***The Question of Calling***

[SoldOut4Christ]

Today's Prayer
Dear God, I come before you today asking for your protection and cover of grace upon marriages. I pray for every couple who is happy, those who are struggling, and those who may be on the verge of break-up--whatever the case. You instituted marriage and it is not your will for the union to be broken. I pray that eyes will be opened and spouses will be alert to the schemes and temptations Satan throws their way. It may be an 'innocent' flirt; a shoulder to cry on for another man or women; perhaps financial troubles or materialism; disagreements over the household or child rearing or even simple things; lack of respect or selfishness; failure to have priorities straight and keep focus on Jesus as the center of the marriage and each other above others. So many things can pull and chip away at a healthy relationship. May each heart be tender to the prompting of the Holy Spirit and each mind set on the ways of Christ and each soul safe in the surety of your love...so that when temptations come, they will be rejected as we draw near to you. Thank you, Father. In the name of Jesus I pray, amen.

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The Question of Calling
TGIF Today God Is First Volume 2, by Os Hillman
01-07-2009

I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints? (Eph 1:18-19).

I walked up to the man and said, "Hello, my name is Os. What's yours?" His name was also Os - Os Guinness. It was the first time he had ever had such an experience. We chuckled about our unique names.

Os Guinness was named after Oswald Chambers and was born in England just as Chambers was. He has become a well-known contemporary writer and has a real interest in the subject of "calling" just as I do. He has written a masterful work entitled, "The Call." In it he shares some important truths about "calling".

"What do I mean by 'calling'? For the moment, let me say simply that "calling" is the truth that God calls us to himself so decisively that everything we are, everything we do, and everything we have is invested with a special devotion and dynamism lived out as a response to his summons and service.

There is a distinction between a later, special calling and our original, ordinary calling. Selfishness prefers the first, but stewardship respects both. A special calling refers those tasks and missions laid on individuals through a direct, specific, supernatural communication from God. Ordinary calling, on the other hand, is the believer's sense of life-purpose and life-task in response to God's primary call, 'follow me,' even when there is no direct, specific, supernatural communication from God about a secondary calling.

In other words, ordinary calling can be seen in our responsibility to exercise a high degree of 'capitalist-style' enterprise about how we live our lives. For example, the servants in Jesus' parable for the talents and pounds were assessed according to how they 'got on with it' when the master was away. In this sense no follower of Christ is without a calling, for we all have an original calling even if we do not all have a later, special calling. And, of course, some people have both."*

We are all called to Someone first, then something. As we grow in our knowledge and obedience to Christ, God fulfills our calling in life.