REPEATING THEMES - 6 “CALLING”

REPEATING THEMES - 6
“CALLING”
Readings: Psalm 25:1-14, Jeremiah 29:11-14, 1 Corinthians 1:1-9, Matthew 4:17-22
Preached at First Presbyterian Church, Baldwin, NY, August 29thth 2010

I am concluding today a series I began at the start of our summer services looking at repeating themes that flow throughout the books of the Bible. We have looked at themes such as 'Creating', 'Covenanting', ‘Dying’ and 'Living'. Today we are today going to take a look at the theme of ‘Calling’.

Sometimes people think of God’s call as something that only applies to ordained clergy or missionaries. But biblically speaking every one of us has a calling on our life. Every one of us is called to particular areas of service that God has uniquely gifted our lives towards. Some aspects of calling apply to all of us. Some are more specific.

1. The calling to ENCOUNTER
2. The calling to ENGAGE
3. The calling to EVANGELISE

The calling to ENCOUNTER
God calls each of us to encounter the love of Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit. I’ve talked previously of the story in the creation account in Genesis in which humankind falls from grace after their disobedience in Eden’s garden. God asks Adam a particular question; “Where are you?” The love of God is a love that seeks an encounter, a love that wants to find us.

A name we often use for Jesus is to describe Him as the Savior. The love of God that we can find through Jesus Christ is one that saves us from having lives disconnected to God. John 1:12 tells us “To all who received Jesus, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God”. In John 15:15 we find Jesus telling those who respond to His call to discipleship, “I have called you friends”.

Commenting on this close encounter God desires for our lives Paul speaks in his first letter to the church in Corinth of how; “God who has called you into fellowship with His son, Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful” (1 Corinthians 1:9). The word Paul uses for ‘fellowship’ is the Greek word ‘koinonia’, a word of deep intimacy and partnership. ‘Koinonia’ is a word that speaks of a love and unity with God that occurs when the Holy Spirit is allowed to transform us and renew us.

God calls to us “Where are you?” Where are we in our encounter with God? Do we know ourselves children of God? Is our encounter with God one of deep ‘koinonia’ fellowship? Is our encounter with Jesus Christ one in which we know ourselves His friends?

Such is the sort of encounter God wishes us to have through our faith in Christ. Oswald Chambers in his classic book ‘My Utmost for His Highest’ writes “God’s call is for you to be His loyal friend, for whatever purpose He has for your life”

The key to finding this close encounter with God is the grace of God. The realization that what we can never do for ourselves, God has already done in Jesus Christ and is seeking to do in our lives today through the Holy Spirit. Returning to that verse from Corinthians; “God who has called you into fellowship with His son, Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful” (1 Corinthians 1:9). God has put everything in place for us to encounter God’s love. God is faithful. As God calls “Where are you?” our answer needs to be “Here I am Lord! Ready and willing to do whatever You ask of me!”

Bill Bright, a Presbyterian and founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, commented one time on how to hear God’s call. “The most important way to know God’s will is to totally surrender to the Lordship of Christ. Ask Him to guide your steps. You are in God’s will if you are surrendered to Him. The God who created everything will guide our steps.”

Encountering God through God’s grace is not about what we can do, but about what God desires to do in us and through us! It’s about going with the flow. Allowing the current of God’s Spirit to move us and take us. Until we let go and let God we never get to experience that ‘koinonia’, that intimate relationship with God that God desires for us in Christ through the Holy Spirit.

There remains great truth in the words of Charlotte Elliot’s hymn; “Just as I am, without one plea, but that Thy blood was shed for me, and that Thou biddest me come to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come!” We must encounter God on God’s terms, not try and set the terms for ourselves. And as we encounter God we will hear a second type of call;

The calling to ENGAGE
The Psalmist muses about the faithful person that “God will instruct him in the way chosen for him” (Psalm 25:12). The first letter of Peter tells us “You are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of Him who called you out of darkness and into His wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9).

Paul agrees when he writes to the Ephesian church, “For we are God’s workmanship (which means literally ‘valuable masterpiece’) created in Jesus Christ to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Ephesians 2:10). The Old Testament prophet Jeremiah pictures God declaring to God’s people “For I know the plans I have for you… plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

God calls us in order that we may be engaged in the work of God’s Kingdom. We are firstly called into relationship with God. We are then called to build on that relationship by engaging ourselves in the work God created us to enjoy. Hear again that promise of Jeremiah… “I have plans to give you hope and a future.”

But how do we find out what those plans may be? I would suggest that we discover those plans in two particular ways.

Firstly, by identifying our desires and passions. There are areas of life that resonate within us. There are things that we love to do simply because that’s what we love doing! Other people may find them boring. Others may not resonate in the same way towards them as we do. They are our passions.

And often they are closely related to what we can do. When we are good at things others find hard, then that’s a good sign that God has been preparing us to be engaged in those things. As an example I am useless at car maintenance. When I open the hood I look under there … it looks like an engine. I know there are some cars that have shinier engines, and some that have engines that don’t look anything like my engine, but to me its always going to be an engine.

But a mechanic looks under there and they see things I don’t see. They know what all that stuff is doing in there. All I know is that I’m really glad it is there… but I’m even more glad that there are people who get excited about what is in there, because God has not created me with the gift and desire to get excited about engines. So when they stop working, I see it as a problem, but they see it as a challenge!

God has created us with different abilities, different passions. There are things that we do and not only do them well but really enjoy doing them. Such things are usually part of our calling.

Secondly, God graces our lives with spiritual gifts. In a number of places in scripture there are lists of spiritual gifts that God graces people with to equip them for ministry. Sometimes these are things that don’t come naturally to us, but it is only as we try them or experience them that we find how they work in our lives. Passages such as Romans 12, Ephesians 4 and 1 Corinthians 12 all contain lists of such gifts.

1 Peter 4:10 tells us ‘Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.’ Likewise, Romans 12: verses 4-6 “Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts, according to the grace given us.”

A study of the different gifts is beyond the scope of this sermon, so for now it is sufficient to say that God desires to engage you in ministry using your passions and desires and through equipping you through the Holy Spirit to find joy in areas of service you may not even have on your radar at the current time!

We are called to encounter God and to be engaged in being the unique person God calls us to be. Thirdly, there is…

The calling to EVANGELISE
I understand that for some folk the word ‘evangelism’ has many negative connotations attached to it. It can conjure up images of manipulation, insincerity and used car salesman! That’s a shame because all evangelism is about is telling people some good news. Good news that there is a God and that God is crazy about us! Good News that God’s love can be found through encountering Jesus Christ! Good news that God’s Spirit is still in the business of recreating and empowering and making all things new!

The call to the first disciples in Matthew 4:19 is a call to all disciples of every age and every place. “Come follow me” invites Jesus, “and I will make you fishers of men”. So, we may say, ‘But I’m not a fisherman. How can I catch people by fishing?”

The point is that God made you ‘you’, and by being the best you ‘you’ can possibly be (and by openly pursuing being that person God is calling you to be) then you will catch other people up in wanting to be the best ‘them’ that they can be!

The greatest evangelistic tool God has given to your life is you! By being who you are meant to be in Christ, then you become an unconscious, underground, subversive, evangelist. As people observe you using your passions and gifts for God, and they see how God is blessing you in doing so, you won’t have to say a word, because you’ll be a living word of God!

That’s what evangelism is about and why it is so related to the idea of calling. Repeated time and time again throughout the 66 books that make up the Bible are stories of God calling people to be who they are in order to serve God’s purposes. Moses, Joseph, Gideon, Samson, Deborah, Ruth, Naomi, Esther, Isaiah, Daniel, Peter, Paul and Mary, Matthew, Mark and Luke and John, the list goes on and on and on!

They make mistakes. They pursue their passions. They sometimes strive and struggle to understand how, why, where and who! But through them, the world comes to hear good news about the love of God that can make all things new!

I pray that today we will hear God’s call to encounter His love, engage in His work and reach out to others with the good news of the gospel message.

And to God’s name be all praise, honor and glory, Amen!

Rev. Adrian J. Pratt