Myths about your calling

MYTHS ABOUT CALLING:

Calling happens more quickly for others. 
No.  What we see as 'success' in another is merely the long and arduous accumulation of tears, testing and time.  We're merely seeing them on this particular summit.  Calling shouldn't be thought of in terms of months or years; but often, decades.

The journey of calling shouldn't be this hard. 
No.  As John Churton Collins says, a person often fails "because he thinks what is difficult is easy."

Your calling is only valuable when you're getting paid or recognized for it. 
No.  You know your true art and calling when you're willing to do it whether or not anyone sees it or pays for it. You do it because your heart won't let you do anything less. I've tried several times to quit: I couldn't. My heart wouldn't let it go.

Impact is measured by newsletter subscribers and social media "reach." 
No.  None of these existed when Jesus healed dying bodies or launched human history's defining revolution.  Paul and Barnabas received their direction from the Holy Spirit to "go there" or "avoid that town"  increasing the Gospel's "reach" and rootedness.  Technology can be a tremendous vehicle for delivering our message, but there is no substitute for the direct voice of the Holy Spirit and his outpowering of power.

Taking up your cross is the opposite of following your heart's desire.
No.  As a Christian, your heart is now alive with the very goodness of Jesus.  The desires of that heart are noble and ought to be pursued.  [Your 'flesh' may have other, ignoble desires, but we're talking about your new heart's desires here.] Taking up our cross and following our heart's desire are the same thing.  Following your heart's desire and calling may be the hardest thing you could ever pursue.  But that's what noble people do.

 You and your calling are already fully approved:  I can hear the Stadium of Witnesses roar with the Lion. 

Related posts:

Futility is a man's deepest fear

What does calling have to do with your heart?

Video:  'The Long Desire'

Podcast:  'Calling As a Journey:'  with guest Gary Barkalow, author of "It's Your Call"

Myth: "My calling is just to love whoever is in front of me."

Myth:  “My calling is just to love whoever is in front of me.”

Your calling has broader implications for the surrounding culture and what God is doing in the world.  What you can offer is not simply to impact who ever might cross your path at the time.  Don’t underestimate your place in the Story by thinking too casually,  “My calling is just to show God’s love wherever I am.”  It includes that dimension, but more.

God is not casual or haphazard in his efforts to redeem all of creation from the ground up.  If you are too casual about your place in the Story, whole groups of people may live without what you uniquely can offer them.  God doesn’t want to have to send them someone else:  you’re the best fit.  

This isn’t about pressure or guilt – it’s about getting perspective.  Even the devil doesn’t underestimate you. 

“Some Christians prefer to keep their faith to the level of the personal, the relational, the spiritual, and the simple.  I believe that such a view of faith is misguided.  Calling is certainly a truth that touches our personal lives intimately, bit it also touches cultural life potently.  Calling is more than purely cultural, but it is also more than purely personal.” (Os Guinness, The Call)   

Guinness laments further that

“…second only to the joy of knowing [Jesus] has been a sorrow at the condition of those of us today who name ourselves his followers.  If so many of us profess to live the gospel yet are so pathetically marginal  to the life of our societies and so nondescript and inconsequential in our individual lives, is there something wrong with the gospel, or does the problem lie with us?”  ( The Call)

What you are called to individually, is directly tied to what God is currently up to in human history.  It's that important.