What's your next step of faithfulness?

“Calling” has turned into quite the buzz word in modern day church culture, and one that can produce equal amounts of excitement and anxiety. What does it mean to be called? How do I actually figure out what God’s grand purpose for my life is? Am I going to let God down if I don’t get this figured out by the time I graduate?

Breathe easy, y’all. God’s going to work through your life regardless of whether or not you find your dream major by the time you’re a Senior.

But really, what does it actually mean to discern a “call?” The reality is that it’s going to look different for each person. And it’s easy to be drowned in a sea of comparison in this social media age where all you see is the highlight reels that make other lives and ministries seem superior to your own. Furthermore, it is easy to believe the lie that the only worthwhile calling in the Church is that of an easily tweetable preacher or a musically gifted worship leader. These are noble callings….but they’re both just cogs in the greater machinery that is the Body of Christ.

In order to understand your personal calling, it is important to understand the calling that is universal to all believers: faithfulness to Jesus Christ.

Faithfulness can manifest in many ways. Some of those ways may garner more Instagram likes than the other...but that doesn’t make it more valuable. Instead, the scriptures remind us of the following:

“Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body.” 1 Corinthians 12: 15-20

No matter what your specific array of gifts are, what matters is that you use them for the love of God and neighbor.

So rather than ask how you can make the most “impact” or how you can be a “true world changer,” I would invite you to ask God a simple question: “What’s my next step of faithfulness?”

Perhaps it’s to reach out to that friend who’s been going through a tough time. Maybe it’s skipping out on that wasteful purchase and instead giving some money to a good cause. Or maybe it’s even just to give God more time in prayer tonight instead of derping around on your phone for an hour before finally forcing yourself to sleep.

I have found that the road to finding your calling is better paved with a little less career existential crisis and a lot more small instances of seeking faithfulness to the call of Christ. Because at the end of the day, your most important mission will always be the one that’s right in front of you. Whatever, or whoever, that may be.

Our hope at The Co-op is to provide a summer full of next steps of faithfulness for you.