Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

A third time the Lord called, “Samuel!” And Samuel got up and went to Eli and said, “Here I am; you called me.”
Then Eli realized that the Lord was calling the boy. So Eli told Samuel, “Go and lie down, and if he calls you, say, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.’” So Samuel went and lay down in his place.
The Lord came and stood there, calling as at the other times, “Samuel! Samuel!”
Then Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.”

• 1 Samuel 3:8-10

So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.

• Galatians 3:26-29

Paul, a servant of Christ Jesus, called to be an apostle and set apart for the gospel of God—the gospel he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures regarding his Son, who as to his earthly life was a descendant of David, and who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord. Through him we received grace and apostleship to call all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith for his name’s sake. And you also are among those Gentiles who are called to belong to Jesus Christ.
To all in Rome who are loved by God and called to be his holy people:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.

• Romans 1:1-7

“In their encounter with Jesus Christ human beings experience the call of God and with it a calling to life in the community of Jesus Christ. … As Jew or Greek, as slave or free, as male or female (Gal. 3:28), as married or single, people hear the call. Right where they are, people are supposed to hear the call and let themselves be claimed by it. … People fulfill the responsibility laid upon them, not in the faithful completion of their earthly vocational duties as citizens, workers, and parents, but in hearing the call of Jesus Christ, which also leads them into earthly duties but is never totally absorbed in them. It instead stands beyond, before, and behind them. … Luther’s return from the monastery to the world, to his ‘vocation’—in the genuine New Testament sense—is the strongest attack and offense that was carried out against the world since early Christianity. Now a position against the world is taken in the world. One’s vocation is the place where the call of Christ is answered and lived responsibly. The task given me in my vocation is a limited one, to be sure, but at the same time, my responsibility to the call of Jesus Christ goes beyond all boundaries.”

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, I Want to Live These Days with You (devotion for July 12, devotions compiled from his writings)

I guess the concept of calling stems back to the Lord calling Samuel, but most of us do not hear an audible voice.

These days, a “calling” seems to be limited to the call to become a pastor, but in Galatians and Romans (the passages quoted above), the calling is God calling us to become children of God.  With that being lost in the definition, people who have no clue about God flock into the pews, become members, vote on critical matters, and become church leaders.  This entire time, they never heard God’s voice calling them.

I like what Wintley Phipps told Bill Gaither in an interview.  He said that if God wanted him to be a garbage man, he would hang on to the back of that garbage truck, singing praises to God.

Each of us who can rightfully claim that we are children of God have been called.  It might be called to be a garbage man.  Bonhoeffer makes that distinction.  We are called to be a child of God.  Then, that distinction might limit what vocations to which we might be called.

Some of us take a lifetime to get into the vocation that we were called to be.  I wanted to be a writer when I was in middle school, and I was always dreaming up a story here or there.  I am reminded of a pastor’s story about a pig farmer who felt he should have been an opera singer.  He lived his entire life with the pigs, never getting his big break.  And late in life, during his prayers, he lashed out toward God.  He wanted to know why he never got his big break to do what he was ‘called’ to do, to sing opera.  And God laughed and said that his calling was to be a pig farmer for pigs that enjoyed hearing him sing.

Some vocations might not be the best vocations for a Christian.  We should not be in a vocation that requires us to break God’s laws.  Some of us may not have a choice in that matter.

But the important choice is that we allow Christ Jesus to cleanse us of our sins.  We allow the Holy Spirit to enter into us and guide us toward being more like Jesus.  And once we have attained salvation, our calling in life is to share the Gospel in word and in action.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.