If he belonged to your church, his photo would be on your Web site. Tall, good-looking, ruggedly athletic (although not disproportionate), he was a young man who was clearly going places when he pops up in the Scriptures (I Samuel 9).
And he was going places — literally. He was all through Ephraim, and Shalishah, and Shaalim, and the entire land of Benjamin. His task? He was wandering all over the countryside placing “lost donkey” fliers on the telephone poles. He didn’t do a very good job; he never found them.
When Saul got as far as Zuph, he realized that “Donkey Rescue Technician” was probably not his most promising career. So he shrugs his shoulders and says to the servant who accompanied him (in modern translation), “Let’s just head for home. This isn’t working.” The unnamed servant, however, was not as easily discouraged, and he suggested asking for a little professional advice.
The lost donkeys led Saul to Samuel, known locally as “the seer.” If Saul’s face was in the advertisements, then Samuel’s face would have been on the money. He was the most important figure in the nation at that time — a man who both hearkened back to the days of the judges and the patriarchs before them and who anticipated the rise of the monarchy in Israel. Samuel presided as judge, priest, and prophet in Israel at a time when the entire culture was shifting. The old days (when there was no king in Israel and all the people did what was right in their own eyes1) were passing away, and God was bringing Israel to a new understanding of what it meant to live into their role as God’s people.
The author of I Samuel has painted a contrast here: the photogenic, if potentially vacuous, Saul on the one side and the ardently prophetic and perceptive Samuel on the other. Samuel tells Saul to quit worrying about the donkeys since he’s about to be made king over Israel. Saul immediately starts to play it small, and comes up with a raft of excuses as to why he is clearly not the man for the job. Samuel listens to all of that, and then goes ahead and anoints him as the king, reminding him that the office of king exists for the good of the people (You shall reign over the people of the Lord and you will save them from the hand of their enemies all around2).
I am afraid that the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is spending way too much time looking for donkeys and playing it small, and not nearly enough time seeking to discern how and where the Holy Spirit is already at work in the world around us. I don’t say this lightly, as I have sat in meeting after meeting where we have wrestled with such incredibly complex topics as “projector in worship, or no projector?” and “to drum or not to drum?” I have been in presbytery meetings where “points of order” lasted longer than the Sermon on the Mount. And, in the face of the shrinking economy, I have seen many faithful presbyters looking nervously at what appears to be dwindling resources wondering where in the world they will be able to find enough donkeys to do all the heavy lifting that needs to be done to keep the denomination moving.
We have argued passionately and eloquently about Amendments to the Book of Order. We have done mission studies. We have fretted as our children walked away from the faith.
And I don’t know about you, but none of this has made much of an impact on my neighbors. We had a Communion service on Maundy Thursday, and because we weren’t able to find childcare, one of our young parents stayed home from church. She wrote me expressing her wonder that nobody else on her street seemed to notice that the day was any different. People were cutting their lawns and running to the store and playing in the yard … on Holy Thursday, no less. I guess nobody saw the signs we put up on the telephone poles!
Meanwhile, as the church in North America and in Europe ages and dozes, the church in the rest of the world is catching fire. God is bringing amazing things to bear in the lives of God’s people — old wounds are being healed, young people are becoming passionate for the faith, entire communities are being shaped by the presence and the practice of the Christian faith. So as I approach my fiftieth year, I’m deciding that I’m just about through looking for donkeys. I want to spend more time with Samuel than I do with Saul.
What does that mean?
I am going to focus on living out my faith in such a way that what I say and do is for the good of those around me.
1. I will work hard to provide food for those who hunger, whether that’s via the congregation’s food bank, or through helping single parents get through school and find a decent job, or as an advocate of just policies in our national budget.
2. I am going to spend as much time as I can seeking to create opportunities for people to reflect on how they can live out their faith in the places where they spend the most time: at work, at home, and at school.
3. I am going to look for ways to pay attention to our partners in the rest of the world, and see if I can learn from them a few practices that will help me shape my worshiping community so that it is bearing fruit that is pleasing.
4. I am going to spend time with my clergy colleagues who are eager to grow spiritually and who need an opportunity to engage in the spiritual practice of friendship and mutual support, encouragement, and challenge.
5. I am going to pray and fast and read more.
Obviously, all of this will take time and energy. I probably won’t have time to attend all of the caucus meetings relating to how “my side” is supposed to vote on sexuality. I may have to give up one of my favorite television shows.
More than half of my life is behind me. I have – maybe – a couple of decades left in ministry. I don’t want to spend that time asking strangers if they’ve seen the previous generation’s donkeys. In the last fifteen years, our small congregation has provided scores of people with the opportunity to make a profession of faith in Jesus Christ. Some of these people are still here, still walking with God. Some are in other congregations. And sadly, some are apparently no longer interested in the life of faith. Not one of these people ever joined our church because we were “right” on the issue of homosexuality. No one has turned to Jesus because we are such strident defenders of “family values.” Not a single person has had a life-changing commitment to Christ based on the quality of our music or the depth of my preaching. No, each of these brothers and sisters has wound up here because someone came alongside of them and treated them as if they were important to God. And in that honoring, and loving, and praying, and challenging — well, some of it has made a difference.
I don’t want to argue about being right any more. I want to be a part of the exciting new thing God is doing in the lives of the people in my neighborhood and in my world. I hope that there is a place in the PC(USA) for people like me … and my neighbors.
DAVE CARVER is pastor of First United Presbyterian Church of Crafton Heights in Pittsburgh, Pa.
1 Judges 21:25
2 I Samuel 10:1
