Second Sunday after Epiphany

Richard Davenport January 16, 2022 - 2nd Sunday after Epiphany 1 Corinthians 12:1-11 I've always been pretty good in school, but I can certainly say there were fields I didn't do so well in. I remember starting out in high school and taking math classes. I remember doing really well, but as time went on I started to fall back. I was still ahead of most of the other folks in my grade, so I thought college wouldn't be too big a deal. It might be tough, but I'd manage to get through. I remember sitting in my calculus courses in undergrad and becoming increasingly lost. Many of the other students didn't seem to be having much trouble. They were moving through the program at least. I didn't fare so well. The same was true for the computer programming courses I had to take. I distinctly remember at one point I had to write a program that I just couldn't figure out how to do for the life of me. Most of my friends there were in the computer science program and had taken this class the previous year, so I enlisted their help. At one point I had three of them standing around me trying to help me get it done. Granted, they all agreed what the professor had asked for was ridiculous because no one would write a program that way. I felt a little vindicated after that, but it didn't change the fact that I wasn't doing well. I wasn't making sense of most of what I was trying to do there. I certainly could have applied myself a little more, but the problem I think went deeper than that. Hearing about life at the nursing college where Laurie taught back in Cincinnati, there are a lot of resources to help students that are struggling. If there was anything like that at my school, I had no idea. No professor took the time to talk to me. No guidance counselor offered suggestions or direction. If those resources had been there and if I had availed myself of them, would things have been different? I can't really say for sure, but I kind of think it wouldn't have changed all that much. I never found math to be all that interesting. Theology is far more interesting to me and it gives me a lot of satisfaction to be able to put all of the pieces together and to help other people do the same. At the time though, I was pretty jealous. I just couldn't get it together to follow that particular path. Most of my friends from high school and college are working in computer fields in one way or another and many of them are making over $100,000 a year. A couple of them I know are making quite a bit more than that. I don't begrudge what I have, but it's hard not to be jealous of that too sometimes. That jealousy is a hard thing to shake. It's not that I think about it all the time, but every so often you're confronted by the life you don't have, the life maybe you could have had and it gets under your skin just a bit. What you've got starts to look a lot less valuable. That's kind of how these sorts of things are judged. The in-demand job fields are where people make the big salaries. It starts to feel like maybe God doesn't want you to be as happy as those other folks. They just have something going on that God likes better or maybe it's all kind of random and you just got the short end of the stick. Sort of like there's lots of work to get done and someone's going to get stuck doing the stuff no one else wants to do, and that person happens to be you. No one asked whether you'll like it or not and no one really cares. Just do what you've been given to do. No kid grows up dreaming of becoming a custodian or garbage collector, but someone's got to do the job and if those are the skills you have then that seems to be what you're destined to do. The grass starts looking a whole lot greener on the other side of that fence. When you think back to how you ended up where you did, the blame ends up falling pretty squarely on God's shoulders. After all, if he hadn't given you what he did, you wouldn't have ended up where you did. You start to wonder what you did or what God has against you to put you here. Everyone else has it so much better. I mean, sure, there's sin in the world and I'm a sinner, but so is everyone else. So why do I end up getting stuck? We start thinking this way about just about everything God does for us and everything he gives us. Spiritual things fall into the same category. Some definitely seem more useful or valuable than others. We call them "spiritual gifts," but some of those gifts feel a lot more like those garish Christmas sweaters you're always getting from old Aunt Marjorie, the ones you open, you smile for the camera, and you promptly stuff in the closet next to all of the other ones you've gotten, never to see the light of day. If God loves you, he has a funny way of showing it. I wonder though, what life would be like if hadn't been given anything. I'd like to think we'd have a life of endless potential, the freedom to do anything we wanted, the future a blank slate to write whatever wanted on it, but I'm fairly certain it would be anything but that. Without any of God's gifts, we'd be like newborns, or at least toddlers. We'd have no talents, no skills, no aptitudes. Everything would be difficult. We wouldn't be good at anything except failure. Every day would be a slog and every task we'd try to complete would be a new mountain to climb. Life would be pretty awful. We compare ourselves with one another and find other people who look like they're a lot better off than we are. They have an easier life. They have more money. They're more talented. When we extend that same notion to spiritual gifts it ends up being, "She's more generous. He's better at connecting with people. All I can do is help out here and there. It just isn't very important. God doesn't want me to be very useful. He doesn't want or need my contribution." We compare ourselves to other people in worldly terms and in spiritual terms as if there's a hierarchy, as if some are more important than others. But none of us are the head of the Church or King of Creation. None of us are in charge. St. Paul describes us as the Body of Christ, the hands, the feet, the various other parts, but Jesus is the head. Jesus stands above us all and he stoops down to serve us, as he shows the disciples at the Last Supper. So our thoughts should be focused not on how valuable God seems to think we are, and simply on the task of service. Jesus is the king of his kingdom. He knows what needs to be done and who is best to do it. He gives his gifts to ensure everything that needs to be done can be done. Every part of the work is necessary for building up his kingdom and for sharing his love with his people. All of it is important and none of it can be ignored. We see our gifts through worldly eyes and come to the conclusion God must not think very highly of us. Seeing our life through God's eyes, we find that he has entrusted each of us with critical jobs in his kingdom. He has given us the tools we need to do the jobs set before us, the skills and talents he has provided us, his Word and Sacraments to teach us and strengthen us, the Holy Spirit to guide and direct us. We don't consider his plans or opinions to be worth much. We figure he must have gotten things wrong or that he really doesn't think much of us at all. The truth is quite the opposite. We spend so much time looking at what everyone else has received as worldly blessings that we never bother to look for the abundant joy to be found in what God given us specifically. We don't consider our spiritual gifts as very noteworthy either, even when God considers them vitally important. Whether it's teaching, or service, caring for others, or generosity, whatever it is he has given you to do is something he feels important enough to send you to do it. We think so little of God's gifts, even though he has hand-picked them for us and delights when we put them to use and for that we need to repent of the callous and off hand way we treat his good gifts. We repent because we have mistreated God's gifts, but also because we know it's only because of his gifts that we are able to repent at all. God's greatest gift is Christ himself. Christ comes to you as a gift, to take your sin, to take your place under the wrath of God. Christ is a gift to you, the surest sign of God's love. If you ever wonder about God's love and whether he truly thinks you're worth it, you have only to look to the cross and see what he was willing to do for you, you can see what he willing to give you, not as payment for something you have done, a simple business transaction, but given freely to one he loves more than life itself. When you think about it in that light, the spiritual gifts St. Paul lists here all become something new and different. If God has given you a spiritual gift, then it is a sign he reserved a place for you in his kingdom. He isn't contracting out the work to another firm. He's giving it to one of his own. You're part of the family and God has a place for you here and he gives you a purpose. He even sends his Spirit with you to help get the job done. That also means every moment of joy you find here on earth is just part of his employee benefits package. Every friend you share a beer with, every brother or sister who picks you up and helps you sort out life, every moment of wonder you are struck with as you discover something new and amazing in the world, that's all part of God's love for you. The gifts you get won't be the same as those anyone else gets, because he knows you are unique and so are your gifts. He gives you the gifts he knows you can appreciate and that you can make use of, to bring even more joy to your life and to others. The season of Epiphany reminds of the magi who travelled from the East. They brought gifts to Jesus and acknowledged him as king. We remember too that those gifts were just a small portion of what he had already given them. Before the gold, frankincense, and myrrh were gifts to Jesus, they were gifts to the magi. So, as you leave God's house today, go in the confidence that his love for you is unshakable and beyond all measuring. He who gave his only Son for you will continue to shower you with his gifts because he will always love you and he wants you to be sure you know that.