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Sort of Deep Thoughts 
-- a dialogue with Doug & Betsy --

About Call...

Call is a confusing concept. It seems like little of my work life has had anything to do with being called. Does anyone really feel called to be an advertising copywriter? I doubt it. At the time I was one, I just knew it would allow me to write, which I love to do.

A friend recently wrote a sermon about being true to your call, your destined-to-be vocation. Basically, he said if you don't feel passionate about your work, you probably shouldn't be doing it. I felt pretty intimidated by that. I also felt like I'd missed the boat on being true to my call, whatever it may be.

Part of the truth is that I didn't set out early in life on a "career path." I tend to envy those people who have always known what they wanted to do and then carefully crafted their lives around those goals. Rather than plotting a course, I feel like I've done what felt right at the time. But the road has taken unusual bends and detours, which I think is good and bad depending on what day you ask me.

Another part is perceiving demands on my time and energy from so many different directions. We all have that. I am not only "worker," but wife, stepmother, daughter, sister, aunt, volunteer, half-time partner in general housework, church member -- even commuter. (Three hours a day counts for a lot!) Sometimes my work has fit around those other roles or help to support them. Truth is, I feel much more "called" to many of the volunteer roles I've played. But those don't support the lifestyle I've chosen to live.

So maybe I should chuck the lifestyle -- who needs a house, two cars? Am I brave enough to do that? Will John think it's a good idea for him? I don't know. I feel pretty deeply invested in that whole shebang, for better or worse.

Since you're a pastor, I make the grand assumption that you felt called. And once called, always called. Is that the case?

Wearing one of my many hats,

Betsy

Reading your thoughts on call reminds me how complicated the idea of 'call' is--we clergy types should not speak too glibly about it.

I suppose in a perfect world we all would do a 'gift's discernment' workshop at just the right age, find out what we are supposed to do, then find the job that perfectly matches our gifts. (A job which also pays well, has good benefits and is located right where we want to live).

Life is messier than that. Its the 'bends in the road' that you spoke of, not to mention our own confusion about what we want to do when we grow up.

Part of the problem is the issue of passion which you brought up. I think it's a bad word or at least a misleading one. Yes, some people probably do wake up and feel excited to go to work. But that may have more to do with their emotional makeup than anything. Being the Scandinavian, non-morning person that I am, I don't wake up and feel excited about much of anything other than coffee.

Maybe call has more to do with day in and day out faithfulness than with feeling I am in the job of my dreams. With that definition, call becomes a lifelong process of seeking to follow God's leading in all areas of my life, including the bends and detours along the way.

Faithfully,

Doug

I was most struck by your thought that call might have less to do with feeling that our jobs are perfect than with faithfulness to whatever it is and wherever I am at the moment. When I think of times when my job feels just right, I know that it has been when I am faithful. When I am completely present to the people and tasks at hand, and -- in a real way -- trying to serve God. When I get right down to it, there is no other good reason to do anything.

Feeling faithful too,

Betsy

The other day was our wedding anniversary, which got me thinking about another analogy. In some ways our call to work is like committed love. Long-term committed love seems less about FEELING and more about choices. It involves a lot of taking out the trash, hard talks and wrestling with gray areas. But then there are those moments when you reaffirm your commitment in some way, moments when you just know you are with the right person.

Work is similar--lots of choices, faithfulness, doing the same things over and over. But every once in awhile, you need that confirmation that you are in the right place doing what God wants you to do.

Watching for a sign,

Doug

I agree that we need a moment or two of affirmation to break through the everyday stuff, reminding us why we are doing what we are doing.

Which makes me think of a time this past Spring. So much of what I do in my job is task and/or project oriented. Then one evening, I got an e-mail from a faculty member who reported a student of his "missing." This student hadn't passed in a paper which was overdue, hadn't returned the faculty member's telephone calls or e-mails -- and so he began to suspect something was amiss. For whatever reason, I was the only person around that evening. To make a long story short, that e-mail and my receipt of it set off a chain of telephone calls and events that brought to light a clinically depressed student, who had not left his dorm room for days. Support people of all kinds went into high gear, and several weeks later, that same student walked across the stage to receive his MBA degree. Up until that moment, the possibility of him doing so seemed remote. On commencement day, a colleague called me to let me know he would be "marching," and to acknowledge that our collective actions that evening were significant in ways that we could not have known at the time. The student even called me and said he was glad I set that process in motion. That one small victory made me feel like I was in the right place at the right time. And the feeling stayed with me through the next several weeks of everyday stuff.

Surprised and sustained,

Betsy

Thanks for your story. You were the right person at the right time.

It's funny, these last few days I have been thinking about my call as a pastor quite apart from our dialogue. The other day I heard myself saying to someone that, after three years here, I'm finally starting to enjoy my work. I was always clear that this place is a good match for my gifts and that I was needed. But when people asked me if I enjoyed my work, I would pause. I could never actually say I found joy, or enjoyed it. And that troubled me because I believe if we are following our call, there will be joy there. Not all the time, of course, but sometimes. Now I can say that I really do enjoy my work. What all this says to me is that my intuition, or God's voice, or whatever it was that led me to this place was right. I can trust it. This is the most clarity I have felt about my role, and it's been three years. This call stuff, (I suppose like the spiritual life itself) takes time to work out.

Joyfully,

Doug