Calling: Remembering the Simplicity

Calling is a mysterious thing. People talk about it like everyone has one particular thing in life they are destined to do, like you must find this one thing or you’ll miss out on your whole purpose. That you’ll miss out on experiencing life to the fullest.

I’ve always wrestled with my calling in life, with what I was designed to do & be.

I had a dream to open a community center.

I thought about being an opera singer.

I considered going into human services.

I pursued a degree in Family Ministry.

But through it all, I always knew I ultimately had a desire to impact people.

I was in Georgia a few weeks ago over Christmas. One morning, I was driving alone, following my husband as we were driving two cars to his sister’s house. As I cranked Sigur Ros (one of my latest fave listens :) and reflected, a sudden sense of clarity began to emerge from the cloud of questions I have been wrestling with for the last few years.

As a reflected, I recognized a new thread running through the years of my life: a passion for equipping God’s people. A passion not just to make a difference with my life, but to empower others to make a difference and to experience life to the fullest God intended.

My passion for vocational ministry was confirmed once again in my heart & mind, but now I have other questions.

Now I wrestle with wanting to not just have one question answered, but to have them ALL answered. So now I am asking questions like “are there particular areas I am passionate about equipping Christ followers in?” and “are there particular ways I am passionate about & gifted in that I can do this through?”

These are all good questions to ask, but maybe there's a bigger picture that I forget about sometimes. Maybe there's a Person involved I forget about sometimes.

Recently, a gifted executive coach I know made a comment that reminded me of the fact that I don’t have to know the answers to all these questions to experience what God designed me for. He pointed out that this whole idea of calling in relation to vocation and fulfillment really didn’t come about until the last 100 years. Before that, calling was a much broader idea: we are called to love God with everything we are and to love people.

Yes, God designs us with unique gifts, passions, and opportunities. Yes, sometimes God asks us to go a certain direction, but I think people have forgotten that ultimately our purpose in life is not to figure out our exact niche and excel in it. Ultimately our purpose is to love God and love people.

So, I must learn to trust along with everyone else. To trust that even when my direction isn’t clear, God guides our footsteps. To trust the Person rather than my path & my plans.

I don't have all my next steps figured out right now. I'll keep asking those questions, but I'm also reminded to experience the fullness of life God has already placed around me and to live that "to the hilt" as Jim Elliot would say.