3 Practical Signs that You’re Missing Your Calling
I am passionate about walking in the fullness of what God has called me to do on this earth. I hope you are too. I don’t want to miss my calling and just come close.
Our new favorite Internet-TV series is The Chosen, a dramatization of the gospels that is done extremely well. Instead of trying to cram everything into a two or three-hour movie, they are presenting the life and ministry of Jesus as a multi-season series. This gives them the luxury of developing fictional but plausible back stories for the various characters that met Jesus, like the disciples and others.
Jesus is not the main character, although he becomes more and more of a central character as the series develops. The main characters are the people who meet Jesus. The vision of the production is to introduce Jesus to viewers through the eyes of the people who met him, so viewers can have similar experiences meeting Jesus. The stories surrounding its production and the impact it is having around the world are truly the fingerprints of God. This series is reaping amazing Kingdom fruit.
No spoiler here, but there is a character that Jesus asks to follow him. This character has a very involved life he’d be leaving behind to follow Jesus; this is not an easy choice at all. Jesus tells the person in two days they are leaving Capernaum from the Fountain in the Southern Quarter of the city. He can meet Jesus and his disciples at the fountain if he decides to come.
When Jesus meets up with his disciples at the fountain, they find a money bag left by that man to finance their journey. A complete mystery to the disciples, Jesus knows who it is from. He also knows the man is hiding just behind the fountain’s wall, desperately wanting to come but not being able to.
Jesus calls out, “Are we all here? Is there anyone else who wants to come with us?”
The disciples look around, counting each other, and say, “Yes, we’re all here,” not realizing the invitation Jesus is giving to the unseen man. It’s a heart-wrenching scene: The man is silently weeping behind the wall, desperately wanting to go with Jesus but unable to tear himself away from his career and family.
Jesus looks directly at the wall where the man is hiding and says with sad longing in his eyes, “You came so close.”
I don’t want that to be my epitaph. I want to accomplish the calling and the work God created me for here on this planet, not get right up to the edge and back out.
Dominoes
When I began this writing journey in earnest, God showed me a vision of dominos, stood on end like we used to do when we were kids. You know the deal. Knock over the first one, and it knocks over all the others.
What if, on That Day when I see Jesus face to face, he shows me all the resources Heaven had lined up to use my writing for the Kingdom of God? What if it was an impact beyond anything I could ever ask or think (Ephesians 3:20)? But it never happened because I never tipped over that first domino. How tragic would that be?
That’s a conversation I never want to have. I don’t want to spend an eternity in regret, wishing I hadn’t been afraid to step out into what I knew God was calling me to.
3 Signs that You’re Just Coming Close
Here are three practical clues that you’re missing the calling God has on your life. Do any of these resonate? They did for me, and they continue to help me check myself, get off the eternal hamster wheel, and actually make real progress.
1) Always planning but never doing. Planning is so much safer than doing. I want to do it right, so I just have to figure out a few more things first… You know the drill, needing to have everything figured out before doing anything. I perfected this to an art form.
Perfectionism is just socially acceptable procrastination. The truth is we keep planning, instead of doing, because we’re scared. But the only way forward is to start doing things, taking intentional steps, toward the calling we know God has on our lives. Stop ducking it by eternal planning. Enough with the excuses, already.
2) It never gets done because it’s not scheduled. Darn, another week went by without doing anything to move my calling forward. Oh well, I’ll do it next week. No, actually I won’t. Next week, life will happen and crowd it out just like it did this week. Unless.
Unless we schedule it and protect that time. For example, if God’s calling you to write a book, schedule regular writing time and protect it. If, say, a friend wants to do something during that time, just say, “I’m sorry, I have another commitment.” You don’t have to explain. Protect it like you would any other appointment on your calendar.
3) Always busy but never making progress. We’re all busy. But are we just letting life happen to us? Are we drifting, endlessly careening from one emergency to the next? Or are we intentionally taking steps into what God’s calling us to?
Moving Forward Is Simple, but It’s Not Easy
If this is resonating with you, ask the Holy Spirit to help you move forward by doing two things:
- Identify the next right thing to do. What’s the next baby step you need to take?
- Schedule time to do it. Pick a date and time and write it on the calendar or in your phone. Make an appointment with yourself to move forward into God’s calling on your life.
Simple, obvious, but not easy. Yet, you can do this. God wouldn’t have called you to it otherwise.
Your Turn
Does this resonate? What is your next right thing? What’s holding you back? Tell us your story in the comments, and please share this post to bless others.
Bam, straight to the heart! 😉 I’ve definitely been letting things slide to the wayside.
Thank you Randi! I’m glad this post blessed you. How are you going to re-connect with your heart’s passion?
Well Dave, God has given you a gift and you are using it. He has given you that rare empathic connection skill that enables you to put into words thoughts that many people are having. Your humble, authentic, transparency has shown through again. You have probably already written about this somewhere, knowing you, lol. If you identify pain points without the empathy of your admission of having gone through the trauma of it, your audience will check out.
You have, however, Brought us along on your journey to effectiveness. Thanks Dave.
Thank you for the kind words, Dan. I’m glad the post blessed you.
Just read this. Looking forward to rereading, pondering, then jumping over to the FB group and sharing. Lord-willing over the upcoming holidays. Just wrote myself a note, regarding this.
THANK YOU Dave!
Bless you. 🙂
Thank you Naomi! I can’t wait to hear your thoughts in the FB group. Have a very Merry Christmas!
You couldn’t be more right, Dave, and I see myself in the excuses you describe. When I’m in flow of my calling, I make appointments with myself to focus on my work, remembering that baby steps are ‘good enough’ and actually leads to getting things done, rather than waiting till I can do it all in one big leap! I needed this reminder today. Thank you for the nudge!
Thank you, Jane, I’m glad this post blessed you. I’ve perfected these excuses to an art form, and am learning to step out of them and into healthy progress forward. So great to hear from you!
My Lord. The poignancy of this blog continues to pierce, indict, convict and inspire my soul. Thank you, Again, Dave.
Thank you for the kind words, Eric! Great to hear from you.