This is the day Christ called me into ministry

This is the day Christ called me into ministry

To where or what has he told me to go is not so clear that I have a positive direction in my brain?  So it was with Abram after the Lord sent him away from his father’s land, so it may be as if any of us is sent into the unknown of our lives.   “Go forth from the land of your kinsfolk and from your father’s house to a land that I will show you.”  (Gn 12: 1). 

Perhaps we have been too dependent on being told to do this or that and given instructions on how to accomplish what is expected at each step of the task. The Ministry is not like that.  It's as though we are peering through a looking glass and can only see what we’ve accomplished with the help of the Holy Spirit.

Each of us is called to some type of ministry, be it in Church affiliated service or secular requirements that we are prepared to accomplish.  In either case the world can only succeed in growth when everyone does their assigned position.  

No doubt some of those reading this are already functioning as deacons, priests, religious, or theologians.  Each has accepted their choice even if our expectations varied a little or for some much more in a quantitative essence.  However, when the Holy Spirit is left to place us where he wants in order to plant or nurture a seed for one person whom he has ordained to reach where we cannot, the choice is his.  

There was no question from Abraham when his presence had been felt as his God led him into uncharted areas to make decisions that would prove his trust in God, especially when the life of his son was put in jeopardy.  (Gn 22: 1 - 14).  Abraham  never knew what God would do to test his faith but he trusted that the God who called him and promised he would father generations of descendants that ultimately would inhabit the earth in praise of his creator.   

It is not likely that God’s call to each of us would entail sacrificing our child, but making descendants because of our ministry is not out of the question.  When I answered the call to seek full-time ministry and ended in Midland, Tx, unbeknown to me a young man who along with his wife befriended me and some years later he told me he was now a deacon because of my ministry in Texas.  Perhaps his ministry was to reach people that the Holy Spirit was calling forth could only come through him using his diaconate orders and no one else.  I planted a seed, and the Holy Spirit sent another to nurture further citizens of the kingdom.

I can’t imagine any other vocation outside of Holy Orders or religious orders where one person can accept the promise to live their life for Christ while facing some of the most adverse situations that secular positions do not experience.    When asked what I was able to do as a deacon, I reminded questioners of the words of John: “Beloved, we are God’s children now, what we shall be has not yet been revealed. We do know that when it is revealed we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.  Everyone who has this hope based on him makes himself pure, as he is pure.”  (1 Jn 3: 2).  Our ministry is in the hands of Christ’s Spirit.

Ralph B. Hathaway