It was the year of the dying of the king, when Isaiah saw the Lord, high and lifted up in the incense-shrouded heights of the sanctuary. When he heard God say, "Whom shall I send?" he replied simply, "Here am I, send me!"

It was the year when the priests robbed the people in the name of God, when Samuel heard the Lord, as he was waking from sleep by the ark in the temple at Shiloh. When he heard God say, "Samuel," he replied simply, "Here I am ... speak, Lord, for your servant is listening."

It was the year when the fish weren't biting, so you worked all day in the hot sun, throwing the nets and pulling them in empty, and they still went home hungry, when Simon Peter fell to his knees, surrounded by flopping, tossing fish, in a boat astonishingly overloaded with the catch of a lifetime; and …