Part II

This second article on call looks at how changes in our lives can impact our calling. Marjory Zoet Bankson bases her book, The Call to the Soul, on the cyclical nature of God's call to the soul of man and on William Bridges' book, Transitions. In this book, Bridges describes a three-stage process of ending, neutrality, and new beginning. Marjory's model includes seven stages of passages which she identifies as resist, reclaim, revelation, the passion river, risk, relate and release.

These seven stages are reflected in the various changes we experience in life and in our seasons of ministry. They are reflected in what I call the changing face of call. Some might say there are four major stages in the development of call upon a person's life that relate directly to their age as follows:

I agree that we are called to Christian service. For many, that service takes different faces throughout a lifetime in different vocations that are as varied as there are vocations. Some may begin their call as artists and be called later to be pastors or teachers. Others may start out as auto mechanics or computer programmers and later be drawn to evangelism or missionary work. The combinations are endless but all reflect changing faces of call.

However, much of the Church today, I believe, does not understand the nature of call on each of our lives and our responsibility to seek God's will and purpose in our personal lives in relationship and vocational choices. Pastors and laity alike do not appear to believe God leads and directs.

Researcher George Barna noted that fewer than 10% of church-going Christians make important life decisions based on God's Word and seeking His will. In other words, 90% of church-going Christians decide major life questions based on their own intelligence, peer opinions, whim or fancy. They marry, change jobs and move to new cities without so much as a 10-minute prayer.

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Our response to call should take us beyond ourselves, beyond conveniences and entitlements, beyond self-esteem and to a larger purpose that has to do with what we understand as God's intention in creation and in us as a part of that creation.

We often look at the nature of call from the viewpoint of Biblical examples we have read about them from an early age. Some of the most memorable include: Abraham, Sarah, Joseph, Jonah, Moses, Esther, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and the disciples. These Biblical models are seen in snapshots. They seem to be called to some heroic adventure or deed or to one event or action, and they always have dramatic success.

For some contemporary Christians this model seems to hold true. One example is Rev. Billy Graham. But for most of us, call works differently. When you look at the Biblical models carefully, most reflect to some degree Bankson's seven-stage cycle.

For example, the resist stage is exemplified by Moses when he says, "Who am I that I should go unto the Pharaoh and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?" Moses resisted and said to the Lord, "You know that I am a stutterer and I don't speak well." And the Lord said to him, "But I will give you Aaron who will be your mouthpiece (Ex.3-4)."
Bankson's final stage, release, is illustrated in the Biblical model of Samuel:

And the Lord said onto Samuel, how long wilt thou mourn for Saul, seeing I have rejected him from reigning over Israel? Fill thine horn with oil, and go, I will send thee to Jesse the Bethlehemite; for I have provided me a king among his sons (I Samuel 16:1).

My point is that the face of call changes. The call remains the same, but the environment or circumstances in which the call is to be acted out changes. There are seasons in call.

There is a sense in which call is linear -- a point of beginning, a period of success and a time of release. Yet there is a sense in which call is cyclical. You begin with an awakening and interest and you initially resist. Then you reconcile it, reclaim the call and accept it. Then greater revelation about what is involved and how it may be accomplished follows. Finally, you make the decision to go forward. You cross the great divide and you go public.

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Your intention is to be a brain surgeon or an auto mechanic or a preacher or a builder. You announce it to the world. With that intention, you have increased your risk. You go out on a limb where the fruit is. Then comes success and you begin to see the need to relate your call to a greater universe of people for a greater good. Having succeeded and having power and control, you again face the challenge to release in God's timing.

We should remember that it was a sense of call experienced by laymen that was instrumental in:

One man or woman stood up and helped change the world.

Rick Burtness, a Christian insurance man, stood up in a business seminar recently and said, "As sure as I know that I am breathing, I know that God has called me to do this work." Rick is working to make medical coverage more easily available to persons in need. He played pro ball for a short while but God called him to this service. As he spoke, his voice cracked and his eyes moistened. And a kairos moment broke into a business setting controlled by chronos time.

Kairos refers to the "timeless realm" of God. In the next Gathering, I will conclude my discussion of call by showing how we can navigate through the seasons of call and have them be a reflection of God's will and purpose in our lives.
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Part III