Listening to the Call

Have you ever known something for far longer than you've wanted to admit?
Weird question to ask at a beginning of a post, but how about I phrase it like this:
        Have you ever known the direction you should be heading, but you just said "NO"?

I guess this has been something that has been floating in my mind since I was 19 years old when I first really started writing in this blog. Which I guess means I should start back to when I was 19.

When I was 19, I was active in Campus Crusade down in Central Ohio. I attended many retreats during my freshman year of college and all were impactful, but the Fall Retreat was what set my life on a path I never could have predicted. I guess the best thing to call this moment is an inciting incident or turning point in my life. When I was 19 yrs old, I sat on a bridge during quiet time of the retreat and decided at that moment that I was completely lost in what I was supposed to do with life and just prayed to God something that went like this:

I don't know what I'm doing with my life. I know it doesn't feel right and I don't know what to do. I'm tired of talking so I'm going to shut up now and listen so I know what to do. God, if you have something to say, I'm listening.

The thing I learned that day is that God does speak and will say things that will shake you. He said one thing to me during my quiet time and it was this:

MINISTRY

In my infinite wisdom, I said stopped listening and thought, "No, no. That's not for me. I'm not called into ministry. That's what my dad and brother do. I want to be active, but ministry is so not going to be a part of it. I don't have the patience and don't have what it takes to do ministry."

The Monday after the retreat, I read the book of Jonah and was majorly convicted and knew that I couldn't run away from this call...

                            I guess you can tell where this is going.

I transferred schools, started a young adult group (and then left the group a few years later), volunteered to help with a just for girls bible study, helped with the children's Christmas program a couple of years, sang on a young adult praise team for a few months, started as a young adult helper then moved as 1/3 of the youth interim team, and all during that time had been lifted up and beaten down by the church. I had many of days when I wanted to walk away, yet God pulled me back in. The thought never crossed my mind to leave the church ever, because I felt so connected to it even when I was burnt out, alone and broken.

So now let's fast forward to the current time to my Emmaus walk. The last post covers the impact it had on my life, yet I kept out a major part that I was still running from. Ministry.

See, my Emmaus walk wrecked my life. My life in general seemed to be okay and I was okay with the status quo, but my Emmaus walk wrecked any of my own personal plans and broke the complacency I had been living in for far too long. It wrecked me in the best possible way and I have been gaining more and more insight from my walk since April. It's been great and also the hardest thing to deal with.

You see, there have been many times during the times since I was 19 yrs old that people have asked me whether I would go into ministry. It was always easy to blow it off then, but after my walk it started to get harder and harder to write it off. I always had a good excuse why ministry was not the direction I should head in. I was prepped for response and was able to eloquently define my answer. I even started using the term "active laity" and most people left me alone after saying that.

Then I went to Lakeside for the East Ohio United Methodist Annual Conference. I went early on Sunday morning and had a great time hearing the sermon and spending time with friends. It seemed like it would be a typical week and I wanted to make sure that I had time to relax and to try to figure out why I felt so off recently. It became apparent on Monday night that I would have to face the thing when one of my friends who was there sent me this quote:

"We are accustomed to imagining the experience of conversion or sudden call to grace as an 'Oh joy' phenomenon. In my experience... at the moment we finally listen to the call we may say, ' O thank you, Lord'; or we may say, 'O Lord, I am not worthy'; or we may say, 'O shit, do I have to?" ~ Brennan Manning

I liked the quote but it hit me. The next day I was able to ignore this turning feeling inside of me and was having a good day. I was planning on attending one of the special evening services that I had never been to before and was meeting my friend who is now my Pastor. He and I sat next to each other during this service, which happened to be the Ordination Service. This service includes laying hands on to new pastors who are just beginning in their ministries and it was a very moving service. Then a part I was not expecting, they had a type of alter call for people feeling called in ministry...

My friend, a friend who has seen me lead groups and seen me grow since I was in high school, half-jokingly said, "You should go down."

I couldn't look at him. I looked forward and made eye contact with no one. I also spotted the two District Superintendents that I knew (one I knew since I was a baby and one I knew from my Emmaus walk because she was the one who I broke down to) and that brought fear inside of me. Thoughts were racing through my head like, "I kind of want to go down. But I don't think I can be a pastor, or can I? What am I thinking, if they see me this is not good. Lord, this can't be it. Not here, not now! My job is good, I just bought a house, my life is now in a good place and you want to do this to me?"

Thankfully, the Bishop wrapped up this alter call before my friend could pester me anymore about this. Yet, I had this aching in my heart that I could not get rid of. I had never felt something weigh this heavy on my heart so I texted my friend the next morning as I walked around to see if there would be a time we could meet. He said yes and throughout the day we worked out a time.

We were upstairs in the coffeeshop as I sit in the corner trying to figure out what to exactly say, since I had never really told anyone other than my dad about the time when I was 19 and heard the word ministry. I was terrified, but I let it out and told my friend everything. I told him how I had heard God call me when I was 19 and had been running away from it. I told him that I had been scared, because I was in school and had no direction of what I wanted to do with this degree. I told him that I loved my job, but felt like I had completely lost my focus for work because I felt like I was longing for something else and it was frustrating me to no end, since I really enjoy what I do. I told him how the last couple of days I had conversations with people that had left such an impact on me that it led me to question what I could do to understand God more and to help the pastors I had spoken to. I told him all of this through tears, because I didn't know what to do. It tore me up, since I knew I was called, but didn't know. AND if that wasn't enough, I was terrified to tell my parents about what I had been feeling.

It was a great conversation and has led to a lot of prayer, quiet time and will lead to even more prayer and quiet time so I can 100% discern this direction. But with talking with my friend, it led me to the realization that I had to talk to my dad about this. We were able to get dinner together that evening and before that we were able to walk around a bit. It was at the end of the pier that I was able to tell my dad that I had felt called into working with the church and was totally terrified about it. We talked as we walked and as we had dinner. We discussed concern of direction and everything that was currently happening in my life. We talked about the specific type of ministry I would be best suited for and how to start looking. He mentioned he had a friend who worked at a seminary who would be a good connection to help me find a direction, in typical God fashion, my dad's friend was sitting right behind us and was getting ready to leave while he stopped at our table to talk. We told him we were just talking about him and how I was interested in attending seminary in a unique way and he told us of a great program that would fit with exactly what I was looking for. I met up with him later at the ministry fair to fill out a form requesting for more information on that program. I was filled with excitement and felt like I had direction back in my life.

The next day, which happened to be the last day of my vacation, I was filled with joy! This anxiousness had been lifted and I was ready to do what I needed to do to move forward. I can say this for a fact, I will not be starting seminary for at least a year and as of right now I believe I will be heading through the diploma route in leadership coaching. That does not mean something may change and will feel called in another direction for seminary (I've been running enough to know not to set anything in stone yet). But this I do know, I will finish up my current degree program and be at may current position as long as I need to be there. I know that seminary is in my future and I know that the next six months will be important as I become a member of a new church with my friend who helped me stop running.

I will admit, I am terrified yet excited. I am so happy my life was so wrecked into redemption that I was able to fully answer the call and not say "no," but to finally say "Yes, Lord. I'm terrified, but I'm in."