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The theme of this afternoon’s worship is advocacy and service. Taken together these constitute what is traditionally called the prophetic ministry of the church. I want to address this ministry in three ways with three questions: Why a prophetic ministry? What is a prophetic ministry? How is this ministry accomplished?

First, why is there a prophetic ministry? The answer: because God calls us to that ministry. Much could be said about this, but let the scripture from Isaiah stand as our text. God always calls prophets. The call of this particular unknown prophet is not unique. It is the call of God that bestows power and authority. Prophets frequently protest that they are unworthy. But God always replies, "Fear not. I will be with you." In the case of today’s scripture, what is interesting is that the call is to a community: Israel. Not just an individual, but a people are being called. In any age an interesting question to ask is "Who are the authentic prophets today?" I believe that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., was such a person. But the more important question is whether the Christian Church itself is responding to its call. God is calling you as an individual to some task or mission. But God is also calling us.

Second, what is the nature of the prophetic calling? It is to speak and to act. But it is to speak and to act in very special ways. It is to speak God’s Word and to act in such a way that God’s Word is revealed. Scripture frequently describes God’s Word as a sword. In the scripture from Isaiah we find two additional images: the arrow and the light. The prophet says "he made me a polished arrow, in his quiver he hid me away." Our call, first and foremost, is to speak out; to speak the truth. The French writer, Albert Camus, himself an atheist, once said that he didn’t necessarily expect Christians to always do good, or even be good themselves. But what he did hope was that, at least, they would speak out. Elie Weisel said the prophetic task is to speak the truth to power. Toward the end of his life, Mark Twain became more and more outspoken about the injustices he saw around him in the world. His attack on King Leopold of Belgium’s abuses of Africans in the Congo was so blistering that no one dared to print it. And when he wrote of his disgust with what he regarded as Theodore Roosevelt’s glorification of war, TR refused to shake his hand at a college commencement. The Word goes forth with power and it lands with impact. And if we embody that Word, we go forth like polished arrows. Second, God says, "I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth." Jesus says "You are the light of the world, " and
be like "a light set upon a hilltop." The image of the arrow in the quiver of God captures the cutting, the penetrating character of God’s Word. But the purpose of the word is to shed light. Today, as always, the purpose of the prophetic is to be arrows in God’s quiver and to shed light to the nations.

First, there is a prophetic ministry because God calls us to it. Second, that ministry consists of our becoming polished arrows and lights set upon a hill. Third, how shall we accomplish this? Protestant theologian Karl Barth once said that to be a Christian today, you need only the Bible and the newspaper. I would put it this way: to fulfill the prophetic ministry today, one needs to read the newspaper with spiritual discernment. In fact, sometimes all you need is the front page. I picked up the Washington Post last Tuesday, for example. Skipping the article on President Bush’s choking on the pretzel, here are the headlines: "Redskins Sign Up Spurrier, Former Florida Coach Receives 5-Year Deal for Almost $25 Million" "Enron Chief Got Early Warning, Staffer’s Memo Told Lay In August of ‘Scandals’" "Delays Cited In Charging Detainees, With Legal Latitude, INS Sometimes Took Weeks" "U.S. Eyes Shift in Colombia Policy, Greater Aid for War Against Leftist Guerrillas Sought." "Mentally Ill’s Options Vanishing, Funding Cited in Closing of 3 More Montgomery Clinics." You can look at each one of these separately, or connect them. There is a real mental health crisis in Montgomery County. Particularly hard hit are those programs designed to keep people out of institutions and functioning in jobs, mainly people in a "gray" zone who earn too much to receive Medicaid but have no health insurance. To treat a person in a state hospital can run to $180,000 a year. Yet outpatient clinics are now closing their doors when far less money per patient is needed to keep going. So I hold that headline up against Mr. Spurrier’s $25 million in five years. Is anyone’s services worth that much? Am I missing something here? And I won’t even go into the $7 million paid to a coach with a losing season. If you turn to the Op Ed page of that same newspaper, you will find a column by George F. Will on the Enron debacle. Mr. Will, someone I rarely seem to agree with, says this:

…a mature capitalist economy is a government project. A properly functioning free market system does not spring spontaneously from society’s soil as dandelions spring from suburban lawns. Rather, it is a complex creation of laws and mores that guarantee, among much else, transparency, meaning a sufficient stream – torrent, really – of reliable information about the condition and conduct of corporations….Off and on over the years, a few capitalists have done more to delegitimize capitalism than America’s…socialist critics or today’s…left could hope to do…Indignation is a precondition for whatever new laws and regulations are required to prevent behavior such as Enron’s…

Will then goes on to take President Bush to task for his apparent lack of indignation about the whole matter.

Below Will’s column there is a piece written by a philosopher on the issue of the Redskins’ name. It’s interesting and clever. However, my personal view of this is simple. Speaking for myself, I believe that God will continue to punish the Redskins and Mr. Snyder with bad coaching and losing seasons until the name changes.

But my point in all this is that these headlines provide us with a call from God, a call to be arrows in God’s quiver and a light to the world. There are many things to speak out about: such as the positively obscene and corrupting amounts of money thrown around in professional sports; the immorality and unaccountability of the corporate executive class in America; official abuse of the civil and human rights of hundreds of detainees following 9/11; and the fact that U.S. foreign aid today means mostly military aid to repressive regimes.

A prophetic ministry is to speak and to act: advocacy and service. Three important resources we can turn to with confidence are the United Church of Christ, Community Ministry of Montgomery County, and our own Board for Social Witness. Under the newly formed Justice and Witness Ministries of the UCC we are kept abreast of national issues the church needs to speak out on. Community Ministry of Montgomery County, which we regularly support, has a focused advocacy agenda for the 2002 Maryland State legislative agenda. On the issue of adequate mental health funding, CMMC successfully lobbied the County Council to come up with additional funding, and is now urging that the legislature "Fund the $37 M deficit for current mental health system patients and additional funding to close the gap on unmet needs." Our congregation is currently involved in a thoughtful process of engagement with the Boy Scouts of American, locally and nationally, regarding its policies toward the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered community.

God continues to call us to a prophetic ministry of speaking out and serving. God has called us to be like polished arrows and a light to the world. And God has equipped us with all we need to do this. I would like to close with a short prayer quoted by Becky Wagner, the Executive Director of Community Ministry of Montgomery County.

Grant that our lives may be:
Surprising in forgiveness and healing,
Abounding in joy and laughter, and
Daring in deeds and dreams of justice.

Amen.

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