Observations of a New Pastor pt.3: The Call

Called. This is a word thrown around in churchy circles. “Do you fell ‘called’ to tell them the Gospel?” “Do you feel ‘called’ to give more in the offering plate?” “Do you feel ‘called’ to missions?” The weightiness of its meaning has been lost thanks to a century of over use and unfamiliarity.
What is a call? Not a phone call, but a call in the churchy sense. This word that we’ve tossed about like a paper airplane without considering it’s meaning or the tonnage that follows in its wake. More often than not it’s used as a sentence filler or a vocab credit (look at me I know church lingo). But the call is a burdensome thing.
A man who feels a call cannot do anything but his calling. It is seated so deeply within his being it is a fire in his bones. Visible when he speaks, sparking up in his eyes at its mention. When conversation begins to move in that direction his heart wells up and his mind flies, he longs to speak of his passion and to see others drawn into the same love. For this man to do anything else would be a travesty. Indeed, If a man can stand to do something, anything else he does not feel a genuine calling.
So what is a call? It could best be described as a fire in the bones. Though this description leaves more to be wanted. It goes further than his mind and deeper than his heart; it attaches itself to the very fabric of who this man is. Indeed if his bones are broken because of his calling it is more likely to cause a stronger sense of calling rather than shattering it.
As a new pastor I would say this, “If I felt no calling to being a pastor, I would not do it. This job would suck if I didn’t feel called. The burden of being a shepherd of loving stupid sheep (though I am one) is difficult. Seeing people hear the Gospel and saying, ‘My neighbor needs this’ rather than recognizing their own need for it is a wearing tedium. But I feel a call. I’d rather have shards of glass in my eyes than do anything else.”
Granted there are men occupying pastoral positions who feel no calling. Some are there to appease their want for being seen as great. Some are there because it’s the only job they could get cause they sucked at Algebra. For the people following these men I feel pity, because they ought to be pitied. They will sit in their pew (or chair, or couch) and learn from a man who feels not the truth he pretends to believe. No fire in his bones, nor flame in his eye, he simply moves the sheep around the same ravaged field time and time again.
The calling must be made sure. It must be tried in the furnace of affliction. Indeed a man must be broken before he is sure of his call. The gravity of this word, this call, must again be made known. Men ought not to lead as a last resort, they must feel the fire in their bones.