Take a road trip with me. From where you are, use your imagination and picture that we are northbound on I-81. Maybe Bill Mitchell has asked that we make a peppermint, butterscotch or Jolly Rancher run to keep our famous candy bucket well stocked. Maybe we are on an ice cream outing with the youth group.

Now we are out on the open road because it is here that we are likely to spot something I'd like you to see. It's one of those unpretentious magnet signs. You can see them centered on the doors of large pick-up trucks owned by an individual working a trade, most likely a general contractor or an electrician.

I imagine Joseph, a carpenter of Nazareth, might have had something like this in his day. It wasn't on the door of a Ford 250, of course, but it's easy to imagine some type of sign he, like other craftsman, might use. Now earlier this month Miss Linda's Sunday school class, which meets near the space where I'm standing, learned in scripture that Jesus had brothers and sisters, so his dad's sign at one time might have read, Joseph and sons, carpentry. No job too small.

No doubt some were thinking about Joseph and his family that morning when they heard that Jesus, who was now back home, would be reading from the scriptures.

Pride must have swelled toward that authoritative reader until he finished the scriptures. Then something happens.  He preaches. Jesus may not have started off talking about signs that identify a tradesman, but he did cite texts from both Elijah and Elisha, and, what that carpenter's son says doesn't flatter those in the synagogue.  Specifically, that carpenter's son says that God often finds it easier to do God's work among outsiders. To prove his point, that carpenter's son sites a widow of Zarephath and later a Syrian leper. Rather than the religious 'in the know' folk, that carpenter's son says people living in far-off lands are the ones God chooses and uses.

Why, that son of a... [carpenter] is saying that God's own people are so busy telling themselves how special they are that they forgot to be God's people, a people called to be a blessing to others.  That carpenter is saying that somehow these religious elite believe that being "God's people" means that they are special in the sense of being "better than" other people.  That carpenter didn't share this gently. No, Jesus dug in and dug deep. He pushed, questioned, and challenged. That uppity hometown boy didn't just stir the pot a little more deeply; that 'kid' being seen around town fetching supplies for his dad just a few years back had them so  fired them up that they tried to kill him.

That same fiery message Jesus shared some two thousand years ago has not changed. God can still find it easier to do God's work among outsiders—among the plebs and pebbles of the earth—rather than with religious well-to-do in that pretty (or is it pretty stuffy?) old white church just next door? Jesus says self-professed chosen people, those considered the religious elite, aren't the ones being chosen.

If you're thinking what I'm thinking there is a real danger now, just as there was that morning in the synagogue. It's this. We can all get a little too comfortable. The danger is even our young ones here today—young ones who will lead us into the future—can be a little too set, a little too soft. The danger is we can become more about singing hymns than serving others. The danger is we can be more about worship than work. The danger is we can be timid in faith, not tenacious. The danger is we are cowards, not courageous.

Or are we?

Here's the gist of the scripture today. God doesn't use you in a pew; no, God uses you when you have a view, a view of the world as you are one in the world spreading his love and sharing his message.

As Jesus was nailed to the cross, this scripture nails us too, if we are honest. Sing hymns from the heart, yes, absolutely. Worship our God most definitely. Sing and worship, oh yes, but do neither sitting still. Instead, let God use you.

This is the second of a two-part sermon series. Last week, we talked about the first part of this sermon title God loves you the way you are. A point we made is the one I just shared. With God's love for you, let God use you. And God can use you, if you let Him.

Hear the echo from our last message. God does love you where you are and today some of us here are in tough places. Career, health or home front situations are frustrating or maybe even overwhelming at times. This is a fact. Some of us aren't where we want to be, but that doesn't mean that, like the outsiders Jesus mentions in his sermon about Elijah and Elisha, we can't be used from where we are. Regardless of location or situation, be one of use. Be one of action.

And that action will change you. In fact, that's our first point today. Allow God to put you into action, and that action will change you. See, God does love you the way you are—and even where you are—but that doesn't mean God will let you stay that way.

And God won't let you stay that way because God can't let you stay that way. And God can't let you stay that way because God, the first and only authentic author of love, has plans to use you not as a religious stuffed shirt, but as one built with the stuff that will make more love possible. Put yourself in this scripture. Are you one to be used by God, or one, who is in the know, who is passed over?  It's your choice.

Whether you're coming up on the age of 9, 59, or 99, no matter your health status or income level...no one is exempt. All of us are handed lessons we can embrace. No one there in the synagogue or here in the Lecture Hall today gets to kick back and say, nope, I've served my time. No one can say a Sunday school class is not for me. No one can say I've served on my last committee, or just as bad, I've can skip a month or two of meetings.

Yes, God loves you the way you are, but God refuses to keep you that way. Instead, God is providing you with a direction.  This direction won't be of your own choosing because it's not about you. Instead, it's about how God will use you, and where. That's our second point this morning. Follow God, and you find direction.

In Hebrews 11:8, the Apostle Paul reminds us that "it was by faith that Abraham obeyed when God called him to leave home and go to another land where God would give him as his inheritance. He went without knowing where he was going."

That didn't mean that Abraham didn't have a direction; it meant that Abraham, just like you when you leave this room, can have direction—and that's the direction God has for you.

True story: a distant family member, a second cousin I'd see maybe every other year, asked when he found out I'd be attending Boston University's theology program, "you...you aren't going to go anywhere unsafe are you?" He wasn't asking if I would be going to unsafe parts in the city of Boston, he meant a third world mission field.

That's a fear he had. That's a fear some of us have. Yes, we're thinking, I know that I am to drop everything I own and follow Jesus, but maybe what you are to drop is your fear that if you truly give your all to God that you'll be lost.  

But that's not the case. God will give you direction. Jesus says this in Mark 8:34. "If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake for the Good News, you will save it."

This is our final point this morning. Trust God, and you will be transformed. Trust God and follow. Trust God and let the cross you've been carrying—that cross of financial worry, that cross of sibling crisis, that cross of marital disappointment, that cross of career frustration, that cross of stubbornness, loneliness, or mourning, and you will be freed. You will be transformed.

Sit here and be unchanged. Sit, like those in our scripture lesson, and be ones God won't use. Or move. Give. Open yourself. Find yourself in God.

It is here and it is now. Allow God to put you into action and that action will change you. Follow God and you will find direction. Trust God, and you will be transformed.

We talked about signs earlier. That's how this started. We talked about signs you might find on the door of a worker's truck.

We started the sermon that way because God wants you to be a worker. Don't do it for yourself. There is no gain. You may reap financial success for a time. Others may deem you one remarkable individual. But, egocentrically, if you hang onto your life as the 'be and end all' of your existence, you will lose it. Those aren't my words, they are his.

Imagine there is a sign on your door. What does it advertise? What do you do?

Jesus, as you remember from the end of our lesson today, did something I'd like you to do too. As Jesus walked right through the crowd and went on his way, walk through what you need to walk through within yourself and be on your way, on your way to God.