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The opening verses of the Book of Jeremiah constitute the "Call" of the prophet. Any consideration of prophetic call inevitably raises extremely hard, perhaps unanswerable questions; namely: How does God speak to us? How do you know it is the voice of God? Who are the true prophets today? Don’t mentally ill people hear voices? I will be circling around these questions, but I don’t have any easy answers. However, I will say this. Whoever the prophets were, the Church of Jesus Christ today has a prophetic role. Our question should not so much be "Who are the prophets?" as "How are we called to act as a prophetic church?"

The prophets of ancient Israel combined two attributes: each was a religious mystic and each was a fierce and uncompromising social critic. It is impossible to separate the spiritual from the social in the writings of the prophets. For the prophets the sin of religious hypocrisy and social injustice were inseparable. Their criticism was not of the irreligious or unchurched, but of the powerful who regarded themselves as devout. Their social critique exposed how the rich corrupted justice to take the lands and property and self-respect of the poor.

In Jeremiah we are provided with a vivid glimpse into the heart and soul of one such prophet. We know not only what Jeremiah said and did, but how he felt as he fulfilled his call. Let’s look at these verses in Chapter One of Jeremiah’s book.

Jeremiah had a long, long ministry, beginning toward the end of the 7^th century BCE and concluding sometime after the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians in 587 BCE. His call apparently came when he was quite a young boy, though we cannot know his age for sure. How did that happen? Did he actually hear a voice? Was he looking back with discernment from a vantage point in the future? We simply don’t know. It is important to recognize that Jeremiah is quite imaginative. My personal guess is that the prophets didn’t literally hear voices, but that the Word of God came to them through imaginative engagement with what was going on. Elsewhere Jeremiah sees a boiling pot tipping in a certain direction, and a thought comes to him. He sees almond branches and another thought comes. He broods, he reflects. And God’s Word speaks through these musings. Or perhaps a voice came in some sort of mystical state. The first prophets were roving bands of ecstatics. We don’t know. But Jeremiah believed that God’s Word came to him repeatedly and unmistakably throughout his life.

God says to Jeremiah "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations." Now think about that. Before Jeremiah was even conceived, God had his duties all spelled out for him. There is an eerie irrationality about these words. A famous zen koan says "What did your face look like before your parents were born?" That’s illogical and impossible nonsense. Yet God not only knew what Jeremiah’s face looked like he knew him. Here is a God whose sovereignty extends far beyond the grasp of our minds. And God says "I appointed you a prophet to the nations." The nations means the whole world. Everything. A prophet to all religious, social, and political power.

Can we not identify with Jeremiah’s response to this? "Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy." The Hebrew word here is na’ar, which means something like "little kid." Jeremiah’s words convey tremendous anguish, amazement and fear. "What are you saying, God! This is crazy! I’m a little kid!" Sometimes Jeremiah is referred to as the reluctant prophet. But I wonder if his reluctance is universal to the prophetic calling. Moses is reluctant before God’s voice in the burning bush. Think of the outright refusal of Jonah. Such reluctance, it seems to me, is not so much a sign of lack of faith, as it is the prophet’s basic sanity. Who in his or her right mind would not react to the call of God with fear, trembling and skepticism? Jeremiah provides us with a window into this depth of reluctance. Who are the true prophets? On rare occasion, I will tune in to one of our television evangelists. I am often quite frankly disgusted with their smug self-assurance and absolute certainty that their word is God’s Word, and God could not have done better than to have chosen such a fine spokesperson. Where is their terror in assuming such a role? Where is the fear and trembling to be appointed a bearer of God’s Word into the world? Who are the true prophets? I think of Martin Luther King, Jr. sitting at his kitchen table in the dark of night having just received a death threat on the telephone. Sitting there struggling in conflict between what he knows God has called him to do and the terrible price that call is exacting. True prophets know the cost of discipleship.

Jeremiah’s fear is real and visceral. But God replies, "Do not say ‘I am only a boy’: for you shall go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, says the LORD." The prophetic call is this, no more, no less: "Go where I tell you to go, and say what I tell you to say." That’s it. God says "Keep your eye on the ball." We know from his book that Jeremiah, over the years, is given a whole host of orders. He goes to the Temple and confronts the High Priest. He goes to the palace and confronts the King. He goes to his hometown and buys a parcel of land. He dons a yoke and goes through the streets of Jerusalem. All these things are the content of how his call is fleshed out. Every call of God is really God telling us to go somewhere, to a particular place and person, and say what we are told to say.

Now notice that God doesn’t dwell at all on Jeremiah’s character. I believe in character building. I believe in the educational ministry of the church. I believe in taking seriously the moral formation of children and youth who will understand honesty, integrity, and wisdom. That goes without saying. But in this prophetic dimension, the prophet’s role is simply to carry the Word of God where it needs to go and make sure the right people hear it. And the only issue of personal integrity involved at all is the prophet’s need to overcome fear, a quite reasonable and understandable fear, after all. God’s response to the prophet are these incandescent words "Fear not, I will be with you."

Yes, character is important. Yet prophets are to be judged by their faithful response to the call, and the content of their character is less relevant. Obviously the two are related. But if someone rushes into this sanctuary and shouts that the building is on fire, we will probably pay closer attention to the content of the message than the character of the messenger. And even then the matter of character is not so much one of moral rectitude as it is believability. Someone warning me to flee a burning building needs to be credible, not necessarily moral. We’ve seen an example of how this works with the revelation last week that the Rev. Jesse Jackson fathered a child by a woman who was his colleague. On the one hand, we must separate his message of social justice for America from the man. On the other, we must acknowledge that the credibility of the message is connected with the credibility of the messenger. The power of Jesus’ ministry came from the fact that people said he spoke with "authority" – that the integrity of who he was, was inseparable from what he preached. Yet, even with Jesus, we find that in his hometown of Nazareth, people rejected his message because they couldn’t believe this son of Joseph was anybody special.

It is easy to put down the messenger as a way of avoiding the message. But the point, as God shows Jeremiah, is the message. Rev. Jackson can be accused of hypocrisy. Everyone can agree that his credibility has been hurt. Yet, if we look at the Bible, it is the continual story of deeply flawed individuals who are called upon to bear God’s message into the world. The list is endless and the failings are serious – Abraham abandons Sarah to Pharoah’s harem to save his own skin; Jacob betrays his blind father and stupid brother; Joseph is a provocative and whiney momma’s boy; David engineers the death of one of his own soldiers to steal his wife; Peter can be a vacuous loudmouth (in fact the whole lot of the disciples seems sometimes a rag-tag band of losers). And Jeremiah himself is forever complaining of the miserable lot in life being a prophet has brought him. The Bible goes far out of its way to stress the serious moral and character flaws of those very persons to whom God bestows the Word. It just assumes that is the case with all of us. None of us is worthy of what we are called to do. None. And in responding to God’s call, that personal unworthiness is made obvious to the whole world. Yet our unworthiness can never be used as an excuse to reject the call. For God is saying "I will be with you and nothing else really matters. Nothing – not even your most obvious failings." So who are the true prophets today? Look for people whose moral and character flaws are pretty obvious to everybody. And, on the other hand, be very cautious of those who appear upright, righteous, and models of good behavior. They are the ones you better be careful of. And this, of course, was Jesus’ message continually.

And then the hand of God was put out and God touched Jeremiah’s mouth.
Now I have put my words in your mouth,
See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms,
to pluck up and to pull down,
to destroy and to overthrow,
to build and to plant.

With respect to the content of God’s message, these closing verses tell us that the Word of God is not immutable and never-changing – the content of God’s message is related to the season and the circumstances. Sometimes the prophetic message will be perceived as devastating and destructive – God’s withering and dis-illusioning Word. At other times it will be encouraging and uplifting; sometimes destroying and overthrowing, sometimes building and planting.

But what is particularly sobering, even terrifying, is when God says "See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms." The operative word here is "over." God is saying that the ministry of the prophet and the prophetic ministry of the Christian Church is to speak and act from a higher plane than the rulers of this world. We are called to speak truth to power with the authority of God.

What a job we have! What discernment this calls for! What study of the Bible, prayer and reflection! The prophets were both intense mystics and ferocious critics. What would a Christ Congregational Church that is both unashamedly mystical, and courageously blunt in its social critique look like? And at the same time, of course, without neglecting the formation of Christian character, the care of the hurting, and the healing of the wounds of our community?

Well, it does seem impossible, doesn’t it? Especially, when we all know in our hearts what morally suspect, inept, bumbling, and hypocritical phonies each of us really is. How can it be that in spite of the impossibility of the task and the inadequacy of our character, God has nevertheless issued the call to us and this Church?

Who are the prophets today? Who are those called to speak God’s Word to the world at this very moment? We are. Send us. AMEN.

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