The High Calling of God

To serve as a minister of the Gospel or the pastor of a flock is a privilege or a right? To take care a group of believers, to preach the Word and to lead a church is a calling or a profession? Is it an 8-5 job with a salary, office hours, benefits and vacation time, or is it a passion to pursue God’s calling and a compassion for souls and a devotion to God’s highest calling in our lives? Is it a place where you can compete with other pastors to see who has the bigger church, a stronger attendance, a larger budget, a higher salary and a more comfortable compensation plan for retirement?

Is it a means which you can use to advance in your career ladder to move as high as you can so that one might seat on the left and one might sit on the right? Or is it a place of full surrender to the lordship of Jesus Christ and the leading of the Holy Spirit in our lives? Are you willing to leave everything behind laying down your nets and following Jesus or are you delaying your response to another opportune time that fits your schedule and convenience?

Have you heard God’s voice calling you in the middle of the night? Has He called you out in the midst of the busyness of life’s trouble and turmoil and set you apart for His purpose? Has he picked you from among your brothers and sisters, and you were the least favorite that someone would pick out from a group? Has He talked to you while you were tending your father’s sheep and the livestock? Among other voices in the highways and byways and even in the wilderness of life, have you discerned His still small voice?

Have you seen His vision like Isaiah seeing God sitting on His throne, and the cherubims and seraphims are worshipping Him? Have you found the treasure hidden in the field that you will go home sell everything and follow Him? Have you counted everything as lost and put everything else behind you so that you can love Him above everything and everyone else; so that you can follow Him, long to be with Him each day in the Word and in service to the people He has loved and died for?

On a practical level, how do you know that He calls you to serve in the soup kitchen, to sweep the floor of a church or to clean the toilet on a Sunday morning before the flock comes? How will you know if he calls you to mend the brokenhearted, to comfort the distress, to clean the wound?

How will you know that he calls you among the 6 billions of people to go into the streets of life, the highways and byways of the nations or to the corners of the world to preach the Good News, to proclaim “the Kingdom of God is at hand.”? How will you hear He is calling you to heal the sick, to cleanse the leper, to raise the dead and to cast out the demons? How will you know that Jesus is calling you to do greater things because He has gone to the Father?

You’ve got to know that the Good Shepherd has called out your names. You’ve got to believe firmly that he has a great plan for your life, a plan to bless you and not to harm you, even before a day was given to you when you were still in your mother’s womb. You’ve got to hear His voice, and there’s no mistake about this wonderful, sweet and gentle voice of God nudging, wooing and calling you out to lay down your life for Him.

You’ve got to be willing to lay down your life, to crucify yourselves on the cross so that the life you now live is the life of the Son of God living in you and through you. You’ve got to be willing to die for God’s sake and the sake of the Kingdom just as the seed after it is sown into the ground, it must die before it will spring forth life. You’ve got to meet Jesus face to face on a personal encounter through the Word, by the Holy Spirit of God.

The Good Shepherd is calling your name now. Will you respond to God saying “Here I am Lord, send me.” Will you receive the gifts, the anointing, the baptism of the Holy Spirit and His power to begin to serve Him? (Acts 10:38) Will the people you serve know you by your fruits?

Jesus is interceding for you. The Holy Spirit is leading, guiding and going before you into unknown territory to you so you can walk by faith and not by sight. What are you waiting for?

Follow His footsteps today and everyday and you will not miss anything that He has set out for you to do. You’ve got to remember always that loving Him, honoring Him, worshipping Him, giving Him praises and thanks, hearing His voice, obeying His Word are all acts of love and obedience. The rest is history.

Answer His call today. You’ll never ever regret it. It’s the right thing to do. Do it today.

Pastor Linh