Follow or Hollow?

What constitutes a call upon your life? For me, it represents something that I would be willing to do for God regardless of pay, and no matter what negative aspects were associated with it - it is just in me to do it. It is something that I have come to love and care for intrinsically, whether I realized it immediately or over time.

We should be aware when we hear God calling us in the various ways a call may come. Yes, through the Bible, but also through the words of God's people living around us. We know when we are drawn to someone's words that speak with God's love and power as soon as we hear them or read them. We feel the pull of those words which carry us away to reach for dreams we never knew we had or were afraid to dream.

It did not matter the conditions that we were dealing with at the time that we heard God's call. We connected to those divine truths, especially those that we already had distilled in us growing up. In the moment that we heard or read the call that summoned us to action and service for God, we were aware that it had not been given the proper form of expression until then.

When we heard God's call, it freed our minds and souls from long-held bonds. It verified the true meaning of our lives and helped us make sense of the world around us. It connected the dots that showed more ways of being fair and showing care for everyone. It is a direct and positive call from Jesus to follow God's love that transforms us. It is like the call that Jesus made to his disciples in John 1:43-51. However, I first would ask that you read John 1:19-34 where Jesus' cousin, known as "The Baptizer" speaks about who Jesus is. You will know about the background that more clearly reveals Jesus' call story in verses 43-51.

There is another way that God calls us that we may not always recognize as coming from God. The call also comes to us in response to a force that is not godly or positive, but is utterly opposed to God's will and message of unconditional love for all the peoples of the earth. This is a call to follow God's leading to rise up against negative and hateful ideologies and legislation that a single person or a group of people use to intimidate and persecute those who are the objects of their disapproval or hatred.

This opposition can be felt when a person or a group attempts to put down, cast dispersions, and frame certain groups of people as not worthy of equal respect or compassion as themselves. Then, these people or groups use their economic and political power or powerful social standing to systematically isolate and marginalize people based on their race, ethnicity, gender identity, sexual orientation, nationality, political affiliation, or any other designation that are used to discriminate against other people.

This call from God is a response to anything which is in opposition to God's love fulfilled. Only God's love and power can make good the promises of fairness, protection, and provision that we make to each other.

Dr. Martin L. King, Jr. said this. "When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." (from the March on Washington, 8.28.1963)