Happy Easter :) I've not posted since last week so I hope you had an amazing weekend in the UK sun! Remember that enjoying ourselves with family and nature and sharing in each others' spirits is amongst the truest form of prayer so I hope you have enjoyed God's presence!
So today I wanted to talk about our calling and our purpose. It struck me this morning for whatever reason that my purpose and calling to a certain extent are clear - but at the same time are completely unknown, but I have peace in this unknown and I hope to explain why in this post.
What is Purpose?
The purpose of human existence has riddled scholars and deep thinkers since the beginning of time I expect. Why are we here? How did we get here? What are we supposed to do here? All questions that deserve an evening with a couple of bottles of wine or a great single malt to discuss with friends. I don't expect to answer your question, "Why am I here?" in this post but maybe I'll get you going on discovering that for yourself.
Purpose is Why.
What is Calling?
Many will at some point in their lives feel 'called' to do something or other. Another word to mean calling could be vocation. Vocation speaks of career, especially ones that are difficult and may not pay as much as they deserve; medicine, nursing and care, for instance are all traditional 'vocations'. But vocation does go deeper than career and salaries, it can be used to describe the act of fulfilling what has been laid out for you.
Calling is What.
Some would argue that the path of your life is the product of a series of decisions made based on information that you have at the time. I would agree to an extent.
I think this view is rather superficial - of course the 'based on information' bit can be development of knowledge and understanding gained over a long period of time so that is not superficial but to believe that we are the masters of our own destiny, I do think is.
I don't know if you believe in destiny, or fate, or coincidence, or a natural order, or Qi, or spirituality or mindfulness or anything along those lines, but what I do know is that there is something bigger than Humanity, and bigger than the World. Bigger than the universe. Infinitely big.
You may have an understanding of what I'm on about, you may not. If you do, great, if you don't, I challenge you to this:
Step 1: Tonight, or tomorrow morning, or whenever; you can be on your own or with someone else but make this your only activity. Rid yourself of any distractions, turn your phone off, switch the TV and the radio off and sit in silence for just 5 minutes. Concentrate only on your breathing, visualise the air going in and out of your lungs, feel your chest rise and fall, listen to the sound of your breath and if you feel your thoughts wandering then slowly bring yourself back to your breathing, replacing the stray thought or daydream with that moment once again.
Step 2: Once the 5 minutes is over, simply say in your head, "I don't know who or what You are, but if You are there, show me." And dwell on these words for a few minutes, keeping the silence and the centred thoughts on your breathing. See what answer you get. I believe you will get an answer.
I believe that that 'Something' or 'Someone' is God. You may know Him by another name, but we are all encountering the same thing.
It might feel that I've diverged from the subject of calling or purpose somewhat but personally I don't think it is possible to have a 'calling' or a 'purpose' without first connecting with something other than yourself and the face-value of others and the World.
Our purpose as Christians is to Love. In Greek there are 3 words for Love and the one I'm talking about is Agape (A-ga-pay). Unconditional love for all other people. We are the product of Love. We are given life through love. (John 3:16) If all we do with our lives is love others, we will leave behind positivity and goodness with all that we come to interact with and that will spread as others love. The Earth will be better than you left it if all you do is Love unconditionally.
Our Calling is where it gets more personal.
Let me first say that I don't believe our futures are pre-determined, I don't believe that there is only 1 life that we can live. God gave humanity free will to make decisions both good and bad ourselves, and to a certain extent, our life is based on the decisions that we make based on the information we have at the time.
I do believe that God uses us for His glory in anything that we do, and there are many ways in which God can use us, whichever path we take in life. God has given us gifts, talents, skills and expertise. We naturally find careers, hobbies, work that exemplifies and increases these gifts and in this way, we have already listened to our 'calling'. God calls us to Love Him first by glorifying Him, we do this wen we use the skills and gifts that he has given us. Second he calls us to love others, this will manifest in many, many ways and a huge part of that is in our careers.
You might say, "But I don't know what to do with my life", or "I don't know if I'm doing the right thing to use my gifts and talents best"
I say to you that listening to God through others, through instinct and through signs that God will lead you in a direction that will best use what He has given you.
I believe God blesses those who are glorifying Him in what they do. Whether this is through career progression, skill improvement, lifestyle, wealth, happiness, family whatever. If we work hard to use what God has given us, he will give us more and more.
Involving God in decisions is also a huge part of our calling. My wife struggled to find her dream job for about 2 years. She was applying for just about everything that she saw that was vaguely related to her training and aspirations. She was close on many occasions to being successful at interview but beaten by 'just a few marks' or 'just that tiny bit more experience'. She despaired for a long while, getting frustrated that the same comments were coming back again and again about not having 'just this' and 'just that', thinking how am I ever going to get it if I can't get a job to get more!?
She had a realisation, and to this day I can remember the moment that it happened, that she was applying for things that she thought were right for her, and she thought she was right for, but not what was truly right for her. From that day she committed her job search to God to take care of, in the trust and faith that He would lead her to the right thing.
We talk often and have firm believe in God 'opening' and 'closing' doors. If we go to a door and find it locked, it's not what God wants for us. There will be a door that we push and it opens. This metaphor could be realised in a number of ways - someone gets in touch out of the blue, we get sent something from a friend that has seen something, a thought gets affirmed by something someone says.
After this happened Tash went for an exact same job that she had previously applied for and come a really close second on at interview. This time she wasn't even offered an interview. She could have been devastated, and confused, and angry, but instead she was peaceful, possibly even a bit excited by this. I was incredulous! I was ready for the tears and the anger but I was met with a smile and all she said was, "Well God has closed that door for me."
A couple of weeks later she was accepted into a role that she could only have ever dreamed of. It's perfect for her and her gifts and skills, moths later she is doing incredibly and making a huge impact in her new team.
God helps us with decisions. It's not always what we think is right or what we want but He will lead us where is best for us to go.
There are plenty of situations in my life that I can personally attribute to God's guidance and advice over the years, even over the past week or 2! I truly believe that I am glorifying God in where I am, what I am involved with both in my job and outside. He is using my gifts and by skills for His good work and I feel blessed by Him in every aspect of my life.
If you are at a point where you're not really sure what your calling is or what you want to do with your life, I encourage you to do Step 1 of the process I wrote about before, but replace Step 2 with the question: "What can you use me in?" or "Where do you want to lead me in life/job/situation?"
The answer will not always be immediate, most of my experiences have come over days, weeks and months for God to reveal His plan for me. Sometimes it's broad and sometimes it's really specific but let me promise you this: He will answer you.
