The great 20th century Jewish teacher Martin Buber liked to tell a Hasidic story about a certain Rabbi named Zusya. Zusya was on his death-bed, quickly approaching the end of his life. He turned to his students and he said, “In the coming world, they will not ask me: ‘Why were you not Moses?’ They will ask me: ‘Why were you not Zusya?’”

Now, for Christians, we’re seeking to follow Jesus, God help us. So, would it be fair and true to adapt this story and say: In the coming world, when we stand before the glory of God, they will not ask me: “Why were you not Jesus?” They will ask me: “Why were you not Nathaniel?”

The secret is that when we become fully our true selves, when we live deeply and truly into who God has created us to be, we do in fact become more Christ-like. In our own peculiar ways, flawed as we are, despite ourselves, perhaps, but supported by the grace of God, thank God, we can grow to be truer to that-of-Christ in us as we become truer to our true selves.

As Christians we see in Jesus a model of the utmost fulfillment of the deepest human identity and purpose as children of the living God. Now, Jesus embodies for us an ideal of life free of sin that is in fact impossible for anyone else to live up to.

But it’s missing the point if we think that we need to just feel miserable and wretched about ourselves for not being like Jesus. And it’s missing the point if we think we need to bend ourselves way out of shape to try to become someone we’re not.

The Way of Jesus is about the love and grace our Creator has for us, as we are. When we receive this Love of God, this can release us to be more truly ourselves in the deepest sense: God’s Grace activates our souls and helps us grow to be more of who we are meant to be. The Way of Jesus is about freeing people from all those forces that keep us deadened or insane, dislocated from who we truly are, and why we truly are.

“The glory of God is a human being fully alive” – according to the early Christian teacher, Irenaeus.  

Howard Thurman, the great spiritual mentor to the civil rights movement, asked the same thing of those he ministered to: “What makes you come alive?”

This is what Jesus asks of us. This is what God calls us to. God call us to this not only for our own sake – if we are in it only for our own sake, we are not truly alive – but for the sake of each other, for the sake of all people, for the sake of our Holy Creator, for the sake of the realm of heaven on earth.

 When we’re honest to God and honest to ourselves about this question, “Am I being truly who I am, truly who God created me to be?” we probably will become aware of the ways that we are. We will also probably become aware of some of the ways that that we’re not, and that we are caught up in keeping up a false self.  

Am I caught up in trying to be someone I’m not?

Am I caught up in being only who other people want me to be?

Am I caught up in playing a role or striving after appearances or the display of who I want other people to think I am?

Am I caught up in my fears, am I hiding out to protect myself from judgment or hostility?

Am I caught up in asserting who I am – or who I think I am – by dishing out judgment and hostility to others, pushing other people around and putting them down?

If the honest answer to any of this is, “Yes,” it’s important to bring this to prayer before God. We can begin to see how underneath all of this false self is anxiety. Anxiety that I can’t be truly as I am, flaws and all, and still be worthy of love. There is a deep lack, a deep anxiety we seek to fill with the stuff of our false self, the stuff that, honestly, doesn’t fulfill our deepest needs.

Only God can fulfill our deepest need, only our deepest belonging, as humble beings created good and worthy of love by the Holy Creator of the entire cosmos.

Now, what’s also true, is that for a lot of people the reasons it is hard to live fully into who God has created them to be is because of desperate circumstances outside of their control. When you’re desperately just trying to survive, and constantly under threat, it is hard for the soul to flourish.

This is why war is evil. This is why slavery is evil. This is why oppression is evil. This is why exploitation is evil. This is why any form of human sin is evil that tries to destroy life and the possibility of life, that seeks to suffocate the inherent worth and dignity of others.

This is why we see Jesus time and again confronting these forces of sin, with the saving power of divine love, bringing new life from of death, restoring the personhood of those whose worth and dignity had been denied.   

Jesus calls on all of us to turn away from the forces of sin, the ways they distort ourselves and distort others, and to return to our true belonging in God, who receives us in grace, forgives us, restores us to be who God truly created us to be.

When we say “Yes” to this, whoever we are, wherever we are in life’s journey, it really helps to be in community – more-or-less healthy community with other folks who are seeking to say “Yes” to the transforming power of God’s grace. In our community here, we take seriously that what can happen when folks feel free to grow more deeply into their truest God-given selves is that folks start showing and sharing their gifts for ministry.

Ministry is not just for those of us who flap around up here in ill-fitting robes. Ministry is what we all are doing, together, when our souls get activated through our encounter with Jesus.

In the United Church of Christ, we believe, I quote, that,

“All members of the United Church of Christ are called to minister to others and to participate as equals in the common worship of God, each with direct access to the mercies of God through personal prayer and devotion.”

As part of this, it is very important to us that we remove the barriers that far too often have denied the gifts for ministry of folks for all the various reasons, often because someone inhabits the wide world outside the kingdom of straight males – folks who have been denied full and equal participation in the life and leadership of the church because of their gender or sexual orientation.

It is a sin to deny the gifts for ministry that someone can offer when they truly activate their souls and authentic selves. And it has been a blessing to be a part of churches that have stopped denying this, and instead have welcomed the gifts that everyone can bring to all parts of a community of faith, including ordained ministry.

Whoever you are, wherever you are on life’s journey, God is calling you by name to live more deeply and truly into who God has created you to be. When you do that in the Way of Jesus with God at the center, this does activate gifts for ministry in the way shape or form that accords with your gifts.

I will end with a prayer for the awakening of the soul, by John Phillip Newell:

Awake, O my soul,

And know the sacred dignity of your being.

Awake to it in every living soul this day.

Honor it, defend it,

In heart and mind, in word and deed.

Awake, O may soul,

And know the sacred dignity of your being.

            – (From Sacred Earth, Sacred Soul, by John Phillip Newell, pg. 257

Thanks be to God, and to God be the glory. Amen.

Delivered Sunday, June 22, 2025, by Rev. Nathaniel Mahlberg, at the United Church of Christ at Valley Forge.