I do not remember much about my confirmation. I was barely 12 years old when it happened, actually I was a little younger than 12. I remember about six or seven classes with the minister in his office. I remember a visit to the bishop’s office - much like our confirmands did this past spring. I remember that my confirmation took place on Palm Sunday afternoon. I remember these things, but I have to admit that they are not memorable. They were not life changing moments. 

I doo remember some life changing moments that came a few years later. I remember going to Jumonville one or two weeks every summer and discovering what I felt to be the real meaning of Christian community. I remember a sermon by the minister of my church who said something like this. “I do not care how many skills you master in your life, but I do care very much who is the Master of your soul.” I remember a quaint little Methodist church just off my college campus where I first heard the faint calls from God to enter the ministry. And I remember my first semester at seminary where the light began to dawn. Jesus was truly the meaning and center of life. That light has never gone out. Each of these things and more were life changing and life orienting moments. 

I pray for some life changing moments for you, today, especially for those of you in the confirmation class. Everyone needs some of these. Every growing Christian needs some of these. You need sign posts or markers along the way. You need “Ah Ha” moments not necessarily “Wow” moments, but “Ah Ha” moments. 

Jeremiah had one. You heard about it in the Old Testament reading today. God said to Jeremiah (who was only a teenager at the time), “Before you were born, I knew you. I know who you are.” The actor Kirk Douglas used to stop and pick up hitchhikers. He really did. One day he picked up a young soldier in full military uniform. The soldier got in the car, looked at Douglas, looked away and then looked again. Then he blurted out in a very shrill voice, “Hey, do you know who you are?” God said to Jeremiah, “Do you know who you are. I know who you are.” 

Similarly, we learn the story of Timothy in the New Testament text for today. Timothy discovered he had a gift from God as Paul laid his hands on his head and received him into the Christian community. 

I pray for each of you a life changing moment. Maybe it will be a moment like Jeremiah where you hear God say, “Your life is not some accident or chance.” Where you hear God say, “I knew you from the beginning and I know you now.” Or maybe your moment will be like that of Timothy where Paul says, “Remember the gifts that God gave you, Timothy you do have gifts.” 

Let me tell you about a modern day testimony from someone you may know. Winton Marsalis is a great jazz trumpeter. He has received many awards since the age of 19. Recently he spoke and played his trumpet at a commencement at one of our major universities. He told a story: 

He talked about his middle school band teacher. He described the first day of the semester when the teacher passed out instruments to various members of the class. To a skinny kid with thick glasses, the teacher gave a clarinet. To a heavy kid with big lips, the teacher gave a tuba. “Then”, said Marsalis, “for reasons I can’t begin to fathom, he handed a trumpet to me. Then he told us to play. We were terrible…But he told us we were good. Apparently he could see something in us that we couldn’t see in ourselves. And that was the day I was called to play the trumpet.” 

God may be calling you to something beyond what you ever dreamed. God may be calling you to a work like this in a place like this – the ministry of a local church.  

There is a hymn in our hymnal that we don’t sing a lot although we have used it occasionally. It tells the story of Jesus call to the first disciples. Some of the words go like this: 

Lord, you have come to the Lakeshore,

Looking neither for wealthy or wise ones.

You only ask me to follow humbly. 

O Lord, with your eyes you have searched me.

And while smiling, have spoken my name. 

I like to think that God is smiling and calling your name today. He is calling the name of some of you in the 2007 Confirmation Class. God is calling some of you in the Chapel Choir or in Sunday Night Youth Group. God is calling you as a worshipping member of this congregation. If you are a visitor today, God may be calling you as well. You are standing by the lakeshore. God is calling your name. 

Listen for the call of God. It will be a defining, life-changing moment. It may not be a bolt of lightning. It may not be a hammer blow either. It may be more like a gentle or even a powerful nudge. 

And remember: God will never call you to do something you are not equipped to do.  

Confirmands, when I was your age, I was a very skinny kid and I was mostly a loner. (That is why I liked the Lone Ranger as my hero.) I was regarded by many as provincial. I did not know much about the world around me. Most of my parent’s friends thought that I was naïve. And I was. But God saw something in me I did not see in myself. 

A certain minister was known for embellishing the truth a bit. His son said of him one time, “He doesn’t lie, he just remembers big.” I look back and remember nothing “big” in those years that I was growing up. I had no big thoughts, but God saw something God wanted in me. 

God will take hold of your life and lead you. God will lead you where you need to be. God will lead you where God wants you to be. God will lead you where you ought to be. And God will use you. 

This is not only Confirmation Day. This is also Mother’s Day. For those of you who are youth here this morning, let me ask you this question. Has your mother ever said to you, “What in God’s name are you doing?” 

Well, answer the question. What in God’s name are you doing with the rest of your life? What in God’s name will you do for the rest of your life? Maybe this is the day to start figuring that out. Maybe today is a life-changing moment for you.