David-Called to be…
Yesterday I officiated the wedding of one of my most favorite people in the whole world, Reed Moore. In fact, I blogged about him during the “young gun” series. At his reception, this stranger approached me. It wasn’t too out of the norm to be approached by a stranger at a reception. Often they’ll tell you what a nice job you did or tell you that they know so-and-so, but this convo was a little different. I learned that while he was a stranger to me, I was not a stranger to him. He’d heard about me through Sarah Olds and Reed Moore. The reason for his approach was that he was struggling with how to proceed with his call. While the wedding party entered the reception dancing to a Beyonce song, he and I talked for a while about a lot of stuff-seminary, discipleship, Kingdom of God, church work, etc. While I’ll keep the content of that discussion between the two of us, it got me thinking about my calling. Then, this morning as I was reading 1 Corinthians 1:1, I thought about that calling again. Paul wrote, “Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God.” I slipped off into reflective mode for a moment. Here’s what I was remembering:
- In April of 1994, I asked Jesus to be the leader of my life. I’d known him as my Savior and friend most of my life, but never completely submitted to him until one night in April.
- In April of 1995, I was having a deep, intense time of prayer in the peer-leading room of Central Gwinnett High School (of all places) when I heard God say, “You will work for me.” My response was, “Excuse me? I thought you just said, ‘you will work for me.’”
- For a second time, I heard God say, “You will work for me.” At that point, there was an incredible warmth that came over my body. It was as if someone were pouring warm oil that was covering me from my head to my feet.
- I felt a peace like I’d never felt before.
- I wanted the calling to be a Christian Counselor-not b/c I was called to be that, but b/c you could do that and make a very good living monetarily.
- In August of 1995, I learned that calling isn’t about money, but surrender to the will of God. I learned this as I joined the staff at a medium-sized church as a Youth Pastor. I was originally supposed to be interim, but they removed that adjective a few months after I started.
And that’s how it all began!
Need to confess?
