Week 22: Calling - Hello, can you hear me?

"Calling is God's personal invitation for me to work on His agenda, using the talents I have been given in ways that are eternally significant." - Stephen R. Graves.

  When I asked someone, what is God calling you to do? Almost always I receives an answered, "I don't know", "Not sure" "I don't think it is matter for me" etc. If I were to ask you the same question, what will be your answer? If your answer is the same as above, 'I don't know', I just want to tell you that you're not alone. To be 'called' you have to know God and listen when He talks. I love this, "Calling is being released to be exactly who I am supposed to be, to do precisely what I am supposed to do for God, an assignment with eternal worth."
Everyone is interested in knowing what they are supposed to be doing. So, the question is, how do I know God is calling me to do?

Three Channels for God's Call*

1. By name

When God calls by name, it is very difficult to ignore. It might be calling by name if you hear God speak or God's speaking is confirmed by other means. It's probably not calling by name if... what I have heard God speak before turns out not to be so OR I can't clearly identify the time or place of communication. If I think God has called me by name and I cannot recall the time or place, then I probably was not called as I thought I was.
When God is calling us directly by name, there is no doubt about who we are listening to.

2. By placing a desire in my heart.
If a desire is from God, its sense of urgency will be persistent and enduring. God equips whom He calls and calls whom He equips. It is probably not calling by desire if... I am completely unequipped to get the job done or I quit when I encounter significant hurdlers. Personally I know friends who have desire about this and that, thought it was their calling but in the end they fall down broken with frustrations. Remember this friend; it might be calling by desire if the sense of urgency is persistent and relatively longstanding.

3. By arranging a clear path.
A man plans his steps, but God directs his path. God has placed us in space and time and 'determined the times set for [us] and the exact places where [we] should live.' (Acts 17:26) Be patient with God's timing pays off. Sometimes friend, the question is not which path, but whether I step out  when the path is clear.

What is your calling? Did you hear Him calling you by name? By desire? By a path? Are you going to answer that? Are you willing to step out and answer it?

'His call is a call worth taking, worth listening to, and worth following up on. Trust me, He has your number and has been trying to reach you for some time. It's just up to you to pick up the phone.'
What is your calling? Ring… Ring… Ring, pick up the phone.
----------------------------------------------------------
*Taken from book Life@Work: Marketplace Success for People of Faith by John C. Maxwell, Stephen R. Graves and Thomas G. Addington. Above are my summary of their chapter on Calling.