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Your Other Vocation
A sermon by Dr. James Flamming
Pastor, First Baptist Church, Richmond, Virginia
Sunday, January 29, 2006
Henry Blackaby says in one of his books, find out where God is and get there.
And find out what God is doing and get there.
The year 2006 could be one of the finest in the history of our church. If it
is it will be not only because we’re willing but because we have discerned what
God is doing.
Let me ask you a question. What does God do all day? He has eternity.
Sometimes you get bored in a few hours. Does God get bored? What does God do all
day? If you want a short answer and if you just read through the Bible you will
find that God works. He’s a doer. He makes things happen. He sees something and
then carefully gives an answer and brings it about. And one of the things He
does the very best, He chooses and He calls. He’s a doer in your life. He is a
doer in my life.
Have you ever taken seriously the question what is God trying to do in my
life and through me? You see, God comes and says I created you. And I’m calling
you to use what I have given you, the gifts that I have granted to you, the
talents I have endowed you with and I have bestowed them all upon you in order
that you can use them for your family, for the world that is in such great need,
and for my glory. I’m calling this the discovery of your other vocation. It is
not your take home pay vocation, not likely. It’s your spiritual vocation. And
you see one thing about this vocation is it’s going to last when the other
vocation has phased out. Because it’s you and it’s what God has given you to use
in behalf of others for His kingdom and even for the fulfillment of yourself.
And what a danger it is. What a tremendous loss if we ignore all of this.
In the hit movie, “About Schmit”, Jack Nicholson plays Warren Schmit. 66 year
old man who retiring from a career in life insurance, lost his wife after 42
years of marriage, and he came to see life as totally meaningless. And near the
end of the movie he reflects, “I am weak. And I am a failure. There’s just no
getting around it. Relatively soon I will die. Maybe in 20 years, maybe
tomorrow. Doesn’t matter because once I’m dead and everyone who knew me dies it
will be as though I never existed. What difference has my life made to anyone?
None that I can think of. None at all.”
How sad! And how unnecessary. Something is missing here. Something is deeply
wrong. It’s like a puzzle where the key pieces aren’t in place. It’s like
fathers and grandfathers like me on, right, the eve before a birthday or
Christmas Eve and I have a box in front of me. And there are two words on that
box that are very large and they’re in a foreign language. They say, “Assembly
required.” I’m not into assembly. Inevitably I wind up with something missing.
There’s a piece that, oh there it is, and I look at it and I have a feeling that
if it could speak, it would look at me with a kind of a mischievous grin and
say, Na-na, Na-na, NA-NA. Life takes some assembly or better yet, life needs
someone who can assemble our lives. And the critical piece that so many miss is
that you’re here for a purpose. You’re not an accident. God takes you and in the
process of fulfilling you by you using what He’s given, He turns it around and
uses it for His church and for others as well. Well, you say how does this apply
to me? I mean, calling. That’s for popes and priests and preachers and great
teachers. You haven’t heard it yet. You and you and you. You have a calling. Oh
you say I’m nobody. I’m a throwaway scrap and there is nothing about me that
would attract God. Well you see God has an affinity for spare parts.
Samuel in the Old Testament in the book that bears his name is only 12. He’s
a kid, left there by his mother in the temple, raised by the priest Eli. He does
his chores but in some ways he’s in the way. And one night God calls him. Did
you hear that? God calls him. 12 years old. He’s a spare part in that temple.
God didn’t call anybody else that night. God has an affinity for spare parts.
In Mark 10, there’s a blind man named Bartimaeus. He calls out when he hears
Jesus is coming. He calls out again and again but the roar of the crowd. He
thinks he’s not being heard. Then all of a sudden somebody punches him in the
side and says Jesus is calling for you. And Bartimaeus left the cloak which was
the only one he owned and had somebody lead him to Jesus. Is there anybody in
that world more of a spare part than a blind man. And the Lord heard his call.
God has an affinity for spare parts.
Turn to 1 Corinthians. I want you to read this passage. This is a passage
that you probably have ignored. Or if you’ve read it, maybe you just kind of
passed over it. Verse 26. “My brothers and sisters, think of what you were when
you were called.” And then Paul lists the most intentional spare part list I can
imagine. Listen. “Not many of you were wise by human standards. Not many were
influential. Not many were of noble birth but God chose the foolish things of
this world to shame the wise. God chose the weak things of the world to shame
the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things and
the things that are not to nullify the things that are so that no one can boast
before Him. And it is because of Him that you are in Christ Jesus.” Let me say
it one more time. If you think you’re not good enough to hear God’s call, look
at that list.
Let me tell you something: most of the people Paul is talking about couldn’t
read. In that day and time they were what we called illiterate. God has an
affinity for you whatever station of life you’re in. You say to me, “how can I
discover this? What can I, how can I find out what God is saying to me? Well the
first thing, pay attention to your Bible reading. I’m going to give you an
assignment. Here it is. This week Ephesians 4: 1-7. Read that every day. Won’t
take you a minute to read it. And then listen for the other 4. Give God 5
minutes of your day. One to read it, four to listen. And see if one of those
words doesn’t jump out at you. It’s about the ones who are called. And if it
will you may realize how much God uses the Bible, His word to speak to you.
On the front cover of your bulletin you have our verse for the month. It is
Psalm 119:105. “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” One way
to discover what God has for you is to start reading the Bible and to start
listening. Number 2 ask yourself what do I really care about? And what is really
me?
Some years ago I was at a conference with Peter Drucker who said we ought to
be able to put our purpose or our mission statement or our calling on the back
of a t-shirt. And he added to those of us who were ministers or in religious
professions, you cannot use your profession. Your mission has to be beyond that
as if you could do it anywhere, doing anything, in any vocation. In other words
I couldn’t put on the back of my t-shirt I am called to preach. Well I did a
good deal of praying and thinking about that. I shared this with you once
before. And the mission statement, the calling statement, the second vocational
statement of my life and I’ve lived with it now for 15 years, and I am, I am
there. I’m comfortable with it…is to connect people with God, to bring people
together and to connect people with their spiritual selves. See that doesn’t
have anything to do with a vocation as such. To connect people with God, to
bring people together, and to help people connect with their spiritual selves. I
could do that almost any vocation and so could you.
Suppose you have been given the gift of encouragement. Boy, that’s simple.
Haven’t you been listening around your office? How much encouraging goes on?
Suppose you’ve been given the gift of prayer and you were to say to somebody in
the sphere of your world, I want you to know I’m going to be praying for you. I
know you’re going through a difficult time. The third thing that might help you
find your calling. Look at your raw material. What did God birth you with?
Michael Novak puts it like this. We didn’t arrange for ourselves the parents
that birthed us, the personalities, the talents, or the longings we were born
with. The creator of all things gave them to us. And when we fulfill these,
these gifts from beyond ourselves it is like fulfilling something we were meant
to do even before we were born. Pay attention to the raw materials God gave you.
One more step with me. Don’t overlook the family factor
please. Years ago, Shirley and I went to a mission conference down at
Ridgecrest, North Carolina where our Baptist assembly is. And it was appointment
service, appointing of new missionaries. And a missionary wife was saying
something to the effect that she wanted to be a missionary because she wanted to
do something more than just be a housewife and raise her children. And I felt
Shirley stiffen beside me. And the speaker continued, I believe I was made for
better than that. And I reached over and I put my hand on her hand as if to say
cool it babe. Because I knew she completely disagreed with that. Because for her
the highest calling in the world was raising her kids, her sons. Now it’s the
grandkids.
Don’t overlook the family factor. And if you’re a
homemaker, man or woman, and you have the feeling that all of this call business
in your life would become possible after the children are gone, you have just
heard your pastor say that’s a gigantic lie. See. The calling you have is right
now in your family, in your marriage, with your children.
Well you say how does this affect the church. Well it
affects the church in every way. The church is a body of called out people who
were doing a jillion different things in their lives, in their neighborhoods, at
their first vocation they are exercising their second spiritual vocation. And
what Paul does is liken the church to the human body. He says it’s like the
human body. It has so many parts. They look different. They function
differently. But if you don’t have them, you’re a cripple. That’s the way with
the church. If we don’t have you discovering what God wants you to do for all of
the rest of us, we’re crippled. We limp. It’s not only a matter of what you’re
going to be fulfilled with. It’s a matter of fulfilling a crucial spot in our
church. And if you don’t exercise your gifts in our behalf, we don’t see as well
or sing as well or serve as well or teach as well or pray as well or usher as
well or greet as well or visit as well or reach out to the homeless as well and
on and on. We’re crippled. I ask you. I ask you to take seriously what is it God
put inside of you from the beginning that is supposed to be used for your
fulfillment as well as the fulfillment of others. God did a genius thing. He
knew you. He knew what you could do and He knew what you could do for all of us.
Bow your head and close your eyes will you? I want you to
think in this little moment of your life and what is it you can put on the back
of a t-shirt and say this is my other vocation. This is my calling. This is my
purpose in life. Amen.
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