Hope at the End of Dr. Powlison's Rope

"But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong." (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

The Call of the Conduit

Notwithstanding the sad state of the pastoral ministry, both here in the Philippines and abroad, the call to preach and teach the oracles of God has never lost its gravity and importance. God, in His gracious condescension, has seen it fit to course His faith-building blessings through jars of clay, and the determination of whether one is among those chosen to be conduits of His speech must be taken very seriously.

On a subjective, personal level, determination can be commenced by asking oneself, "Do I love to study the Word of God?" "Do I endeavor to obey the Word of God?" "Do I have a desire to teach the Word of God to others?" This is in keeping with what the priest Ezra was described as being and doing, "For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the Lord, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel" (Ezra 7:10).

On a more objective note, the estimation of the elders of the church play the most important role in this determination. The exercise of one's gifts in the church context gives the elders the data that they would need in ascertaining (with prayerful consideration) whether the love of God's Word, the life of God's Word, and the teaching of God's Word are apparent in the individual. This process of submitting to the authority of the Church simply recognizes the Christ-representative function of the eldership and the Lord's able use of ordinary means.

Dr. Dennis Johnson has more: "Discerning One’s Call to the Ministry" and "Confirming One’s Call to the Ministry"

Calvin Paid His Dues

John Calvin suffered through being in a place and situation he didn't prefer. The demands of the ministry on him were enormous. Enemies wanted his head on a plate. Relatives broke his heart. He was frequently ill. He lost his wife and son.

John Calvin was no mere brainiac. He lived hard and paid his dues.

"Above all by sufferings he wishes us to be conformed to the image of his Son, as it is fitting that there should be conformity between the head and the members" (John Calvin).

Read more: John Calvin in the Valley of the Shadow of Death

A Theology of Resignation

I just received word that my younger sister has decided to leave her current spot at the leading telecommunications company in the country. The reason given was that she was "not happy" anymore. This got me thinking: what does it mean when someone says that they are not happy on the job anymore? Is there some objective standard by which one can measure career happiness? The usual replies would be the pay, the environment, the stress, or the ability to express creative output. Of course, other reasons abound, but the ones mentioned seem to me to be indicative of the Zeitgeist—the subjective, "I am the determiner of my fate and reality" spirit that is so much the S.O.P of most individuals in our time. Would civilization and culture be able to maintain its ground if every one of its constituents suddenly had a flash of inspiration and decided that they were not happy with their vocations anymore and ran off to more "fulfilling" pursuits? I think hardly. What we would have is chaos.

Jesus Christ is God. There was never a time when He wasn't and there will never be such a time. We could say that He had the best "job" of all! The Persons of the Trinity, in their aseity and impassibility, were (and are!) in perfect fellowship with each other and needed nothing else to complete their happiness. There was no room  for improvement in the essence of God's being. But from eternity the plan was to create and bring about redemption. God would showcase to a created universe the splendor of His perfections, and this meant that Christ had to leave a "well-paying, perfect environment, stress-free, creative" job for an antithetical one, in a manner of speaking. He "...though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (Phil. 2:6-7). This was the job description, and what a job it was! God became man—what fitting analogy in the corporate world can we find for the Incarnation? The CEO becoming a janitor? Not even close. The radical humility and self-effacement of Christ is the wonder of all wonders, and this fact shall stand for all eternity.

What if more people, I should say Christians, had more of Christ's willingness to take on a "lousy job" (rhetorically-speaking) when the need demands it, instead of making their "happiness" the chief criterion for their state of being? Perhaps more of God's will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven then.

Embracing Career Change for the Glory of Christ

"Many of you are simply not satisfied with what you are doing...the output of your lives is not satisfying your deepest spiritual ambitions. We must be careful here. Every job has its discouragements and its seasons of darkness. We must not interpret such experiences automatically as a call to leave our post. But if the discontent with your present situation is deep, recurrent, and lasting, and if that discontent grows in Bible-saturated soil, God may be calling you to a new work. If, in your discontent, you long to be holy, to walk pleasing to the Lord, and to magnify Christ with your one, brief life, then God may indeed be loosening your roots in order to transplant you to a place and a ministry where the deep spiritual ambitions of your soul can be satisfied....God seldom calls us to an easier life, but always calls us to know more of him and drink more deeply of his sustaining grace." - John Piper, Don't Waste Your Life, ch. 9, p. 178

As the uneasiness grows, does faith grow along with it?

Are we building up the soul resources needed to enable us to respond in radical obedience when the Lord calls us out of our white-collar comfort zones into the thick of battle?

Are we weaning our hearts off earthly affections and focusing on heavenly ones?

Do we really want to walk the talk?

Is Christ our everything?

I need to reflect on these questions and more.