[THE ANGLICAN CATECHIST A Column for Catechists or Teachers who share their Christian faith with children, youth and adults in congregations of the Episcopal Church.]

With Fear and Trembling

By: The Rev. Joseph C. Neiman

"Here I am. Send me!" These words from the prophet, Isaiah (6.8), might be a direct quote from your lips also as you responded to being drafted by the rector or vicar for the education program of the parish this fall. Indeed, documented surveys have shown the majority of men and women who staff what we call our "Church school" or religious education programs, we truly "drafted" by the local priest. He or she may well have put on considerable pressure to persuade you that you can and should take part.

Oh, there are a few among us who volunteered. And even those of us who were drafted know down deep that the call is really from the risen Lord: "Whom shall I send? Who will be our messenger" (Isaiah 6.8)? We wouldn't have answered that draft or volunteered unless we were convinced the Lord was asking us, for who could pay us to endure such thankless and endless frustrations. In addition there isn't a catechist who hasn't wished that the Lord would send "one of the seraphs" with a burning coal from the altar to purify our lips, as was the case with Isaiah, so we too can speak the words of the Lord to those entrusted to us in the educational mission. We're afraid we can't do it, and that what we do might not be what the Lord wants.

Yet that's the incarnational reality. Beneath the scissors and paste amid the chalk dust and torn papers it is really the risen Lord who is calling us to speak in His Name, and it is the power of His Holy Spirit which will turn our words into His. So we need not be afraid that we are a person "of unclean lips" soiled by living among "a people of unclean lips". He calls us and He will guide us if we will be open to His presence working in and through our lives.

There's another part to this passage about the call of Isaiah we ought to hear as well. The prophet asks: "Until when, Lord?" How long do we carry the frustrations? How long do we continue to teach when it seems as if they hear, but do not understand; see by do not perceive? When will they "be converted and healed" (c. Isaiah 6.9-13)? That's also in His hands. Results and thanks are not to be expected. Nevertheless, if you stop and think about it for a moment, many of us can see the face and remember the loving presence of a teacher who came to us with the fire of learning and enkindled within us a spark of our own. And did we say thanks?

The fruit He intends in their lives may not come until years later, and as for our thanks, the "peace of God which surpasses all understanding" is God's gift on His timetable. But there are hundreds of catechists who can testify that it is given, and that answering the call to teach was truly worth it despite the endless hours and frustrations associated with the educational mission in our day and age. They know the call may have come in frantic pleading from the rector, but deep down it was from the risen Lord. And so they too have answered, "Here I am. Send me!" You are not alone!

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