What is a calling? How can we find our calling and understand what God wants from us? So much has been said and written on this subject over two thousand years of Christian history that one might think no questions should remain, yet they do not grow any fewer. The apostles, however...
What is a calling? How can we find our calling and understand what God wants from us? So much has been said and written on this subject over two thousand years of Christian history that one might think no questions should remain, yet they do not grow any fewer. The apostles, however, or one might say the future apostles, faced no problem of choice and had neither doubts nor hesitation. Curiously, Jesus says nothing special to them, does not teach them anything or deliver long sermons; He simply invites each of them to follow Him. And they go, as though they had always been waiting for this encounter. Of course, they had most likely heard something about Jesus before and may even have heard Jesus Himself. But hearing is one thing, and leaving everything to follow Him is quite another. It is clear that a true calling is always revealed to a person with complete certainty.
One might, of course, say that this was a unique situation, for the Saviour Himself stood before them, and if the future apostles understood Who stood before them and where He was calling them, there was nothing surprising in their resolve. And yet the evangelists give examples of far less resolve among some of those whom Jesus called to follow Him in exactly the same way. On the other hand, can there be any discussion of a Christian's calling without that personal encounter with the Risen One, without which not only any calling, but Christianity itself is impossible? Apparently, the question of calling is resolved quite simply: a calling is that without which it is impossible to live, because life loses its meaning. And if a person still has questions, doubts or hesitation about whether a particular activity is his calling, then the answer is most likely negative. If the answer were positive, the person called to serve, whatever that service might be, could and would have no doubts or hesitation.
Of course, what is meant here is specifically doubts and hesitation concerning the content of the service itself, not the difficulties that may accompany it. Sometimes the cunning human mind, in its desire to spare its owner the difficulties and problems inherent in the service to which God is calling him, supplies doubts about whether the call is genuine and whether the decision already made or being made is right. But that is another matter, a question of spiritual honesty, without which no one can find his calling.
