Triangulating Calling
Issue 019
JUNE 20, 2018
WRITTEN BY CODY MCMURRIN
Can you feel the hum?
Do you sense a call to something bigger than yourself?
Many of us do. We sense that God has gifted us - knit us together - to take part in a bigger calling. But there’s a gap. We have this sense of calling and gifting, but we don’t experience it in our everyday.
We get caught up living in an inherited way of life.
I’m sure that way of life was inspired in its inception, but the problem is our actual current-day experience isn’t marked by fully engaging in calling and joining God in making earth more like heaven.
For some time I wrestled in that growing unrest. I tried to engage in my church culture. And I tried to engage in my city’s culture. But they didn’t satisfy.
I grew up in a world which taught me that if I could gain enough self-knowledge I would find my calling - that thing to which I could give everything I am, everything I do, and everything I have to - and then I would truly be happy. Maybe it would come in a job, or a moment of brilliant creativity. However it comes, when I find it, I’ll be whole.
This belief was formed after the modern, secular world took hold of a very ancient, spiritual concept and made it their own. They simplified calling to the singular value of self-knowledge. Self-knowledge is healthy, but it’s not the only factor determining calling.
“My increasing love of God expressed itself in an increasing love for the world around me. The Caller was inviting me in.”
For centuries travelers have used a compass and a map to triangulate their position. In order to get where they were going, they needed to know multiple points. For me, those points were our caller and His project for the world, our world and its situation, and a realistic understanding of myself.
To fully engage the idea of calling, there must be a caller. This was my first point of triangulation. In my life, as I encountered the Lord and Caller Jesus, I began to discover that I was not only called towards Him but was also sent. God was calling me to join him in the redemption of the whole world. The making all things new. My increasing love of God expressed itself in an increasing love for the world around me. The Caller was inviting me in.
This can be daunting because the world can be a painful place. It is beautiful and magnificent, but full of brokenness. Entering that brokenness is the second point of triangulation. I don’t show up with solutions born somewhere else and disconnected from the hurting people in front of me, but rather enter into those places to be present and discover the ways the Caller is already present. Fortunately, Jesus calls us out to a hurting world, but he doesn’t send us alone. God calls us to where he already is. Jesus taught that to be with and for the marginalized is to be with and for Jesus himself.
Finally, I have to know who I am. The way God gifted me. What He made me good at. What He gave me to contribute. I have found that I was most aware of who I am in the thin spaces - the place where heaven is breaking into earth. For me, that comes when a community of people are actively present in the space where the Kingdom is punching into darkness.
But it isn’t just me. Do you hear the hum?
You can choose to ignore it. You might even be able to mute the hum for a while, but if you’re anything like me, your calling can feel like a haunting. You cannot ignore or forget what could and should be. You sense that the brokenness is not how it is supposed to be. You’re right. You feel the pull of the Caller. Answer Him. You have gifts. Offer them.
If you’d like to join us on this journey and you haven’t yet, come! There are people across Orlando already living into this. Lives are being transformed. People are linking together for something bigger than they could do on their own. You have a part to play. Get in touch. Let’s do it together.