I don’t think you can reflect accurately on what it is to respond to the call of God until you are in that moment or action of response. Of course there are many theories and theologies surrounding what the call is, why God chooses to call and what happens if we do or don’t respond. Today these things are not what preoccupies my thinking. Today as I rise at 6.00 am and sit typing this in a motel room in Connaburrabran what sits heavy on my heart is the affect of the call on one’s life. Because it is the call that can not only change everything but that can and should define everything.
Yesterday morning we rolled out of Seymour, to travel some 1600 km to Robina where we are to begin a new ministry, Lyndal and I, to youth and young adults. Getting to the point of agreeing with God that this was the way to go was not easy. But what was far tougher was following. You can agree to following but then actually following is a whole other world. I received a letter from a friend which I read last night, as I felt quite miserable and uncertain and in that letter my friend said,
"As much as I don’t like the fact that you and Lyndal are moving away, I think you’re both really brave for actually doing the stuff that God wants you to do, except it makes me scared about the things he might as me to do.”
These words resonated with me, not because I’m brave, or even think I am, but because to follow the call scares the hell out of you, or life into you! To follow the call means to risk things. In my case, it was a call to leave a place and a group of people I deeply loved and enjoyed and travel 1,600 Kms North to an opportunity that (through prayer, reflection and discussion) I felt God was asking me to throw myself into. For me the struggle of coming to terms with this new direction of call and then responding to it wasn’t about the fear of the unknown I would be moving into, but what I was going to have to move away from.
When you minister in a place, you give yourself to that place, to the people, to the call, to the tasks. In my opinion it’s the only way to minister with true effectiveness. But the impact when the call changes is consequently very hard. What I have discovered is that in those times one discovers where their security lies. If you’re security lies in those who you do life with, then when you leave them, even for the most noble reasons, you will come undone. If however your security lies in God, then it will be hard (almost unbearably so) but it will be possible to follow the call and embrace the call.
Leaving Seymour was the hardest thing I have had to do. Many spoke of how exciting my future would be, but those words seemed somewhat empty in the face of leaving friends you love. However I think God’s perspective on these things is different from ours, because if it were up to us we would stay put with those whom we love where life is comfortable. We would never venture from these bounds, or throw ourselves calculatingly yet carelessly into the unknown where God awaits us. But thankfully God’s vantage point is greater, and whilst he knows how difficult it is to move away from people you love, God also knows that there are greater things at stake, and a bigger picture in which he wants to use to our full capacity the gifts, graces and experience that he has built into us.
So the bottom line becomes faith. Faith that we have in God obviously, but also the faith the we have in ourselves to follow, and the faith that we have that says I can move out of my comfort zone, I can move away from my friends and those I love, I can move into areas that will challenge and confront me and force me to grow, because I know through all of that, that if I am called to it by God, then God can and will sustain me.
This is great, Ralph. I'm sorry I haven't read it earlier! It has blessed and encouraged me greatly... thank you.
Posted by: Elizabeth Danes | June 28, 2008 at 03:01 PM