My Call

People ask me about my "call".  Every time they do I picture a phone ringing and God being on the other side.  "Hello God here, today I would like you to do...."  Wouldn't that be nice if that was the way it worked?

 I actually had, and still have a difficult time putting to words my experience, not because I am not sure I was called, but because I have vivid memories of other calls that did not seem to come from God.  I remember the Waco, Texas incident - watching in horror while people were killing each other.  I remember the horror stories of those who had left the cult before hand.  It was all done in the name of God.  I have vivid memories of people claiming to preach God's word and preaching hate.  I sat in a Bible study at Siena offered by a protestant outside group. The man became angry when I didn't read the passage the same way - I was told I didn't know what I was talking about and I could absolutely not read it that way.  Yet I knew my understanding wasn't completely off base - I just didn't' have all the words he did to prove it.  I heard and saw groups preaching about saving the unborn child while killing the father, husband, doctor who preformed abortions.  These images do not resonant with my call.  The hatred I hear in the voices of exclusion in the name of God is not my call.  Yet, I have also met very devoted people who try to live out God's words who still carry these prejudices as well as other ones.  I know them to be trying to be Christians and working at it just as I am.   I know I am limited with my own set of passions and prejudices and I don't want them to be misconstrued as the work of God or in God's name, when they are nothing else but my human failings.  

So with this as my back drop, with the jokes and jeers of my friends and family still in my ears regarding the hypocrisy in Christianity.  With my background in science and empirical data and many hours trying to prove things in a lab I hear God.  With my own  shortcomings and with the skeptical voices of my scientific friends resonating in my heart and mind I feel drawn to God.  I feel a peace that comes from no where and everywhere.  I have read the scriptures and I have looked at the time period and I have begun to understand Jesus's radical love.  The kind of love that would crush all of the falsehoods and that can allow you to escape your own narrow mindedness.  I have had amazing conversations with Bible study groups and pastors.  I have prayed and asked God to help me in my understanding.  When I ran up against a wall of my own bias I asked God to help me understand and see the truth.  Help me understand the words I read because they don't reflect the love and understanding I got from prayer and meditation.  It was amazing - I wrestled for months in some cases, years in others and still do with others, but I am open.  I didn't have my mind made up before hand of what God was going to help me understand but I was open to it.  I was blown away.  God put people in my life whom I never imagined I would meet and have theological discussions with.  I read books that I could have only found by others recommending them and I learned how slippery the concrete Bible truly is.

I also have at points experienced a direct understanding of something I was to do.  In prayer one day about six years ago I was praying in the Ames church and knew without hesitation that I was being asked to be a pastor.  Something I felt completely uneducated enough to do, as well as inadequate in every regard.  I didn't have enough anything to do this job, but the pure joy that came with the revelation made me know there was no turning back.  I did not describe this to anyone but my husband and eventually my best friend for many years.  It sounded crazy to me.  This was the kind of stuff other people who did crazy things said.  This was the kind of thing I had heard from those crazy people on tv who had tainted God.   I did not want anyone to judge me based on that.  I didn't want them to stop hanging out with me or talking to me because I was too "Holy", or that I was going to  turn all "Jesus freak" on them and no longer hang out, have a glass of wine or just be me.  I was afraid of the expectations to be perfect.  I was afraid of tainting God's name and love as so many before me had.  How do you talk about your call when it is buried in fear?

I did it slowly.  I talked about my call with my best friend and partner who helped me to listen, to understand and to step back.  I took classes on the Bible without telling anyone for a long time that not only was I interested in what the Bible really said, but because I knew I needed to build some self confidence to answer my call.  I experienced a strong resistance to the idea of women pastors, I heard much hate in the name of God proclaimed and I prayed.  God how can I do this?  Why me? I am the most ill equipped person possible.  Besides I had a tendency to curse outside of school, and my shortcomings compose a rather long list instead of a short one.  Even now I find myself not being as patient or understanding with my kids.  I yell, I cry and I loose my temper too.  I am a work in progress, but it took me a while to understand that we all are.

In these experience though I learned, that is exactly why God was calling me.  I have to turn over my shortcomings to God and depend on God for help.  I have to make sure people know me as a person - not as a Holy person.  I have to admit when I screw up and wait on God a lot.  I have to speak the truth as it is revealed to me understanding it is revealed to others differently.  Most importantly though I learned that God not only speaks through the Bible but though nature, through friendship and most often for me, through people.  If I am struggling with something or think I have my mind made up God will send me somebody to rock my world and tear apart my biases if I am willing to get to know them.  God speaks to me through relationships, friendships, conversations and discussions.  God wakes me up with thoughts I can't get out of my head and I know they are from God because I would love to get them out of my head and have a "normal" day. 

This is my call.  My call is to be real.  To help other people be real.  To know that God loves you even when you loose your temper, when your nasty or short sited.  That we are called to be members of the body of Christ but we are not Christ and need to cut each other some slack.  That our concepts of God should be shaped by reading the Bible, understanding the culture at the time, understanding our culture and our personal experiences with God.  This is what I am called to do.  Just be me.