SUCCESS.  SUCCESS?  SUCCESS!

“He asked, ‘Who are you, Lord?’” --- Acts 9:5a

 

Paul had an excellent pedigree.  Originally named Saul from Tarsus (in current-day Turkey), he was trained by the great rabbi, Gamaliel, in the Jew’s capital city of Jerusalem.  He received a strict education in the ancient ways of the Jewish faith & was exceptionally enthusiastic about serving God (Acts 22:3).  He was a success.

 

Saul’s zeal for the faith was such that he sincerely believed Jesus’ followers posed a genuine, heretical threat to Judaism.  Saul, in turn, became a serious threat to Christians by persecuting them through imprisonment & death (Ac. 22:4).  He famously gave his approval for, & witnessed the execution of, the first Christian martyr, Stephen (Ac. 7:58ff).  Those actions got people to take notice of him, such that Saul was considered a hero by the Jewish leadership, the Sanhedrin.  The Sanhedrin, you may recall, were the ones who pressed for Jesus’ execution on Good Friday.   Paul was hard at work executing the rest of Jesus’ followers during the ensuing years.  Is this really how one defines success? 

 

One day, while on his way to Damascus, Syria, to track down Christians evangelized by one of Jesus’ disciples, Philip, Saul was literally knocked off his feet & struck temporarily blind by a bazillion gigawatt light.   Seemingly at the peak of his career, Saul endured a crippling blow to his heartfelt efforts.  He had no idea how much real success he would see from then on!

 

Most Bibles entitle these verses, “The Conversion of Saul.”  Don’t believe it!  It’s a misnomer.  Saul was not converted.  He did not need convincing about God, the teachings of scripture, & the blessings of faith.  He already had strong religious convictions & was firmly on board with the program.  I wouldn’t call that a conversion.

 

I want to suggest that what happened to Saul on the Damascus Road was not a conversion, so much as a calling.  He was hit with a new way to serve the God he loved.  It was a way of embracing Jesus, rather than rejecting him, a way that exemplified God’s love, rather than God’s wrath.[1]   

 

 Although he re-branded himself with a one-letter name change from Saul to Paul, he remained an observant Jew to his death.  He main-tained a host of character flaws, too, that were not altered.  It was not so much that Saul was converted to God, but on that Damascus Road, clearly realized his calling to serve God through God’s Son.  He stopped persecuting Jesus’ followers & began preaching Jesus to make followers … for 2,000 years to come!

 

Paul’s Damascus Road encounter poses questions to you & me, Jesus’ current disciples.  They are:  Have you found your calling in Christ?  What is your calling to serve Christ?  How are you joyfully living for Christ? 

 

I’m not asking for a show of hands, but how many of us who sincerely know & love Jesus lack a sense of calling?  I would estimate that most Christians are in that predicament.  We may be successful, but must question the kind of success that is not grounded in God’s dream for our lives, a plan that will bring genuine success for us & others in the kingdom.  As Rick Warren writes in the opening line of The Purpose-Driven Life, “It’s not (just) about us.”  The kingdom’s bigger than you or I.

 

My friends, what I’m saying is that conversations about calling are rarely discussed in the secular world.  They should be.  They can be life-changing conversations.  At the same time, we, in the church, should not exclusively reserve the concept of calling for pastors & missionaries.  Every one of us is called to serve Christ in ways that are as unique, as we are unique, & exactly because we are created by God to be so unique.

 

   One of the reasons that Protestants are so famously known for our work ethic is because we used to spend a lot of time talking about calling & vocation.  When you see yourself working for God -- doing God’s holy work – & not just working for a human boss, one’s work & one’s life take on a whole new meaning.  God’s kingdom needs every line of work at every level of giftedness, not just priests, monks, & nuns.[2]

 

How do we know God is calling?  How do we know it’s
God calling us?   The answer (& we’re not taught this, either): God calls us through things that we absolutely love to do & are great at doing.

 

  Now that doesn’t mean that every waking moment, when we pursue that calling, is supreme ecstasy or that some sacrifice is not required along the way.  It does mean that when you find something that gladdens your soul, that totally wraps you up (body, mind, spirit, & emotions), that enjoyment may, indeed, be God’s calling.  Who says living one’s faith can’t be fun!?!  It will be the most fun you’ve ever had, the greatest life, the abundant life that Jesus offers to us (John 10:10).  It’s just that no one’s ever told most of us these things.  Jobs, occupations, & careers can be drudgery, unsatisfying, & just plain horrible.  You know that.  One’s calling, however, always brings joy, meaning, satisfaction, & fulfillment. 

 

Is that to suggest that I never have a bad day as a pastor?  No.  Even on days when I am deeply saddened, say, as I minister to a family whose beloved member is dying, my calling is confirmed.  I may not be happy, but I possess an inner joy that I am doing what God wants.

 

Sadly, most persons won’t hear this advice, as they ponder what to do with their lives.  They go through life wondering, “Is this all there is?”  When one spends so much of life working, these doubts are deadly.  Yet, the Bible, Martin Luther, even contemporary Christians like Rick Warren, leadership guru John Maxwell, & Os Guinness (the heir to the Guinness ale & “Book of World Records” fortune/fame) say this.  The men from the Tuesday morning men’s group, who figured this out later in life, provide the same advice.  As Ken Gire, the author of our Tuesday book writes, “I believe that if it is a thing that makes us truly glad, then it is a good thing & it is our thing & it is the calling voice that we were made to answer with our lives.”[3]

 

God may be calling you to a full-time Christian vocation.  Christ needs pastors & missionaries, indeed, but he also needs: administrators of Christian faith-based organizations; teachers in public & parochial schools; doctors, nurses, medical professionals & researchers called to serve the needy & the needs of a fallen world; individuals with financial acumen to help us be good stewards in terms of the use & investment of our environment & material riches; political leaders who are not influenced by the degrees & kinds of corruption that have become the norm in local & national politics; engi-neers who create systems that honor God & assist humankind; journalists & authors & film directors who bring us uplifting, healthy entertainment;  parents who raise kind, thoughtful children who love the ways of Christ. 

 

God may be calling you to a part-time Christian vocation, although you’re still a full-time Christian.  I can’t tell you how many persons over the years, who have their full-time occupations, say something like: “What I really live for is going on those mission trips.  If I could do that full-time & pay the bills!”  Or, “It’s teaching that Sunday School class that is my real passion.  Those students!”  Or, “I love my job, but it’s the church that gives me the opportunity to really share my musical gifts & glorify God.”  

 

I want to ask you, Brother & Sister Christian:  Have you found your calling?  What’s your calling?  How are you joyfully living for Christ?

 

If you’re graduating this spring, this sermon on calling is for you.  If you’re successful in your work, this sermon is for you.  If you’re not successful in your work, this lesson is for your.  If you’re retiring & embarking on a new chapter in life, God is calling you, too.  If you’re going through that dissatisfaction of adolescence, or a mid-life crisis, or a time of re-evaluating your life based on some recent major event, hear God’s calling.   If you’re directionless & feeling lost, God’s calling is proof that you’re found.

 

Christ calls to us from the cross.  Christ calls to us from the empty tomb.  Christ calls to us as he ascends to heaven.  He’s given us so much & asks so little in return.  

 

God wants the best for his children.  Again, look at Saul.  God found one area of Saul’s life & homed in on it.  There were plenty of things about Saul of Tarsus, & his character, that could have benefitted from change.   There was the “thorn in his flesh” of 2nd Cor. 12:7 that dogged him through-out his life, a pronounced arrogance, what our culture considers sexist attitudes & a tolerance of slavery, etc.  God chose one, arguably the one that most required transformation, interestingly, the one that gave him the most worldly success, namely persecuting & murdering others in God’s name.  That’s what God chose!  That kind of stuff needs to change.  Agreed?

 

If you have ever been to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, you may know that when the group takes a break to go outside, the surrounding air is thick with cigarette smoke.  The members & God (their “Higher Power”) are working on one addiction -- the alcohol addiction.  To manage recover from another addiction – nicotine – is too much.  We/they tolerate the lesser of two evils in order to combat the greater evil.

 

I talk about God transforming one area of life, because we often operate under an all-or-nothing, black & white, either/or, kind of thinking.  We tell ourselves that God will not call us or use us, until everything bad about us changes.  All the problems need to go away.  All the personality quirks & flaws require mending.  All the failings need to metamorphose into successes.  We think that either we need to create the change or God does.  Well, we’ve proven that we cannot do it.  And, clearly, God’s not making that change, either.

 

Frankly, if God wants to change all of those things, then
God can do it.  Trust God to do it.  In the meantime, don’t use those excuses to deny your calling.  Refusing to heed God’s call may well be a costlier sin, than the ones you think need total & immediate correction.  While you’re dithering  & sweating the small stuff, there’s a world waiting for you to live the life God created, redeemed, & called you to live.  Let God call the shots!  The pickle most folks are in is because they’ve been calling their own shots.  They’ve said they believe in God, but they don’t really believe God & what He can do.  They don’t trust Him.

 

Goodness, if I had waited to heed God’s calling until I got my entire act together….  I’m not there, yet.  Don’t you know it!  I’m “going on to perfection,” as John Wesley taught, but not there, yet (not that I use that line as an excuse to be content in my sin.)  A grace-filled God gives us time -- God’s time -- to grow in the ways of Christ, in holiness. And although I don’t want to blithely discount whatever successes or failures I have along the way, they do not matter as much as knowing that I am doing what God called me to do.  I am living God’s will, such that the best about me is to God’s credit & the worst about me, I still own.  You can’t blame that on God![4]  The point is, regardless of my success or failure, as the world defines them, I could die tonight with the full assurance of my salvation & the full assurance that I’m doing what God needs me to do.  Wow!  Talk about peace & contentment!  I don’t lead some exalted, dreamy life, but I’m living God’s dream for my life.  You can, too!

 

This is the season of Easter, the time when we celebrate resurrection.  The resurrection we celebrate was the one pioneered by Jesus Christ rising from the grave, leaving the tomb, & leading a life that was different from the past.  He gave that resurrection gift to all who believe & accept his supreme act of love & grace. 

 

Pursuing one’s calling leads to a resurrection of sorts, too, in ourselves & in others.  Their lives change, too.  The resurrection life is the one each & every Christian is called to live, regardless of our age, sex, intelligence, economic status, health, or any matter than confines our human lives.  (On Wednesday, I preached an abbreviated version of this sermon to the most senior seniors in the skilled nursing section of Dock Terrace.  God calls them as clearly & sincerely as He calls the young, soon-to-be graduate.  God doesn’t discriminate by age, status, or life situation!)  Christ was not just alive in the days after Easter, or alive in our individual souls, but because of those events (on Easter & in us), is (made) alive in our world today when we respond to his call.

 

There’s success, as the world defines it.  There’s success that’s questionable.  (And), there’s genuine, kingdom success.  Hear the call & go for it!  

 

In the Name….               Copyright 2010 by G.D.Knerr at Lansdale, Pa.  All rights reserved.

 

 

 

 

 

Recommended for further reading:

 

The Call: Finding & Fulfilling the Central Purpose of Your Life  by Os Guinness.  This book links the Christian – specifically Protestant – concept of calling with our career choices.

 

Windows of the Soul: Experiencing God in New Ways (1996) by Christian devotional writer, Ken Gire.  See especially Chapter 6, entitled, “Windows of Vocation.”

 

Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes into Stepping Stones for Success(2000) by Christian & secular leadership expert, John Maxwell.  See especially Chapter , pp. 108.

 

The Purpose-Driven Life by Rick Warren.

          Teachers & professors of logic acknowledge, what they call, the “either/or” fallacy.  Many persons call it “black & white” thinking.  The physical world is not starkly black & white, but filled with subtle nuances of gray & exciting, technicolor hues.  The striking variety of green shades this time of year makes the point. 


Similarly, the world of ideas is not black & white.  While there are certainly ideals, perfections, & absolutes of good & evil, there is everything in between.  Jesus is absolutely good & our personifications of evil in the devil are absolutely bad, but the rest of us fall somewhere in between, don’t we?   That’s what absolutes are, perfect renditions of an ideal.  Graphic artists may have absolute red, absolute blue & absolute yellow in their palette, but the rest of us often just approximate those colors when we paint the house, or match clothes, or select a new car that’s pleasing to our eyes.


Human behavior is complex, too.  We cannot handily divide the world into pure good or pure evil.   While we may have more of one than the other, none of us are the personification of those extremes.  The Bible has Jesus & Satan, yes, but everyone else fits somewhere in between.  The Egyptian pharaoh & Herod the Great may be more evil, than good, but  Mary & Joseph are more good, than evil.  And, of course, there are the “split decisions.”  King David was Israel’s greatest king, but he had a torrid affair & was a murderer.  Moses, too, was a murderer.  Rahab, who helped the Israelites defeat their enemies, was a prostitute.  John the Baptizer was devoted to God, but had a sharp tongue.   I could go on.


Today’s topic is the apostle, Paul. 

 

[Many long-time church-goers bristle when other Christians tell them that they need to undergo a “born again” conversion experience.  No doubt, some of them do.  One does not magically acquire faith by osmosis just because the sat in the pews for a few decades.  Taking the name of Christ no more makes one a Christian, than a spouse taking the name of their beloved during a wedding ceremony gives them the other family’s DNA.  Some kind of heart-change is necessary. 


How transformation occurs – in the split-second “twinkling of an eye” or over the course of years – is God’s business to work in each of us through the Holy Spirit.  Whether the Spirit smolders within for years burning steadfastly, or explodes as a bright, bold ball of flame, both fires produce heat & light for the kingdom.  I agree that a “spiritual experience” is necessary, but suggest that experience can come over the course of years as well as in one sudden event.]


[I don’t want to get in the mix of who had a certain kind of conversion experience or not.]   


[1] See also Stendahl, Jervell, Segal, Wall, et al.

[2] See 1st Corinthians 12

[3] Ken Gire in Windows of the Soul: Experiencing God in New Ways, p. 71, Zondervan, 1996.

[4] I always note how critics of Christianity blame God for our mistakes (the Inquisition, Salem Witch trials, clerical pedophilia), but don’t give God any credit for the good & helpful ministries we conduct (AIDS ministries in Africa & urban centers, orphanages, homeless shelters).  Those critics have it exactly the opposite.