“You would not have called to me unless I had been calling to you,” said the Lion.
~ C. S. Lewis, The Silver Chair
Reflect, Resonate, Reevaluate, Respond
What does your kingdom stand against? What is it opposed to, in particular, because to say I’m against evil, you must ask, “What is uniquely given to ‘You’ to oppose evil in a way that nobody else can do. The way you uniquely can do.” And in the same sense what are you meant to create; A beauty of goodness and truth, that is meant to draw people into an even deeper relationship with the goodness of God.
~ Dan Allender, 1952- , therapist, author, professor
Most of us use, “I’m waiting for God to reveal His calling on my life,” as a means of avoiding action. Did you hear God calling you to sit in front of the television yesterday? Or to go on your last vacation? Or exercise this morning? Probably not, but you still did it. The point isn’t that vacations or exercise are wrong, but that we are quick to rationalize our entertainment and priorities yet are slow to commit to serving God.
~ Francis Chan, 1967- , author, teacher, preacher
I just want to lie on the beach and eat hot dogs. That’s all I’ve ever wanted.
~ Kevin Malone (Brian Baumgartner), The Office, Season 3, Episode 23
Calling is where our talents and burdens collide. Our talents are our birthright gifts, the gifts that make our hearts sing, come alive. Our burdens are found in our stories, in what breaks our hearts. God was inviting me to use the gifts that made me come alive, to redeem the things that broke my heart.
~ Rebekah Lyons, writer, speaker, podcaster
We get our calling wrong when we imagine that God needs us, to be the hero of our own story, rather than Christ. Second, we routinely misdiagnose the problem of our world, underestimating the brokenness of sin and overestimating our ability to fix things. Third, our witness of God often depicts a Lord who is domesticated to serve our causes . Fourth, a justifiable focus on external problems can easily blind us to the depth of our complicity in the pain of the human condition.
~ Tyler Wigg-Stevenson, 1977- , Preacher, writer: The World Is Not Ours to Save