Two elections.

One was here in the Coastal Bend. On the ballot were Republicans and Democrats running for everything from the United States Senate to the Del Mar Regents. We could cast votes for Perry or Sanchez, Shamsie or McComb, Huerta or Greenwell—and we did. At least, many people did, probably 40 to 50 percent of those eligible to vote.

Then there was a second election—only a few weeks before the one here. It was a presidential contest, but the ballot was simple. There was only one name listed. Voters were commanded to go the polls, and they did. Nearly all of those who could vote did—re-electing Saddam Hussein as the president of Iraq.

Two elections, but with very different processes.

I share this with you because it points to one of the realities those of us in the United States most enjoy. No, it is not freedom, although that is certainly a part of it. What we value most is choice, the opportunity to select between various options.

It is foundational for our political system. That is why we have a two-part system, why we can choose to vote or not vote, choose to support one candidate over another.

But it is also fundamental to our economic system. When we go to HEB we can choose from among more than 30 different breakfast cereals. We can go car shopping and not just choose from among the different brands—Ford and GM, Chrysler and Dodge, Toyota and Honda, Saturn and Suzuki—but from among different models, colors and options within any one brand. In the U.S. we choose our mates, our careers, our homes. We can even choose our religion, or to have no religion at all.

More than any people in history, those of us in the U.S. today live with the assumption that we have choices, that we can decide what we will and will not do.

Maybe that is one reason that many people in the United States find the God of Scripture hard to shallow. Because the God of Scripture doesn’t give his people a lot of choices.

God didn’t go to Abraham and Sarah and say, "Would you like to leave your home and your kinfolk, grow old on the road, bear children and become the parents of my people?" God told them to go. God told them that they would be the parents of his people. They weren’t given a choice.

Neither was Moses. God didn’t appear in the burning bush and say, "Moses, I’ve been looking for someone to go to Egypt, face down Pharaoh, and lead my rebellious, stiff-necked people out. Would you consider the job?" No, God said, "I’ve heard my people’s cry, and I am sending you to bring them out."

When God called Jeremiah, God didn’t give him an option. God didn’t ask if he wanted to proclaim disaster to the nations. God said he had appointed him to pluck up and pull down, to destroy and overthrow, to build up and plant." God gave Jeremiah no more choice than he gave Jonah about going to Ninevah or Hosea about marrying the prostitute Gomer.

And it gets no better in God’s son, Jesus.

• "Follow me and I will make you fish for people," he demands.
• "Love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and your neighbor as yourself," he commands.
• "Go into all the world, baptizing people in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded," he orders.

Where is the choice? Where is the opportunity to select a different path, to seek an alternative ministry, to choose some other task or way?

It is not there. And that is troubling for us. We would rather God be democratic or capitalistic. We would prefer that God let us select from various, equally acceptable options. We would prefer it that God let us choose what we are to be and do as his disciples. But God doesn’t do that.

Yet as God’s children, God does give us a choice. That choice is not whether we will do what God commands us to do, but whether we will do it reluctantly or willingly, whether we will grumble over it or rejoice in it. Those who chose the latter know the peace of God.

Mary is one example.

You have heard the story. Mary is alone, spinning thread or maybe at prayer, when the angel Gabriel comes to her. He tells her not to be afraid, that she had found favor with God. Then he tells her that she will conceive and bear a Son, not just any son but the Son of God, the messiah who will rule forever.

Of course, Mary is perplexed by all of this. She doesn’t understand how it could happen. She is, after all, a virgin, engaged but not yet married. When she asks the angel, he tells her it will be by the power of the Holy Spirit, that with God even the seemingly impossible is possible.

Notice that nowhere in the story is Mary given a choice. The angel doesn’t asl if she would like to be the Christ-bearer. He doesn’t ask for her to volunteer. He declares that this is what will happen.

Yet how does Mary respond? She embraces the calling. "Here am I," she said, "the servant of the Lord. Let it be with me according to your word." She not only willingly accepts the role that God has chosen her to play, she rejoices in it. When she goes to see her cousin Elizabeth, she breaks out in song.

"My soul magnifies the Lord;

and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior

for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant."

Mary may not have chosen to bear God to the world, but once God chose her she was willing, joyful, excited about fulfilling her calling.

It was not a task for which Jean felt particularly fitted. First of all, she was an introvert. Second, she did not like to be around sick people. But when the chairperson of the pastoral care committee came to her, said she had been praying a lot about the church’s folks living in nursing homes, and wanted her to help with the visits, Jean didn’t feel she had a choice. It was not just that the person asking was an old friend. There was something inside that told her that this was something she had to do. So she set about the task. She was hesitant at first. She would visit one or two people at a time, and when she was done she would find herself exhausted. Yet the next week and the week after that she would again make her rounds. Then, almost without realizing it, something became to happen inside Jean. She began to look forward to those visits, to seeing the smiles on the faces of the church’s long-time members, to hear the stories they told, often over and over again. She even got to the place that she would stop and visit with perfect strangers seated in the gauntlet of wheelchairs that lined the halls. She began to embrace the calling God had put upon her life—to willingly yield to the work God had commanded her to do. And like Mary, in doing so she came to know joy like none other.

Fred had hoped for a quiet seatmate as he boarded his flight home. He had a Sunday School class to teach and the time in the air would be his last chance to prepare. But as he opened his book, the woman in the seat next to him asked, "What are you reading?"

He tried to be polite but distant. "It’s a book for a class I teach."

"What do you teach?"

"Sunday school," he said, figuring that would bring the conversation to an end.

"Oh," she said. "I went to Sunday school as a kid, but I haven’t been to church for years. Do you really believe all that?"

Fred knew his hopes of studying were over. He knew that God was calling him to something more--to listening to the woman‘s doubts, to sharing God’s love and grace. And he wasn’t thrilled with the opportunity, but he closed his book, turned a little toward the woman beside him, and embraced his calling.

"What do you mean?" he asked, opening the door to hear the woman’s story, hear her doubts. He opened the door to speak of God’s grace and the joy of following Jesus.

We are people who like choices. It is the very air we breathe. But we are also the people of God, disciples of Jesus Christ. That means that we sometimes we have no choice in what we are called to be and do. We are simply called to obey—to love, to pray, to tell, to serve. We are simply called to do as God commands. Yet if we embrace our calling, yield to the wisdom of God, willingly do as God asks us to do—there is joy. And like Mary we can sing:

"My soul magnifies the Lord;

and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior

for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant."