NOTE: I am putting my weekly sermons on the church website. It will be on for two weeks (usually posted on Friday) and then placed in the Archives area by date. You can download in a matter of seconds.

Let me know what you think. The church Email is: slumc@direcway.com, Phone: 480.895.8766

February 22, 2004
Sermon:"Area Code - GLY(459)"
Scripture:Exodus 34:29-35
Reverend Larry Gerber

212. It's the area code for Manhattan, New York City. The most envied, desirable, sought-after area code in the world — bar none. Those three digits scream power and prestige. 212! Wow, you must live in Manhattan! That area code alone proclaims that you are someone to be reckoned with.

Don't have a Manhattan area code? (Remember how desperately Elaine tried to get one in that episode of Seinfeld?) Not to worry.

Vonage, a voice-over-IP phone service will sell you a 212 area code for your use whether you live in Manhattan or Maui. This area code (or any other area code you may want) will work anywhere there's a broadband connection. Vonage provides a portable adapter that plugs into a DSL router or cable modem which, in turn, converts your analog calls into digital signals. That Vonage has such a huge market base for electronic hypocrisy like this says that we Americans know that to be powerful, you must be connected to the powerful; to be wealthy, you must be connected to the wealthy; to be privileged, you must reside in the center of privilege.

For those of us without such connections, Vonage is here to give us a hand out and a leg up on the competition. We can share the prestige of an area code without the actual cost of living in that area.

Which, by the way, is what God offered to Moses in today's text. God's invitation to Moses, granted, was not to tap into the electronic corridors of power, or to merely become privy to God's area code, but was an invitation to experience face time with God himself. Area code GLY (459-God loves you); prefix f2f (face to face).

So what happens to Moses in his f2f with God, and what can we take away from this exchange at the center of all power? One thing we notice immediately is that Moses responds to God's call or invitation. Call/response. It is God who initiates the encounter, inviting Moses to step out of his comfort zone into a new area code with a whole new purpose. "Here is my number - GLY-f2f-plrn (God Loves You-Face to Face-Please Respond Now" says God. The message was clear: it was a summons to meet God and fulfill a divine purpose (Exodus 34:1-3).

Still, there is a call and response that precedes any encounter with God — although we should not expect that when the call of God comes to us, the voice of God will sound anything like Charleton Heston, or that the experience itself will be scripted like a Cecil B. DeMille movie. At the end of the day, we need to remember God is the One who wants you to hear the call and will do what is necessary to get your attention.

But you need to connect with God, that is why God gives you the number. Return the call and listen for the invitation. "God calling. I want to see you face to face. Please respond now." The message is clear. Step out of your comfort zone. Step into a new area code, a new zone; and that is the hardest thing of all.

No one can predict how the call will come to you. But throughout Scripture one thing appears certain: The call from God comes with a purpose that serves others. For Moses it was the giving of the Ten Commandments that shaped a community; for Sister Helen Prejean it was a ministry of compassion to persons under penalty of death. She intended only to respond to a letter from a lonely man on death row. For her, the prisoner's plea was an invitation from God that she could not refuse, any more than Moses could refuse God, who summoned him to the mountain.

Saying yes to the divine invitation that came in the form of a poorly written letter from a prisoner led her into a web of hurting people who needed her to be the instrument of God's healing.

There are plenty of God's people available to do God's work. So why is there so much work that yet needs to be done? God's people are not responding to God's call.
• Are unbelievers given a reason to believe?
• Are the homeless given shelter?
• Are the homebound and invalids given meals and clean homes?
• Are the prisoners being visited in their prison?
• Are our neighbors being comforted in their sorrow?
• Are the hungry given food to eat?
• Are the disobedient admonished?
• Are the people being taught the word of God?

If the answer is "No" to any of these questions, the fault lies not with God. It's not as though God has turned a blind eye or a deaf ear to the conditions of his children. Someone is not responding to God's call. And perhaps we're not responding because we're not listening.

Moses' appearance was changed when he met God f2f. Scripture says that after the encounter, Moses' skin was shining so brightly that he had to wear a veil to keep from blinding the people (Exodus 34:33-35). We don't know exactly what to make of this and neither do the scholars, but it's safe to say that we need not expect our faces to glow like Moses' did in that encounter.

On the other hand, seeing God up close and personal may change your appearance and will certainly change your outlook on life in such a way that others will notice the difference. The apostle Paul says that believers in Jesus Christ are being changed day by day by the Holy Spirit until they reflect unveiled the very image of Christ. Don't be too surprised if people notice your appearance appears brighter as you come to know the presence of God more personally.

UMOM is a center that says yes to all the questions above. In the best way possible, UMOM answers the needs of God's people. Some of us have seen first hand (f2f) the ministry of this organization. Some of us are volunteers that help this ministry happen. Some of us can't do that, but we all can see f2f by taking a tour of the facility, or reading one of the beautiful brochures, and then supporting the work. Each of us can get to know God more intimately by seeing and responding.

We know this intuitively. How many television commercials, or adds in magazines, can you think of that suggest that when you use their product, encounter the experience their product has to offer, your entire appearance and outlook on life will be changed? You're a new person exuding self-confidence, a person of new optimism and more self-esteem. (The Viagra commercial comes to mind.)

Finally, we notice that when Moses prayed to see God, he saw God only indirectly (Exodus 33:12-23). You, too, can pray to see God, but chances are that you will see God only in an oblique way because this is precisely how God chooses to be revealed to us. A full-face encounter would blow you away.

In Matthew's gospel, Jesus says that he will be found in the most vulnerable among us: the hungry and the homeless, prisoners, those without clothes and those who are sick. No one notices it is Jesus until after the fact.

Luke reminds us that Jesus appeared as a stranger along the Emmaus road and that it was only after hospitality was extended to him that he was revealed in the breaking of bread as the living Christ.

Area code 212 is no doubt a prestigious code to have. But let's move beyond area code 212 and move into the very presence of God. God's area code(GLY) is much closer and eminently more powerful than we imagine. God will be present to us in various disguises, revealing self to those who have the eyes to see and ears to hear.

The poet Gerard Manley Hopkins once said, "Christ plays in ten thousand places … through the features of men's faces" (As Kingfishers Catch Fire). Hopkins is right; we encounter the living Christ in the many faces of women, men, and children, bearing many names and speaking many languages.

Recently, on a mission trip in Tijuana, Mexico, a young man bearing the Spanish name Jesus(pronounced heysue) told a church group, "When I was a baby, not even a year old, my mother threw me away like trash. But somehow God found me and in the arms of one of his servants brought me here to Casa de la Esperanza (House of Hope). This is my family, the family of God, and this is why I have hope, too." Jesus is only one example of how God calls us into action.

We indirectly encounter God's presence in Jesus the Mexican, thrown away as a child, living in an orphanage, where he shares God's love with visitors who come to serve the poor.

UMOM (United Methodist Outreach Ministries) is one place to encounter God. We thank God for those at UMOM who respond; who return God's call; who are not afraid of answering f2f. (Phone rings) God calling . Are you there?

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Source: Rojas. Peter. "Pick an area code, any area code…" Wired, July 2003.

Let me know what you think. The church Email is: slumc@direcway.com, Phone: 480.895.8766