There are many ways we can understand call. As it relates to our connection with God, “call” is our unique way of loving God and loving others.
And scripture is full of great call stories. Men and women whose lives were interrupted by this great command to love God and love others. Taking a look at these stories reveals a pattern.
The Pattern of Call = God initiating a Relational Response
God Initiates Relational Response
A revelation I AM Pointing toward God
An interruption Come & See Inviting
An opportunity Grow & Learn Nurturing
A sharing Go & Do Sending
You might think only a select few or some special folks would experience a call. You’d be wrong. God throws open the gates when it comes to call. In fact, everyone is invited to the party.
We see God doing the calling in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament it is Jesus who calls his Disciples. (read a bit here)
Poor. Misfits. Uneducated. Marginalized.
And called.
In calling the Disciples, Jesus is saying, “You can do what I do. You can follow my way. You can become like me. You can change the world.”
Jesus makes the same invitation to us. We are welcomed as disciples, or as some have some have started to say, as apprentices. (I’ve heard Mike Schreiner talking about discipleship as apprenticeship, and you can also find similar thoughts in Dave and Jon Ferguson’s Exponential)
I experienced a form of apprenticeship working in an Applebee’s.
A Model of Apprenticeship
I do You watch We talk
I do You help We talk
You do I help We talk
You do I watch We talk
You do Someone else watches You talk
Change the “I” to Jesus and you have a way of understanding what Jesus does with the Disciples. What the Disciples then do with others. What we are invited to today.
This is training. This is practice. This is also more than what many of us have been exposed to.
For too many, discipleship/apprenticeship has been…Read the Bible. Go to church. Offer 10%. Be nice.
But Jesus is inviting the Disciples, and all who would follow him, to a new life. “Follow me” is more than “follow the rules”.
The call is our unique way of loving God and love neighbor. Our unique way of::
Caring for the poor, the widow, the orphan.
Healing and feeding.
Accepting and sharing new life!
It took some time before I was ready to respond to my call. Here’s the thing about that; Jesus doesn’t force a response, he simply invites and leaves it up to us to say “I’m ready to follow”.
All I can say is I’m glad I finally said yes. i pray you have or will as well.
Life is better together,
Shawn
Check out what a few of my friends taking this journey with me think of this word…
Big Rubber Band Ball 