Growing Into Our Calling
When I was in college, I was in the midst of a debate over my future between myself and God. One day when I was praying, I distinctly remember telling him, “God, I’ll do anything you call me to… anything! I’ll serve, I’ll go on mission trips, I’ll support. But I’ll never preach or teach! Anything else is fair game.” There’s an old Yiddish proverb—“We plan; God laughs.” And how true it was; I taught middle school for three years and I’ve been in ministry for 18!
In part, my refusal stemmed from a belief I held about myself—that “the things of preaching” are not things I am good at. I am an introvert, and I used to hate standing in front of people, trying to get my thoughts out. School presentations… I’d stare at my notes. I didn’t run for a class office position for fear of speaking in public. So the thought of doing it for a living terrified me!
Yet I also discovered through the years that my fears were where God had also placed my gifting. I am actually a talented teacher! I can take difficult ideas and present them in ways that people can interact with and understand. I craft good questions that facilitate conversation. I love watching people light up when you help them comprehend a subject for the first time. And the introvert in me gets to do the research for it, so it’s a win-win!
What if I had stopped when I thought I couldn’t do it? Or when the first few lessons were only ok at best? Some amazing and wonderful church members listened to quite a few mediocre sermons with love and encouragement along the way. (And they still do, occasionally. God must have gifted them with an amazing amount of patience!) But if we gave in to our doubt, our fear, our frustrations, our lack of understanding, we might miss out on some incredible avenues of ministry.
In Ephesians 4, Paul writes to the churches in Asia Minor, “So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (vv. 11-13). When we think about gifting, we often consider it to be something evident and easily identifiable. But I think it is as much about perseverance, understanding, and growing in the midst of mediocrity. It may be gifting from Christ, but even gifting takes hard work.
In his book Adorning the Dark, Andrew Peterson writes, “The best thing you can do is keep your nose to the grindstone to remember that it takes a lot of work to hone our gift into something useful, and that you have to learn to enjoy the work—especially the parts you don’t enjoy. Maybe that’s the answer to a successful career.”[1] Even if it is our gift, it takes work. Like a songwriter mumbling through lyrics with half-written lines muttered into cell phone recordings. Like a sculptor working with a piece of marble, where he swings his hammer to hit the chisel to take large chunks and tiny slivers off the stone, sweating all the way. Gifting takes hard work because it is God’s call to your labor.
Imagine if we were to ignore our gifting? But also imagine if we were to wait until we have it all together and have it all figured out before we get started! We will always be in process, becoming what we are called to be. As Paul says, “Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers….” But evangelists discover how to share the good news meaningfully by doing it enough times with people who’ve never experienced the Good News. Pastors learn through pastoring, the time spent in the lives of people. Teachers learn through teaching and then evaluating: What went right, and what should I change to be better? We learn through doing. Sometimes we learn by doing well, but typically we learn more by doing poorly.
The Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard once said, “And now, with God’s help, I shall become myself.” We have been called and gifted by God, but God doesn’t expect us to have it figured out or fully formed. Instead, we grow by being faithful to the calling we’ve received.
1. Andrew Peterson, Adorning the Dark: Thoughts on Community, Calling, and the Mystery of Making (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 2019), 2.
