#3 Of Comfort and Calling

I said it was my goal to blog about once a week. I managed to keep that up for two weeks. Whoops! I'll try to be more consistent in the future, and maybe I'll even pump out an extra post in the next week or so to make up for missing last week. We'll see. I do have a few ideas developing in the back of my head.

So this week I'm back in Wisconsin, taking some extra time to do some reading and prep for my upcoming examination by my classis. (A classis is a regional group of churches. I need to be examined before I can officially be ordained as a minister of the Word.) The trip and study time have been pretty great so far, though on Monday my mom did finally get me to go through all my stuff in my old room. I found a lot of things that brought back cherished memories or reminded me of things that I haven't thought about in years. However, there was one item in particular that stood out.

In 2006, coming out of my freshman year of high school, I participated in a SERVE project in Benton Harbor, MI. At the end of the week, my work crew wrote notes to each other on paper plates. While I was cleaning my room this week, I found my paper plate. One of the girls I met on the trip had written "I think you should be a pastor" to me. I remember thinking that that comment was really weird when I first read it and had never had any thoughts about going into ministry. Now, on the brink of proving that girl right, I'd love to go back in time and ask her just what it was she saw in fifteen-year-old me that made her think I should be a pastor. (Sorry about the generic references! I saw the name of my SERVE friend when I read the plate, but I can't remember it again. I'm now in Sheboygan Falls visiting my in-laws, while the plate is in a box back in Waupun, waiting to make the journey to Iowa.)

As amazing as it is that someone else could see that I should be a pastor about two years before I even entertained the idea, I don't find it all that surprising. These prophetic words remind me of one of the Bible verses that is most dear to me, Jeremiah 1:5: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations." (Quick interpretive detour: clearly this verse refers specifically to the prophet Jeremiah. However, I believe it finds its greatest fulfillment in Jesus Christ, our chief prophet and teacher, and, following the Heidelberg Catechism, I believe that I share in Jesus' anointing as prophet, priest, and king. So I think I can safely apply this to me as well as to all the rest of God's people. We aren't all called to be pastors, but God does have a calling for each of us.) It is unbelievably comforting and wonderful that God would have a plan for me even before my birth. It's taken me a while to get to the end of my journey of becoming a pastor, and I am definitely intimidated by the call at times, so it's incredibly encouraging to think that God has been working out His purposes for me for years and that I'm not the only one who can see it in me. Right now I'm really excited about being a pastor and don't need much affirmation, but more difficult days will come. Hopefully on those days, God will remind me that I didn't just decide to be a pastor. He chose and called me and used others to confirm that sense of call.

Grace and peace,
BMH