It's good to be here with you this morning on this highest of national "holy days," Super Bowl Sunday. We've missed that while being overseas. And it has been some years since I preached in San Jose. The last time I did, I was pastor of Holy Redeemer Lutheran, near the airport. That's where we were before we left for Tanzania, East Africa, to serve the international Lutheran congregation in Dar es Salaam, the capital city. After that, we went on to Makumira University College, the seminary of the ELCT, where, for the past 13 years, we have helped prepare young men and women to become pastors in that large and growing church. I taught Old Testament and Hebrew and did their mail server and website; Judy taught preaching, worship and music and was my pastor - being pastor of the campus congregation.

Those were good years; we accomplished many goals, saw many changes, were able to build programs and - most important - were able to train former students who could follow us and pick up the ministries and responsibilities we had originally carried alone. Now they are doing that, and we have returned to answer the call to new ministries and challenges in perhaps an even more difficult mission field - our own western culture. As we do, we are being asked to speak in a number of congregations as a sort of a summing up and sharing of what God has done in our lives.

But you didn't come just to hear about Jim and Judy Bangsund. Whenever we speak in congregations on Sunday mornings, we always also look at the scriptures we have before us. That's important - more important - most important. For whatever else we hear and say and do as we gather together, we want to hear what God is saying to us in his word. And this morning, we have a text from Isaiah 6 - a striking text which says something to us about God's call in our life. God's call. What is God's call? We talk about God calling pastors and missionaries. Does God call just everyday folks? Everyday followers of Jesus? Is God calling ... you? Yes he is - though often we talk more in terms of God's plan or direction or purpose for you. But it's the same thing. God calls, leads, guides, and we seek to discern and follow that divine leading. And there are two guarantees: one, God will be with you, and two, there will be surprises and sometimes a bit of jostling along the way.

The sixth chapter of Isaiah brings us the call of young prophet Isaiah. I wish I had two weeks with you on this text, because there are two very different parts to the call, and we need to hear both. So let me give you a brief bird's eye view of the first part and then talk about the second. Because the second part, in particular, says something crucial to us.

This morning's OT lesson has the first part of that call. The part from which we get the hymn, "Holy, Holy, Holy." The part where young Isaiah says, "Here am I, send me." Isaiah was in the temple when he had this knock-your-socks-off vision. Seraphim - six-winged creatures - were praising God before his throne, and Isaiah was suddenly aware that he was a sinner in the presence of God. And in the first part of his call - the part where I'm just going to give a bird's eye view - we read of confession, cleansing and call.

Confession: Isaiah is absolutely overwhelmed and cries out, "Woe is me! For I am ... a man of unclean lips, and ... my eyes have seen ... LORD ...!" That's not your every-Sunday church experience - nor mine. I don't suppose we could survive such a constant adrenaline rush of this kind of direct and awesome encounter with God. Yet I would bet that each of us could point to moments when we have had a brief world-shaking encounter like that. Perhaps a camp setting; perhaps a Sunday morning when a phrase from the liturgy or a word from a sermon suddenly broke through our normal dullness, and we said, "Aha!" And like Isaiah, we suddenly realized how far short we fall of what God would have us be and do. Woe is me. I just didn't get it; now I do. Confession.

And then cleansing. One of the seraphim touches Isaiah's "unclean lips" with a glowing coal and says, "your guilt is taken away, and your sin forgiven." Cleansing. This glowing coal text should probably have a footnote: "Don't try this at home." Only God can do this, my friends. We don't cleanse ourselves, so put away those briquettes. But we do have an experience similar to that of Isaiah when we come to our Lord's table and have the bread and wine brought to our lips, and when we hear similar words: "Given and shed for you. For you." Cleansing. In Jesus' name.

And then third, after confession and cleansing, a call. God says, "Whom shall I send ...?" and Isaiah cries out, "Here am I! Send me." Isaiah was caught up in the excitement of the moment and recognized that God had a plan and a purpose for him. Just as he does for you and for me, my friends. "Here am I! Send me." May that also be our response to what God has done for us in Christ. Confession, cleansing, call.

Well, that's the first part of the call. But things didn't stop there in this awesome encounter. We might wish that they did. Certainly Isaiah wished that they did. But they didn't. Remember, I said that when God calls, there are usually surprises along the way. The next five verses bring a reality check, and that's what I want us to look at this morning.

Young Isaiah, who got on board so enthusiastically, suddenly finds God sending him to speak to a hard-nosed people. God tells him, "Go, and say to this people: 'Hear and hear, but do not understand; see and see, but do not perceive.'" And Isaiah is stunned. This is not what he had in mind. Why such heavy weather? He was looking forward to a joyful ministry of speaking for God and having people welcome him. But this had bad day written all over it. And so in verse 11 Isaiah cries out, "How long, O Lord?"

Do you find yourself in Isaiah's shoes from time to time? I know I do. Here you are faithfully trying to serve God, and it just seems that things should be going better. You as a congregation seek, by your presence in this community, to make life better for people, to draw them to the foot of the cross, to build a more just society, to bring encouragement to those who are in various ways beaten down by life. And then circumstances - and sometimes the very people we seek to help - seem to make things so difficult. Why such heavy weather?

I don't know about you, but I find that, as a follower of Jesus - as one who has said, "Here am I, send me" - I'm frequently found crying out - or, frankly, just grumbling - How long, O Lord? Perhaps you, too.

Our return from Tanzania last month was smooth and free of misadventure. For that we give thanks. But international travel is not always so. I remember our last trip home to visit our supporting congregations. We ended up having to fly through JFK, because we couldn't get a nonstop from Amsterdam to Minneapolis. And there, after going through customs, we had to hand carry all our luggage - not just carry-on, but everything - up four flights of stairs and across the airport, in spite of having checked everything to Minneapolis, all because the security system has been triggered and strobe lights were flashing and horns blaring and all the elevators and escalators and air conditioning were shut off and - How long, O Lord? I mean, here we were being good missionary types and all that. We'd answered your call, Lord, and gone overseas and were doing all these great things and - I mean - I mean, couldn't it be a bit easier and a more fun-packed experience? How long, O Lord?

I remember later looking in the Bible, and I found that people ask that question - How long, O Lord? - a dozen times. A dozen times! And these are not mere ELCA missionaries, these are good Bible folks. And one, of course, was the young prophet Isaiah here in Isaiah 6 verse 11.

Isaiah cries out because he is stunned by what the sending is going to mean. And sometimes we may be given pause, too. We're called to faith in Jesus Christ; we're called to follow; we are called to commitment and we engage ourselves in God's programs and presence in the world. So aren't there some guarantees here? Isn't life supposed to get easier, get better? Well, it certainly gets better, but "easier" is a somewhat flexible term.

Yes, God calls you to follow - in many and various ways. This involves commitment, as you seek to respond in thanks to God for all he has done for you. You do that in your involvement here at St Timothy's and I'd no doubt be amazed at the number of ways in which people in this congregation are involved in God's activity throughout this valley. And in that involvement - as we follow the call - we need to recognize two things: the call is serious, but the caller is faithful. Let's unpack that.

First of all, the call is serious. In his youthful enthusiasm, Isaiah signed onto the project without realizing the seriousness and the depth of God's engagement with the world. Young Isaiah was looking forward to the excitement, the rush, the being on the team. He didn't realize God would ask him to do some heavy lifting. But God did so because God himself faces heavy lifting in our world, my friends. That's why the call is serious. We're a difficult people to work with. The word "sin" has fallen on rather hard times, but I can think of no better word to describe that which so effectively alienates us from God and from one another. Broken people, broken lives, broken relationships. The world is filled with people like - well, just like you and me. No picnic for God.

Some years ago utility crews were out in Michigan after a tremendous ice storm brought down power lines all across the state. It was a dangerous situation, and they had put up barriers to keep people back. As they picked up wires in one hard-hit area, a worker heard a horn honk behind him. Turning around and seeing a man in an old pickup truck, the worker stomped over and yelled, "Didn't you see those wires, red flags, stands, and barriers back there?" "Oh, yes," the guy in the pickup replied, "I got by those all right. It's just your truck that's in the way now."

That's us, my friends. That's the depth of the problem of sin. God gives us his very best - his Son, his Word - and we dodge and avoid and tell God, "It's just your truck that's in the way now." For God, it must be like herding cats. And, my friends, that also describes the world into which he sent Isaiah and into which he sends us. The call is serious. The stress is high because the stakes are high. Jesus himself, as he neared the cross, prayed, "My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me." Is it any wonder then that we, who seek to follow him, at times are found crying "How long, O Lord?"

But, there's more. Yes, the call is serious. But more important, the Caller is Faithful. Old Testament theologian Walter Brueggemann notes that there are two ways of seeing God in the Bible. If you think of our world as a bit of a dog fight or a "fray," Brueggemann says, we can talk about "God above the fray" and "God in the fray." It's popular to talk about God above the fray - that is, God above it all, the master puppeteer pulling the strings over our heads, the grand director of history. But note this well, my friends. Again and again, what we actually find in scripture is "God in the fray." God who seeks us out, who encounters us, who even gets in our face. God who knowingly calls out in the Garden, "Adam, where are you?" God who bargains with Abraham and argues with Moses. God who finally lets himself be nailed to a cross. In the fray. For us.

Yes, my friends, the Caller is faithful, and we see that in Isaiah as soon as we turn the page. Isaiah 6 showed that the call is serious. The first thing we find in Isaiah 7 is God, the faithful Caller, sending Isaiah to king Ahaz with the famous promise of Immanuel: "Behold, the young woman shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel" - which means "God-with-us." This promise had an immediate fulfillment for Ahaz and his people. Indeed, although God first sent Isaiah to say "Hear ... but do not understand; see ... but do not perceive," we later find God's true purposes coming to pass in Isaiah 29 and 35 where "the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped."

And there was more. Because this Immanuel promise, like no other, also pointed centuries ahead to "God in the fray." The world later saw the complete fulfilment of this promise of Immanuel - God-with-us - God in the fray - in the coming of Jesus Christ. God in the flesh. Then it was that God was most present, and did the heaviest of heavy lifting on the cross. For us. Immanuel - God with us - God in the fray.

Yes, my friends, as Isaiah and others have discovered, when God calls you the Call is Serious, but the Caller is faithful. Look back and remember other times in your life when God was faithful, when God was there for you, and brought you through the jostling. As Isaiah shows us elsewhere, remembering how the Caller has been faithful in the past gives God's people courage to follow his serious call today and tomorrow, as God who is "in the fray" for you, who in Jesus gave himself for others, now calls you to give of yourself for others.

As I close, let me tell you about our first arrival in Tanzania. We approached Dar es Salaam in the darkness on an early Thursday morning KLM flight which arrived just 2½ hours after midnight. A few shimmering lights of the city lay beautiful and serene below us, scattered like diamonds glistening on black velvet, as we soared over the city on our approach. How quiet and peaceful. And what a contrast to the jostling ride over the rough city streets that immediately followed. Soaring over the city had been exhilarating! But we hadn't come to soar; we had come to jostle. We had come to take part in the everyday life of the city, and in the everyday lives of God's people. That was why we had come. And that's what God calls each of us to do as followers of Jesus.

I don't know what specific things God has in mind for you, my friend. The possibilities for serving God are endless, from working for a political candidate to passing out Christian tracts on a street corner. From serving on council to writing just the right letter to the editor. The call is a serious one, but the Caller is faithful. And we, the Called, are then made bold to follow the crucified one, the one whose plans and purposes call us into the brokenness of lives around us.

"How long, O Lord?" Jesus replies until lives are changed until I come again until you hear the words, "Well done, good and faithful servants."

May God be with you in the fray, my friends, both in your soaring as well as in the jostling.

Amen.