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I’ve been writing here recently on the subject of call and vocation.  I firmly believe that our call or vocation flows from discipleship to Jesus Christ.  That is why the terms “call” and “vocation” do not solely or primarily apply to those doing “ministry” in a professional or other ecclesial sense.  Call is a disciple’s life. 

Often, people I am discipling or counseling are flustered when I propose that we should seek the will of God and expect an answer.  Nevertheless, I must continue to propose that the entirety of a disciple’s life is subject to the will of God.  There is nothing that can be set aside.  By becoming disciples of Jesus Christ, we have submitted ourselves to a long, deep obedience to Jesus in order that we may be children of our Father in Heaven.  This obedience is long, because it will last the rest of our lives.  It is deep, because it touches every fiber of our being.  It touches every place where we have to make a choice. 

At first, this might seem overwhelming to disciples who realize that they do not know what God’s will is or how his character works.  Nevertheless, over time, through being discipled and mentored and through the discipleship norms of the called community - the church - a disciple discovers how to discern and do the will of God.  As maturity develops, certain things become a given.  Other things are still battled out day to day. 

One of the first habits of this kind of discipleship that may develop is the perpetual, momentary inquiry as to what God desires us to do with the next moment or the next several moments.  Surprisingly, even when we have a relatively structured day, we have a lot of moments in which God may speak.  We have a lot of moments in which he can guide us into something we never would have expected.  This could occur in conversation, in thought, and in action.  Often, this is strengthened by mini-pauses between events, so that we may listen to God’s “well done!” and discern further direction.

There is no escaping this long, deep obedience, once we have committed to discipleship.  God will not allow any part of our life to escape transformation.  And this is to our benefit.  For we must always remember that any untransformed, unredeemed part of our life will not survive the transition to the New Heavens and the New Earth.  God found it good, right, suitable and excellent to put that part of us there in the first place, and now he still finds it good, right, suitable and excellent to be transformed into something that we will have for eternity. 

Thus, such submission to transformation - as unpleasant as it may be - is worth the effort, the pain, and the difficulty - in order to have something that will last.  So let us away with the survival mode tactics of what I can get away with and still be in the will of God, or it hurts too much so I’ll wait, and dive in!  We will find the reward worth the struggle - and more.

As I continue in congregational leadership, I have become convinced that there is much more that God wants to do than we ever allow him to do.  God really wants to heal the sick.  God really wants to cast out demons.  God really wants to change lives and bring people abundant life.  God really wants to pour out his Spirit - in the supernatural kinds of ways that we see in the New Testament and elsewhere.  God really wants to even raise the dead. 

And yet, we don’t pray anywhere near enough for this to take place.  Moreover, oftentimes, the prayers that we pray are weakened by the expectations of failure or, perhaps worse yet, survival rations of God’s Spirit.  Sadly, we often don’t expect God to respond.  Especially not immediately. 

What if the Church - and yes, our local congregation, too - were to pray 24-7 as a habit: not just in a few places, mind you, but as a habit for congregational life?  What if we were to expect the miraculous?  What if we were to expect God’s will to actually be done in our lives?  What if we were to invite the full giftedness of the Holy Spirit to come down upon us - to give us what we need for ministry, and to form God’s character in us? 

If?  Then: then we would see God transforming our communities organically through the work of the Spirit-filled church.  Then we would see the message of Christ connected to the lives of many people who otherwise would see this as just so much more talk.  Then we would see radical revival.  Are we ready for this?

Then let us pray: not just for the extravagant, but for the mundane.  Let us pray expecting that God will speak to us.  Let us pray, knowing that he hears us.  Let us pray, knowing that he desires to grant us Abundant Life.  Let us pray - knowing that God desires the church to grow as we do his work.  And let us do so together, as much as possible. 

God, move your Spirit upon us.  Cleanse us from our sins.  Heal our bodies, souls and minds.  Grant us emotional healing.  Provide for our needs.  We want to give you glory, honor and praise.  Pour out your Spirit and let your Kingdom come. 

Amen!

The subject of Vocation, or Call, has generated some very good reflections in the comments over the last week or so.  I find it a bit difficult to respond to comments that are almost as long as the post (if not longer), since there’s so many rabbit trails to go down!  :)  Therefore, I propose an alternative solution: I’ll try posting more on vocation and call and deal with as specific a topic in each post as I can manage.  Then, we can generate genuine discussion through rather briefer comments. 

Now, that said…

One of the issues that seems to be the most pointed in the comments is the question of discernment: how do we differentiate our will from God’s?  If we desire to do something, is this a desire from God, “from the flesh”, or somehow a mixture of the two? 

When our will is the primary factor, experience tells me that we will pursue something even while doors are closing to the pursuit one after the other.  All the while, the open door (often one we don’t necessarily desire) stands open, until we, either crowded back toward the open door by all the other closures, or finally letting our will submit to God’s, end up going through the door that was open in the first place.  For me, one of the best examples was the pursuit of Graduate School until I finally submitted to the call to pastoral leadership in a local congregation.

In the meantime, the frustrations mount that the ends we are pursuing do not turn out as we like.  We may even try to dive in to the wrong thing just to get the tension over with.  (Yeah, tried that, too.)  In the end, though, as we start listening to God, we begin to discover (if we allow it) what it is inside us that drives us in such a stubborn direction.  And it’s rarely on the surface.  And it’s often rather difficult to disclose to others, if not impossible.  And yet God heals it as we pursue what he really desires. 

By contrast, when God’s will is dominant, it’s much more like a learning experience.  God’s will and his purpose may not be clear - any more than algebra may be or have been for us.  Ultimately, though, like higher math, if we are willing to discover and learn, the will and the purpose becomes clearer and the applications start to make sense.  In such a learning experience, there will be trial and error.  Sometimes we will have to work backward to the point where we messed something up (such as a vain attempt to divide by zero) and re-work the whole issue.  We will discover as we grow that there is more we didn’t know, and become content with what God is doing. 

Usually, need or pain triggers one response; faith based in the goodness of God, the other.  And we tend to mix the two, don’t we?  I painted as stark a contrast as I could for emphasis. 

What sorts of discernment issues grow out of this contrast?

Today, I read a letter to the editor in the local paper written by someone in our congregation.  The article is here.  I responded in the comments section on the paper’s website. 

It seems that residents of Warren and the Mahoning Valley do not feel good about their/our community, on the whole.  With the rust-belt economics and issues of crime and social dysfunctions, it seems that few have a positive outlook on the area.  Survival and holding on to what little is left seems to be the name of the game for many people.  Hope seems to be in short supply.  Community-bashing seems to take the place of positive social action. 

Nevertheless, in her article, Ms. Fishel offers us a contrasting perspective that I welcome.  She seems to suggest that if we spend less time being mad or sad (or even scared) about how things are, and choose to take positive steps toward good leadership in government, education, family and business, then we may be able to turn things around.  She herself seems willing to be a part of the solution.  This is very commendable.  But I think there is a bit more.

God wants to bring his people abundant life - even here and now.  As we engage ourselves in following in his ways, we will find ourselves truly breaking out of being “part of the problem” and becoming “part of the solution.”  For until God directs our lives, we end up dealing with all the same issues and power structures the last group of well-meaning folks dealt with, until we get back to where we started.  Only lives transformed by the power of God have the potential to really make substantive changes in the core issues at work here. 

I would encourage members of our community to enagage in walking the neighborhoods and praying for them.  It gives a very different perspective than when we stay in our cars and off certain streets.  And people come to God through it.  As they do, we see neighborhoods become alive again.  Shall we begin?

I’ve just been listening to a lecture given by N. T. Wright, Bishop of Durham (Episcopus Dunelm), on Jesus’ knowlege of his own identity.  Vocation has been on my heart of late; not only in the missiological necessities but in its relationship to our true identity. 

Wright manages to do something that I have rarely seen among true scholars - and even among many who merely bear the name “teacher” - including myself: he is able, through his deep scholarship and understanding, to lead us, not into an academic exstasy, but into true worship and discipleship.  Even amidst the fluency of many languages - Greek and Hebrew being the most obvious here - Wright leads us to a deep understanding of Jesus which inspires true relationship with God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, rather than footnotes.

I have long held that Christian scholarship and education, rightly practiced, is a true vocation in and of itself.  As such, it can be, for the scholar/educator, an act of worship, a source of true joy, and a vector for others to be drawn up into worship.  Nevertheless, my experience has been that many scholars take so much pride in questions and deconstruction, in academic debates and frank scoffing that rarely has scholarship led me to worship.  The exceptions, of course, are many of my truly Christian professors from Seminary, and a few other scholars whom I have met in books.  In these cases even the footnotes were the adornment of the priestly uniform as we act as the kingdom of priests serving God for the world’s renewal.

As a teaching preacher, I must remember that this mature expression of scholarship need not work itself into a frenzy to bring out passion, but instead speaks so lovingly of the God whom it has come to know academically that, even where we differ or do not understand, we still resonate with to the glory of God. 

Ah, that one day I may become like that.

Today, I observed a subtle shift that has been going on in my outlook on preaching - what needs to be preached, what must be heard - has come to some fruition.  Today, I had the “not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the Kingdom…” passage from Matthew 7:21 - 29.  While through the past I have heard and focused on the warning aspects of the passage, today, we focused on the reassurance and confidence aspects of it.

Yes, even in such a passage there is hope and good news.  That was the focus today.  Previously, I think we needed to hear the warning more.  Now, the encouragement. 

This is a very good sign that we are moving toward congregational health.  What do you think?

This was the question at our men’s group tonight.  How do we reach ____?  fill in the blank.  It was a good discussion.  We decided to pray the prayer Jesus invites us to pray in Matthew 9 - “Lord, send workers into your harvest field!” for two weeks and see what God is saying.

Pray with us!

After a few conversations recently, I am again reminded of the nature of God’s call on our lives.  When God calls us, he does not “need” us.  His motivation is blessing.  He desires to bless us.  So he calls us.  The things to which he calls us are the vectors and the means by which he blesses us - even now.  When we run from God’s call, thinking he is asking too much, we run from God’s blessing.  God cannot bless us as much or as fully if we disobey rather than obey. 

This runs alongside the call-burnout issue.  We think we have to do so much - this activity, that activity… we end up so hyperactive, we don’t know what to do with space and silence except that all the stuff we’ve packed away comes to the surface.  So then we blame God about how tired we are (since he has called us) or what we’re going through (because it hurts) and then don’t want to listen to what happens in the silence and so run harder and further. 

And all God wanted was for us to do what he called us to do: no more, no less.  A long time ago I decided to follow God’s call - wherever that led.  I decided to let God do as much as he possibly could.  And it has led me to some very surprising places.  Not the least of which is Warren, Ohio.  It’s been a tough call, so far.  Crazier by far than anything I’d imagined.

But God’s blessing has been greater than anything I’d imagined, either.  And it isn’t over yet - not by any stretch.  This week, I’m preaching on Isaiah 49:8 - 16.  In that passage, God’s people feel overwhelmed, abandoned by God and unable to fulfill their calling.  Yet, even so, God chooses to bless them.  They’ve been failures as his covenant people.  Yet, he chooses to give them something greater than they had to begin with.  He even wants to bless the journey back from exile into the land of promise.  He’s not just blessing the land, he blesses the journey too.

No, we have not been forgotten.  We will not be forgotten.  But we must pursue the call to receive the blessing.  We must pursue the call of God and no other calls.  This is the Word of the Lord; Thanks be to God!

So I’ve continued my work of prayer this week, seeking God’s vision and direction (while not neglecting my other pastoral duties).  It seems like I’ve been interacting with God at a very deep level regarding some issues we’ve been experiencing in our Congregation.  And the conversations I’m having reinforce what I’ve been praying for. 

I think we as followers of Jesus tend to under-play extended periods of prayer as valid for Christians - espeicially “professional church leaders.” 

I’m realizing it needs to be more balanced, now.  Definitely more time for prayer - in solitude and in groups.  No doubt about it. 

Now… how to get that to take hold congregation-wide…

As our congregation has transitioned from a high-conflict situation coupled with a systems-wide change situation to a point of stability and growth, I have noticed a change in the use of my time. 

Initially, I was working hyperactively, firefighting (in a sense), working long hours, high stress, etc.  This was also a time of managing out-of-bounds conflict and strategizing the change in church systems that needed to happen to bring us to health. 

As the conflict moved to the back burner, the hours-per-week slowly came down into the “reasonable and customary” needed to really be sustainable life.  Nevertheless, I was still working on the systems stuff.

At the moment, we are working on developing new bylaws for the church which will ultimately change the way we govern ourselves and make our systems more Biblical and give us accountable flexability within visionary leadership.  As this transition occurs, we are working to come to leadership consensus as we begin to teach the concepts of such new governance to the congregation at large. 

Now, I believe we have come to a place of quiet re-grouping, a place that can be bathed in prayer - because now there is time to do that.  I think we will find a happy medium in this, such that we can now structure prayer into ministry from the beginning, rather than trying to use it to fight through things later.  I think this is a very positive transition, one which I feel will flow throughout the congregation and bring true healing and Kingdom transformation - and therefore, growth. 

Stay tuned as we continue this process, and please pray for us!