From the ‘Will of God as a Way of Life’, Jerry Stittser wrote:
“We do the will of God when we fulfill our calling in life, a calling that is uniquely ours, like a set of fingerprints. A calling grows our of our temperament, our talents and our experiences in life, though these are not the only factors that affect a calling, as we will see. Ultimately a calling comes from God. It is a part of who we are or what God has put in us, and of how God wants us to serve his kingdom.Though we have to discover our calling, we should also recognize that it is already in us, very much a part of our identity, waiting to be discovered and expressed, like perennial seeds that, once planted, produce flowers that come up year after year.
The process of discovering our calling is as subtle as sign language, where every movement and gesture counts for something. If anything, a calling probably discovers us as much as we discover it. In his sermon “The Calling Voices,” Frederick Beuchner, a contemporary novelist and preacher, explores the divine nature of our calling. A calling itself lays claim to us as we discover it. Beuchner defines a calling as “the work that [a person] is called to in this world, the thing that he is summoned to spend his life doing.” He believes that a calling is like a mandate. It places demands on us. “We can speak of a man’s choosing his vocation, but perhaps it is at least as accurate to speak of a vocation’s choosing the man, of a call’s being given and a man’s hearing it, or not hearing it.”(2 below)
This idea of a calling was especially important to the leaders of the Reformation in the sixteeneth century. John Calvin, for example, believed that God has assigned to each Christian a specific calling in life, which provides each person with a meaningful job to do, a way to serve the world and a sense of divine purpose.
He affirmed that every person is given a calling and that every calling is unique. “Every individual’s sphere of life, therefore, is a post assigned him by the Lord that he may not wander about in uncertainty all the days of his life. . . . Our present life, therefore, will be best regulated if we always keep our calling in mind.”
Since God is the one who calls us into specific forms of service, every calling has dignity and purpose to it, regardless of what the powerful and famous may think.
“And everyone in his respective sphere of life will show more patience, and will overcome the difficulties, cares, miseries and anxieties in his path, when he will be convinced that every individual has his task laid upon his shoulders by God. If we follow our calling we shall receive this unique consolation that there is no work so mean and so sordid that does not look truly respectable and highly important in the sight of God! (3 below)
2. Frederick Buechner, “The Calling of Voices,” The Hungering Dark (New York: Seabury. 1981), 27.
3. John Calvin, Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life (Grande Rapids: Baker 1952), 94-96.
(Posts with a preamble asterisk * are for a more general audience, and not specific to teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.)
