Isaiah 49:1-7
http://bible.oremus.org/browser.cgi?passage=isaiah+49%3A1-7
1 Corinthians 1:1-9
http://bible.oremus.org/browser.cgi?passage=1+cor+1%3A1-9
John 1:29-42
http://bible.oremus.org/browser.cgi?passage=john+1%3A29-42
In the movie, the Fellowship of the Ring, taken from the book by J.R.R. Tolkien, there is a scene where a young, only slightly adventurous hobbit, named Frodo is called to carry a weapon of destruction into the heart of evil to destroy it in order to save the world. It is a pivotal moment in the movie, and a touching one, because Frodo neither wants to nor is really even capable of carrying out such a task. His idea of achieving something big is to get the weapon out of his home village, across the land, and into the home of the elves, so that they can destroy it. Instead, he is called to go far beyond himself, far beyond any adventure he might have wished to have had, straight into the mouth of hell itself. It is, as Gandalf his friend describes it, a fool’s errand. It is dangerous, full of peril, and if Frodo fails, which he is almost certain to do, the whole world will be taken over by evil and destroyed.
Of course, since this movie and book are only the first of three, you can guess what Frodo does. He accepts the call and goes on a quest to destroy the weapon - a ring - and save the world. However, Frodo is not called to go on this journey alone. Instead, he is given eight other companions to help him, and these companions - this "fellowship of the ring" - help Frodo in such a way that he is actually able to destroy the ring and save the world.
But this fellowship is sometimes a difficult thing. It begins full of hostilities. The elf and the dwarf hate each other. One of the men is highly suspicious of the other and actually attacks Frodo at one point to gain control of the ring. Two of Frodo’s friends are just along for the ride and cause terrible things to happen because of their foolishness, but despite all of this, without them, without the fellowship’s weakness and mistakes and failures, without this flawed fellowship, Frodo would not have been able to save the world. Without them he would have failed, and died, but with this community, through the support and strength of this fellowship, he does, indeed, save the world.
Today’s readings are, believe it or not, about fellowship and being called by God to do great things in order to make the world a better place. These things aren’t easy, they’re maybe not even things that we would want to do, but we are called to do them none the less. And we are given a fellowship to help us.
So, to start, the calling. What are we called to do with our lives? Well, we’re going to leave J.R.R. Tolkien now, and go back to the Bible. And in our reading this morning, we hear the author of Isaiah begin by telling his, or her, listeners that they’re not called to "raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel." In other words, they’re not called to the mighty task of restoring Israel after its invasion by the Babylonians, they’re not called to bring back all of God’s lost Hebrew children. That task is, actually, too... well... small for them. It’s not too big, although it is a huge task. It’s actually too small, too light a thing. Instead, God wants Isaiah’s listeners to be a "light to the nations, that [the Lord’s] salvation may reach to the end of the earth." They are called to the enormous task of restoring not Israel but the whole world. They are called not to bring back God’s Hebrew children but to go out to all of God’s children wherever they are, no matter where they come from, no matter who they worship. It is a giant task, one that seems pretty much impossible to carry out, and yet that seems to be what God wants. And that seems to be what God is calling us to do, as well.
We are called not to be a light of God only in our homes and among our friends but to be a light to the entire world, to every single person we come across, in every single minute of our day, whether we want to or not, whether we feel like it or not. We are called to be living witnesses to the light of God, not just when we walk out of church and feel good about the world, not just when the sun is shining and the snow is melting, not just when people are nice to us, but when we’re tired, when we’re angry, when it’s thirty minutes to the end of work and we’ve just learned we have to work overtime. We’re called to shine forth the light and love of Christ in the world when we’re in pain, when we’re suffering, when people hate us. This is no walk through the meadow we’re called to. Like the hobbit, Frodo, who wasn’t called just to bring the ring to Rivendell, the home of the elves, a huge task in and of itself, but to bring it all the way to Mount Doom, to the heart of evil, we are called to something much, much bigger than ourselves, to something that seems impossible, to bring Christ’s light and love to the end of the world, to the heart of other people’s darkness. A fool’s errand.
But God does not call us to carry out this task alone. We wouldn’t be able to do it alone. Without the fellowship to support him as he grew weak, to remind him of the reason for taking on this difficult quest, to draw fire for him, to remove obstacles from his way, Frodo would never have been able to fulfill his mission. And the same is true for us. Without a similar fellowship, we, too, would be completely unable to carry out God’s call.
But, lucky for us and lucky for Frodo, that is not how we are meant to do it. Instead, we are given companions, to help us on our way. Paul, in his first letter to the Corinthians, says as much when he says, "God is faithful; by God you were called into the fellowship of God’s Son, Jesus Christ our Lord." God has created a fellowship for us, made up of other Christians and, most importantly, of Jesus Christ. And this is what is going to help us. You see, Paul tells us that through Christ, we have been given the grace of God, we have been "enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind. . . so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift." Because we are brought into fellowship with Christ, through baptism, we have all the tools we need to take on this impossible call. We have been given patience, endurance, love, and the ability to forgive others. We are made able to be this tremendous light to the nations, to bring the Lord’s salvation to the end of the earth. But we must do it in fellowship with one another. Otherwise we will fail.
A year ago this Sunday, we as a congregation embarked on a year-long process of determining where God is calling us. And after much thoughtful and prayerful consideration, you, the congregation, have highlighted six areas of growth that are going to help us to accept God’s call. The first one, which you have in this month’s newsletter, is relevant to today. It says, we will use our gift of hospitality to strengthen this community by getting to know better the people whom God has sent into the life of this congregation. This statement is about fellowship. It’s about walking together to help each other be a light to the nations. And through the coming months, we will be working to make this statement a reality. We will be looking at various ways to get to know one another better, to enter into fellowship with one another.
Now fellowships aren’t always comfortable. Just because people are companions, committed to helping each other achieve the impossible, just because they are a fellowship, doesn’t mean that everyone will get along. We may find, in getting to know one another, that we don’t always really like someone else, or agree with them. We may want to hide certain things about ourselves, or put up walls to prevent others from seeing our sins.
But the fact remains that without fellowship, we have no hope of even coming close to fulfilling God’s call to us. The gifts we are given through Christ are given to us as a group, to use as a group. And so we risk certain things for the sake of God’s call and for the sake of the fellowship. We risk our privacy. When we enter into fellowship with Christ and with one another, we risk people really knowing who we are - what our failures are, our weaknesses, our deep-dark secrets. We risk our independence. When we commit to being companions, we can no longer put ourselves first, doing what we want when we want. We have to put the well-being of the fellowship, and its goals, first. And we risk intimacy - when we become part of a community dedicated to answering a common call, we risk actually getting to know and love the people around us. We become vulnerable to sharing in their pain and suffering. We risk a lot when we enter into fellowship with Christ and with one another in order to answer God’s call.
But we can do it because Christ entered into fellowship with us first. Christ risked loving us, and being known to us, and entering intimately into our pain and suffering in order to be in fellowship with us, and then, knowing more about who we are than even we ourselves, knowing our failures and weaknesses and mistakes, Christ gave us his strength to accomplish the task God has set us to. "My God has become my strength," says the writer of Isaiah. "The testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you," says Paul. "He will also strengthen you to the end." We are not called to do what Christ has not already done for us. We are not, in fact, called to do the impossible.
Frodo, in the pivotal moment in the movie when he accepts the call laid before him, says, "I will take the ring, though I do not know the way." We are called to say the same thing to God - to accept the call to carry God’s light to all corners of the world, though we do not know what will come. But, like Frodo, we are given a fellowship, eternally bound by the love of Christ, and so we cannot fail. So, I encourage you, as you leave this place and go out into the world, to carry the light of Christ with you, to the end of the earth, knowing that you are supported and strengthened in your work by the people around you, and by Jesus Christ. Thanks be to God. Amen.
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