pastorjohnb

Thoughts and musings on faith and our mighty God!

Tag Archives: Call


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Faithful

Reading: Micah 6: 1-5

Micah opens this section by letting the people know that they have sinned against God.  In their hearts it is something they surely already know.  Just as at times we have sinned and quickly felt the conviction of the Holy Spirit, so too must the people living in Micah’s time.  God calls all of creation to hear the case He has against Israel.  The grand audience would indicate that this is a pretty serious charge that God is going to level against His chosen people.

Then there is a shift.  It begins in verse three, where God asks, “My people, what have I done to you”?  It is like asking, ‘How could you’?  God then asks how He has burdened the people.  In this question God is preparing them for what comes next.  In the next few verses, God explains things that are just the opposite of burdens.  God reminds the people of the many ways in which He has blessed them and cared for them and protected them.  Perhaps the ‘How could you’ question begins to ring in their minds.  By helping them to remember the ways in which God has been there for them, God is reminding them of the relationship they have and of the covenant on which that relationship is founded.

We too have had many times in our lives where God has looked in and wondered, “How could you”?  And God treats us the same as He did the Israelites.  Through the power of the Holy Spirit, God reaches out to us, shines light on our sin, calls us to repent and return to our covenant relationship with God.  God remains true and faithful to His part of the covenant – always loving and caring for us, always calling us back to a righteous relationship.  God faithfully and patiently calls us back over and over, calling us to walk faithfully with our God.

May we recall the many ways that God has blessed, cared for, protected, and loved us to this day.  Then may we go forth to walk this day and all days as a faithful servant of the Lord our God.


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Come, Follow Me

Reading: Matthew 4: 18-22

What has been the scariest step of faith you have ever taken?  When have you stepped out boldly for your faith?  For me it was leaving a job I had known and loved for 23 years to follow God’s call.  I would love to say I was as spontaneous and trusting as those first disciples, but that is far from the truth.  It was a long and slow process that involved lots of prayer and many conversations with family and trusted friends.  But it was a process through which God worked in amazing and powerful ways.

For Andrew and Peter, and then for James and John, the bold step of faith that they took amazes me.  They are sitting there at work, doing the only job they have ever known, when a stranger walks up and says, “Come, follow me”.  Certainly they did not have a clue what this really meant nor how the course of their lives would change forever.  There is no way they could have foreseen the journey they were about to begin the moment they left their nets and followed Jesus.

The same is true for each one of us that has chosen to follow Jesus.  Most are like me, answering a gradual call.  Others answer His call in a flash as Jesus breaks suddenly into their lives, like He did with these simple fishermen.  We all enter into our relationship with Jesus and begin our journey of faith, not ever really knowing where He will take us physically or spiritually, but usually eager to see where that is.

If we faithfully follow, Jesus will lead and guide.  He will also provide us those moments, like He did with the first disciples, when He says, “Come, follow me”.  These are not forever or career-changing moments, but temporary side trips.  They are the come, share a meal with this homeless man moments.  They are come, mentor this new Christian as they begin their journey of faith moments.  Whether big or small, safe or risky, these moments are part of our journey of faith and our responses demonstrate our obedience to Jesus as Lord.  Lord, grant me a willing spirit and a courageous heart today when You call.


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Called

Reading: 1 Timothy 1: 12-14

Paul reminds us today that God can use anybody to help build the kingdom.  Paul acknowledges that his past included blasphemy, persecution, and violence – all against the newly founded church that followed Jesus.  He was very zealous in his work against this new church.  Yet God, in a show of great mercy, claimed Paul for service in the kingdom.  In a flash all the zeal against Christ became zeal for Christ.

When we look at Paul’s past, we can see how God was at work preparing Paul for the role we know him in as one of the great missionaries and teachers if the early church.  Early on Saul, as the old Paul was known, was a star pupil.  He was very intelligence and quickly learned the Hebrew Bible inside and out.  He quickly rose through the religious ranks and became a very well respected Pharisee.  It was all of this past knowledge and practices that allowed Paul to so skillfully build His case for Christ and to defend it against attacks from non-believers and the Jewish authorities as well.

Each of enters into God’s service in a similar way.  We too all come with our past sins and mistakes.  But we also come with we have done and experienced and learned in life.  The gifts and talents that God has blessed each of us with are a part of who we are as well.  Just like Paul, when we are called or led into service in some particular way, we are ready.  We are just who God has prepared us to be and needs us to be for that role.

Like so many before us, often we too ask, “Me?” as our initial response to God’s call.  We are usually skilled at saying “Well…”, “But…”, “When…”, and “No” also.  But God does not call us unless we have been equipped for the task at hand.  We may not know this or feel this way, but God knows better.  May we each obediently respond to God’s call in our lives so that we may say as Paul said, “I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has given me strength, that He considered me faithful, appointing me to service”.


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By Faith

Reading: Hebrews 11: 29-40

“By faith” they walked through a sea, by faith the walks of a mighty city simply fell down.  By faith the giant was slain, by faith three hundred routed the thousands.  By faith touching the hem of a garment brought healing, by faith a man walked on water.  By faith the people of God have done things that would have been impossible otherwise.  Each and every time someone trusted fully in what God was calling them to and the miraculous occurred.

These stories are not stories of someone getting a wild idea and then asking God to make it happen.  Each is the story of how God spoke into the heart of a faithful follower.  Each is the story of a person hearing or sensing the voice or nudge of God and being willing to trust enough in God to lead them to respond by faith.  One can only assume there are thousands upon thousands who heard or felt God leading them as well but instead ignored it or refused the call.  We know this because we each are one.

Each of us that have heard or felt God leading us to do or say or be something are not without faith because we hesitated or were fearful or doubted.  We are human.  Each of us have also had experiences where we did step out by faith, where we did trust in where God was leading us.  In these cases lived were affected and maybe some were changed.  Perhaps our life was one that was changed because we followed God’s lead.

Just as all those who have come before learned and trusted and came to walk with God, we too are learning and building trust and growing by faith in our walk with God.  Just as those such as Moses, Joshua, David, Samuel, Rahab, Stephen, Peter, Luther, Martin Luther King Jr., and many more lived by faith to positively affect our faith and our world, we too can have a mighty impact for the kingdom of God.  May we be willing and trusting servants to answer the call of God and to step by faith to do God’s will.


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Calling, Waiting, Redeeming

Reading: Hosea 1:10

The Israelites of Hosea’s day have broken the covenant relationship they once had with God.  Their choices have led them far from God.  Like any parent, He is surely disappointed and maybe even a little mad, but the love for them is as strong as ever.  As parents we too have been in this situation with our own children, loving them in spite of their actions, words, or behaviors.  And like our heavenly Father, we long for them to repent of their poor choices and to return to the ways they were taught.  We so long for this because this is where our relationship is at its best, both for us and for our children.  God is no different.

With the Israelites and with us today, God continues to ever call us back into a right relationship with Him.  His promise to them is to make them a mighty nation – as numerous as the grains of sand on the seashore.  His promise to us is somehow more personal.  God’s promises to love us, to care for us, to watch over us, to bless us all still remain.  As His children, we are still God’s covenant people.  Yet through Jesus the relationship became more personal and intimate.  We can relate to Jesus’ human nature as a friend yet His divine nature is also present, revealing His power and majesty.  Through His resurrection Jesus imparts the Holy Spirit, a living presence of Jesus that comes to dwell in us once we accept Him as Lord and Savior.

It is through the voice and movement of the Holy Spirit that God continues to call us, His children, back to Him over and over again.  No matter what our choices, God still seeks to keep us in a righteous relationship with Him.  When we stumble, He calls out.  When we sin, He redeems.  When we wander away, He waits patiently, continuing to seek us out.  For God’s amazing and wonderful far-reaching, never-ending, life-changing love, we are ever grateful.  For all of His love, mercy, and grace we say thanks be to God.


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Continues to Call

Reading: Hosea 1: 2-10

The story revealed in Hosea is our story too.  Israel has fallen away from God and has begun to turn to Baal worships and other things not of God.  Yet God does not give up and continues to call them back.  Because of His great love and unending forgiveness, God seeks to renew Israel to an intimate relationship as children of God.

In our Christian walk we too cycle through periods similar to where Israel is in our story today.  Our focus and attention is drawn to things other than God.  Maybe for a season it is our future spouse or our job or our new friends.  The desire for recognition or a promotion or a new car seems to supplant God as our priority.  A new idol has taken God’s place.  Yet God is still there, waiting for us to return to Him, nudging us with the Holy Spirit, whispering our name.  He does not give up.

Even after naming all of Hosea’s children with names that remind the people of their broken relationship with God and even after review how the people have failed to be faithful to God, He ends the passage by saying, “they will be called sons of the living God”.  In this we see that in spite of all they have done and in spite of His anger with them, deep inside God knows that they will always be His people.  Always.

We too may stumble.  We too may wander.  We too may sin.  But God continues and continues and continues to call to us.  As followers of Jesus Christ, we too have been marked as children of God.  He continues to call our name.  We give thanks that in His great love and mercy, God continues to call us home and into His arms of redemption and grace.  Thank you God.


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Step Out

Reading: Acts 16: 9-12

When was the last time you felt God calling you to do something or when you felt the nudge of the Holy Spirit?  Depending on how in tune we are to our relationship with God, the guidance and nudges and whispers can come frequently.  These connections are like everything else in our lives: the more we try and allow ourselves to hear and sense God, the better we become at sensing and hearing His presence and guidance in our lives.

In the text today, Paul has a vision calling him to a new place of ministry.  He had been struggling with where to go next so this vision would have been like an answer to prayer.  For Paul the call was clear as day.  They get up in the morning, pack up, and head out for Macedonia.  New place, new people, new challenges.  Lots of unknowns.  Paul did not hesitate.  As one deeply in tune with God and the Spirit, God spoke and Paul went.

God sometimes calls us in a similar way.  He puts a call upon our heart and we feel the tugs to respond.  Or maybe it comes in an almost audible whisper from the Holy Spirit or in a nudge we can almost physically feel.  There is no denying that we all sense, feel, hear God’s calling and leading.  And there is no denying that at times we ignore, dismiss, … this call and leading.  We allow the fears, doubts, and unknowns to keep us in our safe, comfortable, easy place.  Step out.  We need to step out in faith and with the confidence that God goes before and that the Spirit walks alongside us.

We were each created to be used by God.  Each of us was created with our own gifts and talents for a purpose.  As we allow God and the Spirit to move in our lives, we are freed to experience and share the amazing power of God transforming our lives and the lives of those around us.  Step out and step into God’s plan for your life.


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Our Promises Too

The story of Jeremiah’s call is the call story many of us receive as well.  Like Jeremiah, God knew each of us before He formed us in the womb.  Like Jeremiah, God has a plan and a role for each of us to play in building His kingdom.  Like Jeremiah, God gives us the gifts, talents, and skills needed for the task.  And like Jeremiah, for most of us, our first response is, “Who, me?”

Who could blame God if He got angry when we respond this way?  It is kind of insulting that we question the omnipotent and omnipresent Creator of the universe and all that is in it.  But God is patient.  The only things that exceed His patience, in my opinion, are His grace and His love.  But He is patient.  When we ignore or deny the call or when we refuse to recognize or acknowledge the gifts and talents He had blessed us with, God just continues to nudge and prod and whisper and to bring before us people and opportunities until we choose to begin walking the path He has laid out for our lives.

We are not the first to question, deny, or run from our call.  Before Jeremiah there were people like Noah, Sarah and Abraham, and Moses – just to name a few.  There have been people like Esther, David, and a slew of others just like us who have taken their turn asking, “Who, me?”. Just as He was with all who have come before and required more than one ask, God was patient and used each one according to His plan.

If you are hesitant to answer God’s call, remember the promises He gave Jeremiah.  They are our promises too.  The first is: do not be afraid.  The second is: I am with you.  The third is: I will rescue you.  His promises are true.  As we live into God’s call upon our lives and as we boldly step out in faith, may we remember and hold onto these promises.  They are our promises too.  As we do so, He will bless us on our faith journey.

Scripture reference: Jeremiah 1: 4-10


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His Gifts, His Call

Paul writes to the Corinthians concerning the many gifts that the Holy Spirit has blessed them with.  In today’s passage Pauli stressing that all gifts are equally given and that all are to be used for the same purpose: to do the will of God in the world.  He also emphasizes the idea that we each are uniquely gifts to do our own special work for the kingdom of God.  Lastly, Paul points out the fact that our gifts are given to be used.

It is often said that where our passions meet God’s desires for our world is the place our gifts are best used.  Where our gift as a teacher or healer or encourager or interpreter of tongues fills a need in someone’s life or in a ministry is just the place God calls us to use the gift that the Spirit gave us.

We mus be careful to be aware of, to recognize, and to give the glory to God for the gifts we have.  Our gift is like all else we have in life – a gift from God.  It is something that God placed within each of us through the Holy Spirit.  Our thankful response should be to use our gift for God.  We must recognize that God intended our gifts to be used for the good of all of God’s children, for all of the people in our lives, not just for some.  Each of our gifts is intended to make the world a better place.  And in the end, all must point back to God.  It is He who gave the gift and it is really God who is at work accomplishing all that results from us using the gift.  To God be all the glory.

Sometimes the call to put our gift to work can be a scary thing.  It may involve giving up a career or maybe moving to a new place.  It may involve doing something in your community that is a bit uncomfortable.  We must remember that He who calls is really the only one in control anyway.  He will be with us in the response as well as in the call.  May we be ever faithful to the One who calls.

Scripture reference: 1 Corinthians 12: 1-11


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God’s Call

Paul expresses the profound call that God has placed upon his life.  He knows and writes of the special and holy role that God has selected him to play – to bring the gospel to the Gentiles.  Paul knows what an honor it is to help include this group into the family of God and to reveal the mystery of faith found in Christ’s saving grace.

Perhaps you too have felt God’s call upon your life to be in ministry to a certain group of people.  Perhaps you are still discerning this call.  For all of us, God does have a call upon our lives.  It may not be as ‘big’ as Mother Teresa’s call to care for the dying of Calcutta, but it may be.  We cannot limit God because He is a limitless God.  There is nothing He cannot do.

We all share in one common call.  Jesus commissioned us all to go and make disciples of all nations.  These were His parting words.  This is the general call or role for all of us as Christians.  We are to be the lights and love of Christ to all we meet.  Through how we live our lives we are to model and share Christ.

God’s call upon us as individuals extends beyond this.  He has instilled in each of us unique gifts and passions to be used in building His kingdom here on earth.  Their own unique gifting and passions will lead some to work with those in need.  For some it will be to mentor single parents.  For some it will be to teach others budgeting skills.  For others it will be knitting hats and gloves and scarves.  What is it for you?  How has God built and equipped you?

If you are living out God’s call upon your life, may He continue to bless you in your service.  If you are still in the discernment process, may He open your eyes and heart and guide your feet on your path of service and mission.  Blessings on the journey!

Scripture reference: Ephesians 3: 1-12