Paul and me our call

From Wellington Cathedral of St Paul

Paul and Me – our Call 29 January 2012: am

The Rt Revd Thomas Brown, Bishop of Wellington

The Conversion of St Paul

• Psalm 67
• Jeremiah 1:4-10
• Acts 9:1-22
• Matthew 19:27-30

http://wellingtoncathedral.org.nz/index.php/Sermons

Paul was on the road to Damascus when God stopped him in his tracks. And I was driving along King St in the South Canterbury town of Temuka, when God stopped me.

Strange because I had always thought until just a few years ago, that Paul’s conversion and my call happened very differently. Setting aside Paul’s big star status, I had always thought my journey had been more like on the road to Emmaus – a more gradual gradient to climb to the discovery of my vocation.

In fact for a number of years I didn’t have a very high view of Paul – too evangelical, too stroppy – all very misplaced judgements [I know] of one who made a dramatic change from being a hunter of the followers of the Way, to becoming a servant of Christ and a bridge between the then Jewish-based faith and the gentiles. His change was a show-stopper by any standards whereas mine was of somewhat smaller proportions.

In my case, I had been driving along the street when I suddenly felt the need to stop and pop into the vicarage [without an appointment I might add] to talk with Cecil the vicar. The extraordinary thing was that while I wasn’t struck with a blinding light like Paul and I wasn’t admonished for chasing Christians, I was drawn into a situation where I found myself somewhat in the dark, trying to explain that I felt I was not meant to be marking time with my life – there was something more, something to do –whatever that was to be, and it all seemed to sheet back to God.

Paul became aware in his experience of having his life changed, as I have said, in the most dramatic way: from being the pursuer to being the server of the one known as the Christ: of becoming weak, needing to be lead around, reliant upon others and in particular, reliant on God.

For me in that small South Island town it was the scary way the vicar responded to my enquiry - he astonished me by saying he thought I was being called to ordination.

Not only that but he phoned the Bishop of Christchurch there and then. I remember the moment well. Cecil said “Bishop, I have someone with me who I think is being called”. I felt under the control of something beyond me – that events were racing on without me being in charge.

If Paul’s conversion to the faith and call to serve in ministry – and remember it was both and not merely conversion, can help me reflect on my call, it would not surprise me if his story gets you thinking about God’s call on your life and what your ministry may be or become.

Incidentally I’m not talent scouting for the next Bishop, nor even suggesting you may be called to ordination, although I think there will be at least one or two of you wondering about that.

But what of your journey, whether it be the spectacular Damascus road kind or the less dramatic but as significant, road to Emmaus. What of the call God makes on our lives, to serve the Church’s mission.

Often people think ministry is to do with what clergy do or the significant activities of lay people such as choir, children’s church, youth work, caring for the fabric of the church: floral art, cleaning and so on, or the important Ministry at the Door. All of that is but part of it – indeed as important as it can be – but wait, there’s more. What we do in the world is the most important. Bishop Graham Cray, The Archbishop of Canterbury’s Bishop for Mission, said that the issue isn’t whether the church should be more relevant but rather, that it should be more engaged in the world.

When I first became a bishop 21 years ago, Archbishop Brian Davis sent me off to learn about being a bishop – I went to the Bishop and Church leaders institute at the Alban Institute in Washington DC. One of the teachers Ed White, a retired Presbyterian Moderator told the conference that we didn’t take Lay Ministry seriously enough. Well, you can imagine the howls of protest.

Ed then asked us to raise our hands if when we were running parishes, we had bothered to have an annual blessing of Sunday School leaders. Everyone’s hand shot up. We had him on the ropes, but Ed replied that he expected us to say, ‘Yes’. He then asked us to keep our hands raised if we also had an annual dedication for school teachers. Everybody’s hand went down. And I remember feeling deep regret that I had not blessed school teachers in the congregation, or doctors and nurses or receptionists, civil servants or lawyers [they need it] or anyone serving in the community. Ministry, Ed reminded us, had become too confined to in-church activity.

Jesus called Paul not to run the local parish – others would do that – but to go out and bring the good news to the gentiles. I just want you to know that wherever you find yourselves in this world, whatever you are doing, you can be engaging in ministry. And it doesn’t require us to be great talkers of the faith but as S. James said “be doers of the word” or as S. Francis said, ‘at all times preach the gospel and if you have to use words’.

That’s what Ed White and Bishop Cray were on about.

Our call is be actively engaged with the world we live in. And today when we give thanks for S. Paul’s conversion and call to servant leadership, may we consider just what we can do and are capable of doing, all for Christ.