When the Heron Strikes

 

Propers: The Second Sunday after Epiphany, AD 2021 B

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for You know his sins are great.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

How does a heron hunt? It really is something to see.

This great, majestic bird, all smooth, long lines, stands at a bend in the river—or by the burrow of some small, unsuspecting mammal—and just waits, holding perfectly still: calm, collected, patient, unmoving. Then comes at long last the opportune moment. The gopher peeks his head out from his hole; the fish drifts lazily yet warily within reach. And there’s one quick, decisive dart of movement, a flawless flashing strike, and the day is won, the meal is had.

And then the heron resumes its vigil, patiently waiting once more, for the next opportunity, the next sure, quick strike.

Success here depends upon position, patience, and paying attention. The heron discerns how to be in the right place at the right time. Yet even as it calmly waits, even as it takes no action, this natural master hunter is awake, alert, and aware. Its action appears effortless because it is present in the moment.

In our readings this morning, the boy Samuel hears the voice of God calling to him in the night. At first he’s not sure what to make of it. He thinks it is the voice of Eli, the priest of Shiloh, to whom he has been entrusted as both ward and apprentice. I feel as though any tired parent can relate to this small child interrupting Eli’s sleep several times a night. Yet despite his weariness, Eli discerns that what Samuel must be hearing is no mere childhood dream. This child, himself the result of prayer, has been destined and dedicated to the service of the Lord since birth.

Eli realizes that God is calling to Samuel, and tells the boy to return to his room in order to humbly respond. One mustn’t ignore the voice of the Lord, after all. And while I don’t mean to read into things too deeply, I do get the impression that Eli kind of saw this coming. He is surprisingly unsurprised. Could it be that he too heard such a voice when he was a boy in this place?

Or is it because Eli expects a reckoning, a judgment for his sins? See, Samuel may be his ward, but he has two sons of his own, and they are wicked young men, exploiting their positions, abusing the office entrusted to them. Eli is not like his sons—but neither does he restrain them. He adopts a sort of “boys will be boys” attitude, a refusal to use a firm hand even as his sons despoil the needy.

So when God tells the boy Samuel that the House of Eli shall not endure, that the calling and the priesthood of Shiloh shall depart from them and rest upon Samuel instead, Eli, to his credit, accepts the judgment of God with Stoic resolve. “It is the Lord,” he says. “Let Him do what seems good to Him.” Eli trusts that even in His punishments, which we rightly deserve, God is ever working for our good.

The Lutheran tradition emphasizes that all of us have callings, all of us have vocations. 500 years ago, people often thought of monks and clergy as the only people receiving a holy calling from God. But that simply isn’t so. Every Christian has a calling, a divine office and a duty dedicated to the service of God. If you are a teacher, education is your calling. If you’re a police officer, justice and right order are your calling, to serve and to protect.

Likewise for soldiers, surgeons, servers, salespeople, what-have-you. Everyone of faith serves God in their own way, dedicating their efforts, their duties, and their labors to the love of God and neighbor. The Japanese are really good at this. In Japan, there is no job so small that it demands anything less than a lifetime of dedication to perfection. They have people who apprentice for decades to become master noodle-makers. Every job is holy, every job is worthy, every job invites monastic devotion, when we recognize it as a calling entrusted to us by the Lord.

Yet the idea of vocation is not limited to career. A calling might have nothing to do with our day job. Parenthood is a calling. Being a good neighbor is a calling. Art is a calling. Terms like “hobby” and “amateur” ought not to be pejorative. Remember that the oldest vocation in all of Scripture is that of gardener. Adam was the steward in the garden of the Lord.

Some people seem to know their calling almost from birth. They always knew what they were meant to do. Some of us receive it like a bolt from the blue, laying us out flat just when we thought we had settled into a nice and comfortable life. For Samuel it seems to be a bit of both. He was dedicated to God since birth, the adopted heir of the priest of Shiloh. And then, as we read this morning, he heard the clear, strong, voice of the Lord calling to him unexpectedly in the night.

Oh, if only it were that easy for the rest of us. Wouldn’t it be nice if we all got a telegram, right when we need it the most, telling us exactly what we should be doing and who we should become. But for most of us, callings aren’t like that. They aren’t clear, dramatic, decisive revelations. Most of us muddle through, trying to discern the will of God in our lives, searching for meaning, purpose, inspiration.

Sometimes a calling comes late in life. Sometimes we only see it looking back. And sometimes we might realize that we have had many callings over the years, and all the time that we spent searching for that one clear path intended for us, God was in fact to be found mucking along beside us all the while.

Eli failed at his calling to be a good father to his sons. Yet he found a new calling, to which he was faithful, in accepting the judgment of God and setting things right by raising up Samuel as his successor and his heir. Eli failed two boys. He did not fail the third. We will always find forgiveness, resurrection, new life and new birth, whenever we return to the Lord, whenever we return to the sure, strong love of God our Father.

Which brings me back to the heron. The heron, like all animals, appears blessedly free from the anxieties and weltschmerz ubiquitous in human life. The heron doesn’t sit around fretting about what it is or isn’t supposed to be doing. It doesn’t anxiously chase different lifeways, trying to find the one that best defines it as a person. The heron doesn’t wring its hands in search of meaning and calling.

The heron simply positions itself in a good place, and awaits the opportune time. It does not know precisely what will come its way. The heron is not looking for one specific preconceived opportunity, somehow greater than all the rest. It waits without anxiety, without fretting, without fear. But it must pay attention. It must be present in the moment, so that it may move swiftly and decisively when opportunity will naturally arise.

“Keep awake,” Jesus is always telling His disciples. “Keep alert, for you do not know the day or the hour.” God comes to us like a thief in the night. We may find ourselves unexpectedly called not by a voice from above, but in the sudden need of our neighbor, in a crisis that requires our immediate aid, in an opportunity to do good, to answer God’s call, which we did not see coming yet for which we have been prepared.

God is still calling us to action. God is still calling us to be little Christs for our neighbors in their need. And that calling may be nothing more dramatic than the opportunity to listen, to comfort, to give, to say a kind word at just the right moment, or to speak a truth in the face of a lie.

Keep awake. Keep alert. Keep calm. God is with you. His Kingdom breaks into our lives at unforeseen times, ever keeping us light on our toes. As Christians we ought to be present in every moment, so that when it is time to answer God’s call, in whatever form it may come, His people will be ready to do the work and the will of His Son.

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.