If you’re anything like me, the term calling carries some baggage. We might think calling is connected to a specific job or only vocational ministry. We might think a calling involves influencing a large number of people. Or maybe we view calling as a divine, prewritten script.

The root of our misconceptions is a jump to the third level of calling. We skip the first and second call because the third is more visible and action oriented. But when we ignore the primary call to follow Jesus and the secondary call to become the person he created us to be, we can become infatuated with the third call, which does great damage to our understanding of calling.

Photo Credit StevenW. via Creative Commons

One common misconception is that calling is like a divine, prewritten script. God does not call you to participate in a certain activity in high school, attend a particular college, marry one specific person or work at a certain company. Of course, God cares about these things, and any decision as important as these should include conversation with him. However, there is no predefined script which if missed takes you forever off the rails and outside the will of God.

Becoming the person you were created to be is far too dynamic to be confined to such a strict script. God is telling a story in our lives, and God gives us the freedom to choose our path. He uses the events in our lives, including the poor decisions we make, to shape who we are becoming. We are co-authors of our story with him.

This is incredible. There is a story God wants to tell in our lives, but he gives us the freedom to co-author it. That sounds like quite a risk doesn’t it? He chooses to give us, a fallen people with little understanding of his intended story, an opportunity to participate in its authoring. Dangerous, right?

This flat out amazes me. God not only allows us to co-author our story, but he actually uses our failures, our bad decisions, our pain and our wounds in our story. If you make a bad decision or disobey God, your life is not immediately set on a course toward inevitable destruction. No. If you follow him, God will redeem your poor decision within the story of your life. Calling is not a set of railroad tracks. It is a dynamic, conversational relationship with God.

Photo credit mag3737 via Creative Commons

Have you ever thought about yourself as being called by God to something? Have you ever spoken about a call? “God has called me to…?” Has God placed a calling on your life?

My spiritual upbringing was in Pentecostal churches. This was a place where calling carries a great deal of weight. There was often a special night at summer camp where students filed to the front declaring a calling. You would hear a pastor or missionary speaking of his or her specific call. People who spoke about a calling on their lives had a certain measure of prestige.

In my digital meanderings, I have come across a lot of discussions about calling recently, so I thought I would take a little time to write about it.

Go back to my first question. Do you believe God has placed a call on your life? He has. Each of us has a unique calling. If you are anything like me, there is a lot of baggage tied up in the notion of calling. There is a great deal to say about what calling is not, but let’s begin with what it means to be called. What is God calling you to do?

While we each have a unique calling, it begins will a common calling. Your primary call is to follow Jesus… period. That’s it. Jesus’ introduction to many of his followers was two simple words, “Follow me.” He speaks those words to us today as well. Following Jesus is our first call in the same way it was the first call for those who left their nets, tax booths, fields and families to follow Jesus in the first century.

When we follow Jesus, we encounter our secondary calling, to become the people God created us to be. Don’t confuse this calling with activity. Our secondary calling is far more concerned with being than doing. In fact, most of our misconceptions about calling are tied up in the substitution of doing for being. While your calling will result in action, what you do flows from becoming the person you were created to be.

Finally, when we follow Jesus and become more and more the person he created us to be, we will experience a third level of calling. These are calls to very specific actions. (e.g. to the mission field, to start a particular business, to serve a specific group of people, etc.). These are not our primary or even secondary callings. Your first call will always be to follow Jesus and is followed up by a second call to become the person you were created to be.