The Call of Christ
Have you ever felt like you gave everything you had to a purpose or project and did not receive the outcome you hoped for or dreamed? How did this make you feel? Were you sad, mad, disappointed, or frustrated?
If you are anything like me, you probably felt hurt and upset. As an Enneagram One, when things do not go the way I desire, I often get critical of myself and others. My path of disintegration leads to stress and states of irrational anger, resentment, and impatience. These are my weaknesses.
I remember when I failed my first test in college, in Economics (ironically now my sister’s major), I could not believe it. I had attended every class, took extensive notes, studied for countless hours only to receive a letter F.
“Are you kidding me!?” I thought. “There must be a mistake. I don’t fail things. And I need this prerequisite to get into the business school. You know, the Terry College of Business at the University of Georgia. What I planned!!”
At the time, I thought a business degree from that school was the only option that made sense; the only education in the world that would allow me to be an achieving senior minister in a major church one day, debt free and on my planned career path. Business was practical. Since they don’t teach human resources or accounting in seminary yet, my undergraduate degree was my shot at acquiring the needed knowledge for my so desired success. And with my state-funded, full-ride to Georgia, this business school was the only option, or so I thought at the time.
This grade, however, was not a shiny, gold star in my favor. With only three tests and a final, I would have to make 90’s and above on all the other tests in order to even have a shot at getting a B in the class. I felt like the business school was shoving me out. How was I suppose to pull this grade up now? And I needed this class, this grade, to achieve my goals. I know I am a little dramatic, but at the time, I thought this small detail would kill my future.
And if I’m honest, similar emotions to this situation experienced some five years ago, have been felt in abundance in the last two weeks since the infamous General Conference vote of 2019. At first, when I heard the news that the Traditional Plan passed, I sat stunned to my core. The United Methodist Church that baptized me, taught me to read the Bible and understand grace in abundance, stood witness to my confirmation and encouraged my call to ministry, now wanted to bar me from ordination and the blessings of marriage in the church simply for my honesty surrounding sexuality.
“I have given you everything I have, Madame Church. I have served you faithfully and this is how you treat me. It’s unfair. I need your blessing in order to continue my ministry in the United Methodist Church. I have worked toward this goal my whole life. Seminary depends on this. My future livelihood depends on this. Are you joking!!”
My stunned-self quickly turned into my angry-self and devastation set in. Like the grade on that fateful economics test, I thought the future I planned for myself was ruined. And then I read the lectionary reading for this St. Patrick’s day weekend and began to ruminate.
At that time, some Pharisees approached Jesus and said, “Go! Get away from here, because Herod wants to kill you.”
Jesus said to them, “Go, tell that fox, ‘Look, I’m throwing out demons and healing people today and tomorrow, and on the third day I will complete my work. However, it’s necessary for me to travel today, tomorrow, and the next day because it’s impossible for a prophet to be killed outside of Jerusalem.’
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who were sent to you! How often I have wanted to gather your people just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. But you didn’t want that. Look, your house is abandoned. I tell you, you won’t see me until the time comes when you say, Blessings on the one who comes in the Lord’s name.”
Luke 13:31-35 (Common English Bible)
Sounds familiar, right? Some people come along and tell you something that feels like, “you don’t belong.” Whether its a bad grade on a test, an unexpected and probably unjust job evaluation, a threat, or an institution you love making bold stances on discrimination, you get frustrated, and justifiably so. Like Jesus, you may call them (whoever them is), a bad name or two. Yet, unlike Jesus, you get knocked off our course by these hiccups. We all do it. We seem to think that the bad circumstances before us, carry more might than the God we serve can move. Why is that?
I think it’s because we often understand our calls too shallowly. We know we are all called by God to bear different fruit in this world. “You didn’t choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you could go and produce fruit…” (John 15:16a CEB). Yet, we think there is only one way for each of us to produce such fruit. We think of God as some game-show host, setting doors before us asking us to choose the single one with the big prize. The trick is, in God’s world, journeys of discernment are not gameshow selections with right and wrong choices. No matter which path we choose, God will be with us all.
Christ in the story above would have loved to do his ministry in Jerusalem. “How often I have wanted to gather your people just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings,” He says. Yet, Jerusalem did not want him. In fact, they wanted to kill him. Yet he knew his call was not to Jerusalem, but to the ends of the earth. To which his reply went something like this.
“Jerusalem, so what? You want to kill me? That’s not going to stop me from throwing out demons and healing people today, tomorrow and the next day, even if I have to leave this city as it crumbles. This is my call and you can’t stop me.”
I once confused business for a shallow understanding of my own call. I thought it was the only way to effectively execute my divine orders, to serve the body of Christ in word, order, sacrament, and service. So when business didn’t want me, I found the study of public relations. I have to say it’s been working well for me in ministry thus far.
I also once confused United Methodism for a shallow understanding of my greater call. I thought the denomination to be the only place for me to find a missional purpose. I may have been wrong about that too. The church, in global, connectional, institutionalized form, has said they don’t want me. Yet, I believe I’m coming into a realization that bringing word, order, sacrament, and service to God’s people is not the UMC’s monopoly.
No, I am not leaving my church home presently. I do not believe we are to that point yet. God is still working here, but I am resting with a new peace now that there is a possibility elsewhere.
I will stay and fight for the love and inclusion I believe God’s kingdom needs here on earth today and tomorrow, but if on the third day this Jerusalem still wants to kill me, I’m okay with that. I will move to the fields and villages outside her walls and watch in dismay as the city is left abandoned. I no longer fear that.
As professor and author, Barbara Brown Taylor says, “there is no mastering divinity.” In her memoir of faith, “Leaving Church,” she speaks of about how it took leaving the pulpit of an Episcopal church to understand her true vocation. “My vocation was to love God and my neighbor, and that was something I could do anywhere, with anyone, with or without a collar. My priesthood was not what I did but who I was. In this new light, nothing was wasted. All that had gone before was blessing, and all yet to come was more.”
Vocation and call are much deeper than any major, career, institution, club or church. Use these for education and transformation, but do not be confined by their limitations. We are meant for something more. Find your center and find your true call, for that is where Christ will be also.
“Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ to win me, Christ to comfort me and restore me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ in the hearts of all that love me, Christ in the mouth of friend and stranger.”
Saint Patrick’s Breastplate
