Ever since I was four years old, I sensed the call to be a pastor. I have had people tell me, “Tom, you were born to be a pastor.” I feel very blessed to feel such a calling at such an early age. However, as I grew up, I had my own thoughts as to what this calling would look like, and the pieces seem to come together until my senior year in college.
As the senior theology majors were interviewed by the various conferences in our union, I was convinced I knew where God wanted me to go. I was believed that the largest conference in our union would be the one that gave me a call to come pastor in their field. I was excited because it would be a different state than I had grown up in. I would be able to live in a new place with new faces and new challenges. I was sure that was where God wanted me to go. So I waited by the phone for the call from the Potomac Conference president with an invitation to pastor in the state of Virginia. Much to my disappointment, the call never came. Eventually the phone did ring, but on the other end of the line was the head elder of one of the last churches I expected to work at. It was a church located back in my home state of Pennsylvania and near Philadelphia an area I had loathed growing up in. However, as we talked and he shared his vision for me as an associate pastor in this church, my eyes began to open. I found myself saying, “Maybe this is where God wants me to be.” In that moment, I realized that if I were to live my life as a called person, then I needed not to live out my plan for my life, as grandiose as it might be, but let God work out His plan for my life.
Nevertheless, I’ll be the first to admit that letting God work out His plan for your life can be a very scary place to be in. As I discovered early on in my ministry, God’s plans very likely will be much different from my plans. As I look back on the twenty years since that phone call, I can see that with every place my family and I have been and with everything that I have done, when I allowed God to work out His plan in my life, He did some wonderful things for His kingdom and His glory (even it did mean coming to Cowboy country). It was only when I decided my plans were better than His plans did things not work out so well. If you live life as a called person, you allow Him to work out His plans in your life instead of trying to make Him bless your plans for your life.
What about you? Have you seen who God created you to be and what He has called you to do for His kingdom? Have you lived in such a way that you surrender your plans and allow God to work out His plan for your life?
Conversation:
- Where in your life have you experienced surrendering what you think God called you to be to living out whom He really called you to be?
- Where have you experienced living out your plans for your life instead of God’s plans?
Few spiritual concepts have fascinated and confused people more than understanding God’s calling for their life. Is it primarily about a job or a role? It is precise or general? Is a calling only reserved for those who work in professional ministry?
The truth is actually amazingly profound: What we are supposed to do is what we most want to do.
This is a guide for discovering God’s design and destiny for your life. Drawing from over 20 years of experience in ministry, Gary Barkalow shares how you can:
Live alert and oriented to the voice and choreography of God.
Discover and interpret the voice of your own story.
Discern the strategic assault against your calling.
Recognize God’s intentional training in your life’s journey.
Most of all, you’ll be inspired to let the glory of your life touch the world around you.