Here is yet another way we get our callings wrong.
We think them rare, or heroic, or extraordinary. We think them exceptional, somehow unique, almost beyond belief. Like winning the lottery, maybe. Or coming down with an unusual, life-changing disease.
Yet if we think missionary callings extraordinary, we have misunderstood the callings of God. You are called by God into the mission of God in the world. So am I.
“If anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation,” St. Paul tells us. Everything becomes new for them. They get a new identity, a new perspective – and a new purpose in life, too. “All this is from God,” St. Paul goes on to say, “who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation… So we are ambassadors for Christ…” (2 Corinthians 5:17, 18, 20). This means you.
Not everyone will go, of course. All Christians are enlisted in the cause. Not everyone is called or specifically gifted for cross-cultural missionary outreach, however. Yet the numbers of the called and specifically gifted may be larger than you think – better percentages, certainly, than the odds of winning the lottery.
Some years ago, I was privileged to study at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California. One of my professors was a fellow named C. Peter Wagner, an expert in the study of spiritual gifts. Dr. Wagner estimated that one out of one hundred Christians, in general, has been entrusted with the specific set of spiritual gifts associated with effective missionary service.
If Wagner is correct in his estimate, how many may have received missionary gifting in a typical Lutheran congregation? How many, do you think, in your own congregation? The mathematics are not complicated. If you have 100 members on your membership roster, you may expect one of them to be specifically gifted as a missionary. If you have 1000, you may expect ten.
This means that you may expect someone to be gifted as a missionary specifically – in every average Lutheran congregation across America. In larger congregations like my own, you may expect many individuals to be gifted as missionaries.
I don’t mean missionaries from down the road or across the state, who may come by for a visit from time to time. I mean missionaries in your own homegrown fellowship – people you know, whose faces you recognize, your own neighbors, your friends and family. Maybe even you.
If Wagner’s estimate is remotely correct (personally, I think that he under-estimates) we may expect missionary gifting everywhere. Every believer a part of the cause. And giftings and callings are distributed widely.
Dr. Wagner’s estimate underscores a simple fact, often overlooked or unrecognized: missionary gifting is normal. Missionary callings are normal. Missionary service is a normal condition for normal Christian fellowship. I don’t want to alarm you unnecessarily, yet I think that you should know. When you go to church this Sunday morning, you are likely to shake hands with someone gifted and equipped to be a missionary.
If you are a pastor, you may wonder how to respond to such a situation. If you teach Sunday School or Confirmation, you may wonder what to do if missionary-gifted individuals turn up in your class. Maybe you will wonder if the condition is contagious.
Here are some simple suggestions.
1. Don’t freak out: missionary gifting is normal. Where the people of God gather to worship and pray, you may expect to find missionaries. It should cause you more alarm if you did not. Don’t treat callings as aberrations.
2. Think stewardship. You may feel inclined to think of the called as curiosities, or maybe even problems. Think of them as assets, instead. God has gifted your faith community with a role in his mission. The called among you are part of his strategic provision. Steward them.
3. Think obedience. “Be sure that you do not refuse to hear the voice of God,” the writer to the Hebrews advised (12:25, Phillips). “Obedience is the test of whether we really live ‘in God’ or not” (1 John 2:5-6, Phillips). Don’t minimize the giftings and callings among you. Callings are resolved by obedience.
4. Count on the grace of God. “He who calls you is utterly faithful and he will finish what he has set out to do” (1 Thessalonians 5:24, Phillips). The gifts of missionary calling and suitability are, well, gifts. Like every spiritual gift, they are received by grace through faith. You may depend upon God – not only to give his good gifts, but the grace as well to fulfill them.
If you are a missionary-gifted individual yourself, my advice is the same. Don’t freak out: the condition is normal. Steward it. Aim always to obey. And lean your whole weight on the wonderful grace of God.
These are some ways to get our callings right.
Other posts in this Callings series: