place, our call, our assignment, our position and when we are all doing what we should be doing things go well. Most football plays are designed so that if everyone does what they are supposed to do they will result in a touchdown. Most Church activities – worship, stewardship, education, mission - are designed so that if everyone does what they are supposed to do our souls will be lifted to heights we have rarely known.

But the sad reality is that we don’t all do our jobs at the same time. We skip worship, we shortchange God in the offering plate, we stay home from an education event, we let others carry the mission load and then we say that we don’t get much out of our Church involvement!

Well we aren’t supposed to try to get much out of anything around here, we are supposed to put ourselves into everything around here so that God and others get something out of it. Then, as a byproduct but never as a goal, we discover that we get an enormous amount out of it, but that can take years and decades to realize or measure. Our job, everyone of us, is to provide God with pleasure by our prayers, our songs, our activities, our treatment of others and our lives. When we do that, the touchdowns come.

Debi was making me watch Sport Center the other day and a young rookie defender was being asked what the hardest thing to adjust to was, as he moved from college to the pros, and he said it was learning to not run all over the field, chasing the ball, but to fill his slot, to stay home and be sure that the play didn’t come back his way.

And I nodded because that was always one of the hardest things to teach young players, especially on kick off teams: to do their job, to stay in their lanes and let others do theirs.

And it has always been the hardest thing to teach Church folks of all ages: to do their job, to respond to God’s call upon their lives and to let others do theirs, responding in different and holy ways.

It was a lesson that Joshua, who would become the leader of the Israelites, but obviously never played football, hadn’t learned. Moses had led Joshua and the other leaders of Israel outside the camp to experience the presence of God, it a Pentecostal day when God’s spirit rested upon the leadership.

But back in the camp there were two others, Eldad and Medad, and they received the spirit as well. Joshua wanted Moses to stop them and Moses said, that’s not our job, that’s not our business.

Joshua is trying to limit God’s voice, God’s prophecy, to the “in crowd” and we hear the plea from Moses: Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them!

That’s God’s goal, you know.

God is always trying to go beyond the limits that we try to place, always seeking ways to stretch and include more and more people in the work of the kingdom, always trying to get more people on the field and in the game, and those people are going to be different, they are going to play the Christian role in life differently and that’s good.

God wants the Church, that’s us and all of the other us’s around the world, to develop people who will speak out for God in the communities where they find themselves.

That’s what prophets do, they speak out for God.

One of the great slogans of the European Reformation was that we are called to be a “priesthood of all believers” and a priest is one who speaks to God for the people. That’s a job that we all are called to do, to speak to God on the behalf of others.

In other words you are perfectly free to approach God without an intermediary, your prayers are as valued in God’s eyes as mine or anyone else’s, we are each priests and we pray for the world and for each other and for ourselves.

And, by and large, we understand that. But the prophet thing comes harder. I have not heard the great cry to be “a prophethood of all believers”.

But maybe that is exactly what the world needs right now, a Church that will interpret God’s law and will in the context of current events, “a prophethood of all believers”.

Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them!”

And that’s the same thing that is going on in the NT lesson, isn’t it?

Someone is claiming to be a follower of Jesus and the disciples are echoing Joshua when they say to Jesus “tell him to stop”. And Jesus says “Why? He’s on our side! And no one can stand on the side of Christ without being changed and shaped and molded for greater service.”

So what is your service?

Can you identify it?

Can you say, as the choir has said, “Our service is the gift of song to God, to lift the hearts of the congregation and to please the ears of God”?

Can you say, as the Church School teachers have, “Our service is allowing God to touch the hearts and minds and souls of our children, so that now and for decades to come, God will have others to speak for him in the world”?

Can you say as the Youth Leaders have said “Our service is to provide a safe and sacred environment where our teens can discern God’s presence in and call upon their lives”?

Can you say as 175 years of Consistories, each one different, have said in this place “Our service is to provide the ways and means for each individual to grow in worship and learning and service, so that together we may all be of use to God”? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them!”

That’s the goal of the Holy Spirit, to make us all prophetic, to inspire and instruct us in ways to speak of our faith to others who so desperately need to hear it.

Now you may well be sitting there listening to my rhetorical flourishes and thinking, “I’ve never heard a single person in the choir, the church school staff, the youth leadership or the Consistory, and that includes the minister, say anything even remotely close to that.”

And in a purely verbal sense, you are absolutely correct, we are much more a “do it” then “speak it” congregation, we always have been.

But in their actions, showing up for Choir practice, preparing lessons for Church School, planning activities for the Youth Group, enduring all of my goofy ideas at meeting after meeting and bringing me back to earth as they find ways to make the essential things possible here, in all of the things that matter, they have spoken of their response to God’s call with an eloquence that is greater than words.

We all have.

We proclaim God’s love every time we say a prayer, every time we show up for worship, every time we sing a hymn, every time we encourage a friend, every time we greet a stranger, every time we forgive an enemy . . . or a loved one, every time we write a check to the Church.

We are all the prophets of God, some with flamboyant and obvious faith, others with restrained and subtle faith, all of us using our gifts for God’s glory.

Like a well-coached team we each have a place and a position to play here.

Do you know what it is?

God knows.

God has created you for a very special place and position.

And have you prayed that God will tell you what your special place and position might be?

Have you prayed that God will tell you what to do in your life?

I have, and I suspect we all have.

Well here’s the thing: God will never tell you what your place and position are, God will never tell you what to do in your life. You see, God is going to reveal it to you, as you go out and live your life with faith.

We need to let go of our need for certainty and direction, we need to go out each day and live our lives as faithfully as we can and when we do we will find the role that God has created us for, we will find the tasks that God has called us to.

Tough thing to do, letting go of our plans and dreams to accept God’s will, letting go of our egos and pride to accept God’s wisdom. But the more we work at it the more we discover what God has in mind for us and the easier it becomes for us to convey God’s love to others, and to ourselves.

It means coloring outside of the lines at times.

It means prophesying back in the camp.

It means listening to those who are different than we are, and learning that those who are not with us are not necessarily against us. It means accepting our own role as prophets, speakers for God with words or actions, and it means allowing and encouraging others to play their prophetic role so that the full dimensions of the gospel might be seen, heard, understood and accepted by the world.

When we do that, when we all play our own position, all of the good things that God has promised come to us and when one sings, we all sing, when one teaches, we all teach, when one encourages, we all encourage, when one serves, we all serve. One people, one heart, one church, one God in a wondrous and holy diversity, that is what we are created to be, that is what we are when we do our part and allow, encourage and trust others to do theirs.

“Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets, and that the Lord would put his spirit on them!”

Clover Hill Reformed Church 1834-2009 A 175 Day Scriptural Companion Dear Friends, As we progress through our Anniversary Year, I invite you to join together in a shared reading of scripture. I have selected 175 passages, from Genesis through Revelation, that have had special meaning in our Congregational life. Go Here