I don't really feel qualified to preach or especially
not to be a preaching minister. But this isn't
the first time that I felt that way. See, when
I was 14 or 15, somewhere in there, my youth
minister, Mr. Glenn, came to me and he asked
me if I would preach at our congregation Sunday
night service. This was back when churches did
Sunday night worship. Y 'all remember that? And
I was a little nervous. I was also. Really confused.
And I was asking him, why me? Of all the people
you could choose, what qualifies me to preach?
I mean, you know who I am. You know what I've
done. You know where I've been. You know the
kind of person I am. I don't know enough. And
I started running through all of these reasons
why I should not be the one to preach. Because
I am who I am. And so... I ran through all of
these things that I felt like surely would disqualify
me, that would take me out of the running. And
then Mr. Glenn says something that's really funny,
and it changed my life and yours, whether you
know it or not. He says, Donovan, you already
talk so much anyways. Why don't you just say
something that matters for once? He got me, but
he was right. I talk way too much. And so I might
as well use that, we'll call it a gift, for good.
It was at that moment that I realized that I
was capable of doing something great. I had the
ability to. But the question still ran through
my mind of if I was qualified. And I still ask
that question. Am I? Well, I want to look at
Scripture, and then I want to talk about this
idea. So we're going to look at Jeremiah 1, verses
4 -10. If you've got your Bible, you can turn
there, or it'll be on the screen. Jeremiah 1,
verses 4 -10. I want to read this passage, and
we're going to pray a little bit. Now the word
of the Lord came to me, saying, Before I formed
you in the womb, I knew you. And before you were
born, I consecrated you. I appointed you a prophet
to the nations. Then I said, I, Lord God, behold,
I do not know how to speak for I'm only a youth.
But the Lord said to me, do not say I'm only
a youth. For to all whom I send you, you shall
go. And whatever I command you, you shall speak.
Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to
deliver you, declares the Lord. Then the Lord
put out his hand and he touched my mouth and
the Lord said to me, behold, I have put my words
in your mouth. See, I have set you this day over
nations and over kingdoms to pluck up and to
break down, to destroy, to overthrow, to build
and to plant. Let's pray before we talk about
this passage. Father, I thank you for your word.
These words that have been preserved for thousands
of years so that we might hear them, so that
we could read them and take them in and hopefully
have some part of our lives changed. And God,
I thank you for the story of Jeremiah. I thank
you for people like Moses and Paul, who even
though they felt like they were not qualified.
Even though they thought that they should be
disqualified. Even though they felt like they
were the wrong person for the job. You saw them,
you used them, and you equipped them for your
glory. And God, I believe that every person in
this room has the ability to do something great
for your kingdom. And so I pray as we look at
scripture this morning, as we discuss, that we
would see. That you are calling all of us to
do something great for you. And I pray that we
would know and trust that you will give us the
words to say. You'll give us the right things
to do and you will help us to see how we can
glorify you in this world. God, we love you.
We praise you and we thank you so much for your
son. And it's in his name we pray. Amen. So we
see this guy. named Jeremiah get called by God.
God comes up to him and Jeremiah is not just
going to be a person that we read a story about.
He's going to be a prophet to the nations. He's
going to be God's messenger, God's mouthpiece
to the world. And he immediately resists this
call with his own disbelief. He says, I do not
know how to speak for I'm only a youth. And that
only a youth thing. is pretty true. Jeremiah
is believed to have only been about 17 years
old when this call from God comes. And so maybe
for some of you teenagers, I want you to imagine
that God comes to you and says, you're going
to be my mouthpiece to the world. You're going
to go and proclaim my glory. You're going to
proclaim my law to the nations. That's what happens
to Jeremiah. So you can imagine being asked this
by God and immediately being. But God says, don't
worry about your age. Don't worry about your
ability. Don't even worry about the audience.
I've got you. More specifically, he says, do
not say I'm only a youth. For to all to whom
I send you, you shall go. And whatever I command
you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them.
For I am with you to deliver you. That would
probably, hopefully be enough to calm Jeremiah's
unbelief in himself. It should be enough to help
him realize that his age doesn't matter or the
daunting task before him doesn't matter. It should
be enough to help him to see that he is capable.
He is going to be qualified to do this because
why would God call him if he wasn't? But Jeremiah
is still not. necessarily convinced. And so God
does something really special. He reaches out
and he puts the words to say in Jeremiah's mouth.
Maybe you've heard the phrase, you took the words
right out of my mouth. God does the opposite
for Jeremiah here. He touches his lips, puts
the words in his mouth. He says, I'm going to
give you everything you need. I'm going to help
you know what to say. I'm going to protect you.
Then the Lord put out his hand and he touched
my mouth. Behold, I've given you the things that
you need. See, Jeremiah is able to do some really
great things, obviously, because he has an entire
book that is about his life. But more specifically,
Jeremiah, through his spiritual leadership, is
able to help his people survive disasters. They're
able to survive captivity because of his. Now
this is a 17 year old who goes from being just
a teenager to being an incredible prophet and
messenger of God. Not because he was super qualified.
Not because he had all this training. Not because
he was just so gifted. But because God chose
him and equipped him. Because God equips whom
he chooses. And who am I to question God's calling?
Similarly, in Exodus chapter 3 and chapter 4,
we'll see Moses. And Moses gets called by God.
And at this point, Moses is about 80 years old.
So we've got our 17 -year -old, maybe 18 -year
-old. And now we've got our 80 -year -old getting
called by God. Moses is out tending his sheep.
He's just doing what he does. He's out on the
job. And God approaches, well, God appears in
a burning bush. See, at this point, Moses is
not only 80 years old, but he's long removed
from the palace that he grew up in. And he's
also probably lost a little bit of that zeal
and passion that he had to free his people and
let my people go. And so God shows up in this
burning bush and he says this to Moses. He says,
come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may
bring my people out of Egypt. If I'm Moses, I'm
not 80. But I have an idea of how big this mission
might be to say, I'm going to free an entire
nation of people from Egyptian rule. Now, you
got to remember, Egypt is one of those empires
of empires at this time. And so you're going
to go one man against an entire nation. To free
an entire nation of people. That is not going
to be an easy job. And just like Jeremiah, Moses
pushes back. And he says, who am I that I should
go? And he questions even more in chapter 4.
He says, they won't believe me. Or he gives his
excuses of why he's not the right person. I'm
slow of speech and of tongue. And you've got
to remember, way back before this, Moses killed
a guy in Egypt. And he's been on the run, so...
This isn't this easy mission for him. This isn't
something that you would hear somebody say, hey,
I need you to go do this. And you're just like,
oh, yeah, I got it. I'll do it on my way home
from work. This is like a serious calling. And
80 -year -old Moses just has to try to understand
that this is his duty. But God doesn't just leave
him hanging. God responds to him. He says, who
has made man's mouth? Who makes him mute? Who
makes him deaf? Who gives him the ability to
see? Or who makes him blind? Is it not I, the
Lord? Now, therefore, go and I will be with your
mouth and I'll teach you what you shall speak.
See, God's qualification process is way different
than ours. We look at people and we say they've
got to be ready to go right now and then they
can have the job. But Moses's age doesn't disqualify
him. His speech problem didn't disqualify him.
His fear doesn't disqualify him because God's
call. always comes with God's provision. He doesn't
call us to do things. He doesn't call them to
do things that He's not going to equip them to
do. God's not going to call you into Egypt and
say, hey, I need you to go free these people
and go up against this army if He's not going
to equip you for it. He's not going to tell you,
I need you to be the mouthpiece to the nations
for my glory if He's not going to equip you for
it. God is always going to call. Those whom He
wants. And when He calls them, He will equip
them. All throughout Scripture, we see this theme
of God not always calling the qualified, but
always qualifying the called. Paul explains this
a little bit in his writings to the church in
Corinth. The first one is in 1 Corinthians 1,
verses 27 -29, where Paul says this, God chose
what is foolish in the world to shame the wise.
God chose what is weak. To shame the strong.
So that no human being might boast in the presence
of God. Think about it. Think of all these people
that we see God call throughout Scripture. They're
not always the mighty. They're not always the
most noble. They're not always the richest or
the wisest or the strongest. They're often the
poor. The young or the really old. They're the
people that you would never expect. And Paul
is explaining that God does this on purpose.
We see what Paul says again, and this was what
our scripture was that we read in 2 Corinthians
3. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves. We're
not capable on our own. It's not our ability.
It's not who we are. It's not what we've done.
But it's God. Our sufficiency is from God who
has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new
covenant. See, this is a key part of the gospel.
This is a very important truth that the church
needs to always remember. All through scripture
we see these people that shouldn't have been
used. That were not qualified. That weren't the
prime choice. That weren't the picture perfect
example of messenger of God. It's funny, somebody
once told me, you're not like... Other ministers.
And at first I took that as an insult. I was
like, that seems kind of, what are you trying
to say? Like I had a person tell me one time,
you don't preach to youth group kids like a youth
minister. I went to college to be a youth minister.
So that was kind of insulting, right? But that's
not what they meant. What they meant was that
you're a little bit different. And God calls
people that are different. He calls people that
you don't look at and say, yeah, he fits the
bill. That's why people love the preachers that
have tattoos all over them. That's why people
love the missionaries that they don't look like
these, you know, white collar wearing high and
mighty people, but they look like they fit in
with the locals. That's why people like the church
member that doesn't act like they're up here,
but they get down in the weeds with people and
live like normal human beings. Because we are.
God calls. And uses these people. And we remember
them because they did significant things. People
like Esther. This young woman who was a minority
in her time and in her place. And she goes and
she uses her ability that God gives her. That
God uses to save her people from genocide. Somebody
like Paul. Who was a former enemy of the church.
Who he literally says, I was persecuting Jesus.
Paul gets used to become the greatest missionary
that the church has ever known and the greatest
church planner and the author of half of our
New Testament. We see somebody like Rahab, this
Gentile woman who was a former prostitute whose
faith saved her and places her in the lineage
of Jesus. What better example than this band
of misfit, uneducated, blue -collar, fisherman,
carpenter, disciples that Jesus calls His best
friends. That Jesus uses to spread His message,
to perform miracles. All of these people that
we would look at and say, unqualified. Do you
see the pattern? Whether you're 18 or 88, whether
you're an introvert or you're charismatic, whether
you've got a PhD or ADHD, whether you are in
the greatest health of your life or you're chronically
ill, whether you are just pouring out confidence
or you are always doubting, God can and will
use you. And when he chooses to use you, he will
equip you. If anybody understood this, it was
the Apostle Paul. This is what he says to the
church in Philippi in chapter 2, verse 13 of
his letter to the church in Philippi. It is God
who works in you both to will and to work for
his good pleasure. It's God. It's God. I understand
feeling unqualified. I still am not sure I'm
supposed to be up here. I'm still not sure that
I'm the one that you want praying over you and
praying with you and that you want trying to
comfort you and minister to you. I'm not sure
of that. But I am sure of one thing. If I will
let him, God will work through me. And God will
be the one ministering to you. And God will be
the one comforting you. And God will be the one
proclaiming the message to you and to Union County
and to the church abroad. And I'm also sure that
He'll do the same thing through you if you'll
let Him. He did it for Jeremiah. He did it for
Moses. He did it for Paul and for the disciples
and for all of those people throughout Scripture
that we see. He calls them. He equips them. He
uses them for mighty good works. And I've got
to believe that he'll do the same for us. So
maybe you've been asking yourself the question,
why me? Every time I say that, I think of the
Chris Christopherson song. Why me, Lord? And
sometimes when I get in the weeds of church work,
I really do think, why me? I think hopefully
we've answered that question this morning. There's
no rhyme or reason to it. There isn't a why.
It just is. God wants to use unqualified, unskilled,
uneducated people to do good works. I love that
what Paul says is he chooses the weak to shame
the strong. I'm not strong enough. And if I ever
feel like I am, I feel like God will shame me.
It's God. And God's going to do what God wants
to do, what God needs to do. And if he says go,
I better go. And I can trust that he's going
to make it to where when I go, I'm going to do
all right. The better question to me that we
need to ask and answer is why not now? Because
the truth is, we're not waiting on a burning
bush. God has already called us. He's already
told us what he wants to do. We go back to that
great commission. Go into all the world. Proclaiming
the gospel to all creation. Baptizing and making
disciples. That's the mission. It was mentioned
earlier. Let your light shine before men. So
they can see your good works and glorify God
in heaven. That's the call. question is why am
I not doing that now? What am I waiting on? Am
I waiting to feel qualified? Because if so, I
got to stop that. Am I waiting for the right
time? Because if so, there is none. If I'm waiting
for something, I got to put that aside. And I
have to trust that I'm ready, that God is going
to prepare me. If you're a Christ follower who's
been holding back from what God is calling you
to do, whether it's serving, leading, sharing,
stepping out of faith, whatever it is, today
is the day to trust that God will equip you if
you will just answer the call. He's not waiting
for you to be perfect. He's not waiting for you
to understand. He's waiting for your trust and
obedience. And if you're not yet a follower of
Jesus, I want you to hear this. And I hope that
this can help you. God's not waiting for you
to get it all right. He's never waited for people
to be perfect before he could cleanse them. God
is simply choosing you. He's already extended
his grace to you. He's already offered you this
new life, this abundant life, this purpose -filled
life through Jesus. So whether you need to take
a first step or a next step, God is calling.
You have to decide. I've got to decide whether
we'll say yes or no. If you'd like to respond
in any way today, if you'd like to take that
first step or the next step, I'll be up front.
There's shepherds in this room. There's people
in this room that want to pray with you, that
want to love you and support you. We extend this
invitation to you now as we stand and as we sing.