Sunday, December 11, 2011

Comments about The Call

Unfinished Sculpture by Michelangelo


I'm currently reading The Call  by Os Guiness and it has been an awesome book so far.  I highly recommend it.  I try to take notes while reading about any ideas the author has mentioned or particular quotes I find interesting.  I've found myself actually transcribing entire passages!

So back to the book. I could spend a thousand posts on ideas that have been brought to mind, but I would like to spend a minute on a couple of quotes by John Cotton.  He was a Puritan writer in the 17th century who wrote on many topics but these quotes come from his writings on being called by God.  These are the first two criteria of seven he lays out to make sure that a person's calling is from God.

1. "it be a warrantable calling, wherein we may not only aim at our own, but at the public good
2. "that we are gifted for the job and guided toward it by God"

Os Guinness makes the point that people in today's time like to focus on the second criteria.  If we're good at it, then that's our calling.  I know that's how I approached my decision to go to Grad school.  However, this is a mistake because this leads down a road of selfishness.  A true calling from God only in comes in light of what we can do for HIM and his people which is the point of the first criteria.  Only after fulfilling and realizing this corporal calling can we proceed to the individual calling.  As Os points out correctly, our first call is always toward Jesus.  Only when we answer that call will we find fulfillment in our individual vocations.

Another point I found interesting is that we should NOT expect to find complete fulfillment in what we are called to do.  Firstly, we can only find complete fulfillment in Jesus and what he has done for us, but secondly after the Fall, work has become "partly creative and partly cursed."  For some people, their vocation is only periphery to what they are and do centrally.  Paul was an apostle, but that wasn't the best paying job back in the day.  He also made tents to support himself.

There is so much I left out, I highly recommend getting the book and reading it!  I have a link on the side of my blog to books I recommend and a link to Amazon.  Please check it out.  I want to leave you with the reason for the sculpture of Michelangelo at the top of my post.  Some people say it's unfinished, others say he left it unfinished on purpose because it gives the perspective of this wonderful sculpture struggling out of the rock.  I think this is a great example of how our call comes to us.  It's a process that takes a lifetime and for most people it is left unfinished, but thanks be to God that he still makes beautiful art out of our mess.

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