Recently, I’ve been hearing the Lord telling me to “walk worthy of my calling”. In the past, I would have belabored every word of this command without ever truly putting the command into action. But there has been a shift in my thinking; a little synaptic pruning here, more formulation of new neuron pathways here, and voila! I no longer am trapped by toxic thinking! Which means, I am moving from receiving a word to acting upon a word in a matter of hours vs. months! For this, I give Father praise!
Maybe you too are hearing the same command by the Holy Spirit. If that’s you, have you ceased and asked Father, “what is my calling”?
I have to confess, this isn’t the first time Father has instructed me to “walk worthy of my calling”. I have heard Him say this sporadically throughout the years. Oh, you have too? Well, I’m glad that I am in good company! Ok, so have you also asked Him these two questions incessantly; “Father, what are You calling me to do? How do I do what You’re calling me to do”? Ohhh word! You too!!!! Can I tell you the truth? I have spent YEARS mulling over the same two questions and I received the same two answers every time! Hmmm huh, I surely have. And guess what I would do? Continue to wrestle with Father’s answers. I’ve literally squandered YEARS wrestling with these questions in my head and mentally mapping out not just my calling but how to do it without ever attempting more than a few steps before fear caused me to sink. All these years later, you know what I’ve come to realize? We, well let me speak for myself, I have always known what my calling was.
Our feigned ignorance to the what and how of our unique callings acts more like a handcuff which keeps us from launching out than a cushion that keeps us protected and safe in the will of God. We’ve convinced ourselves that the longer we pretend to not know, the longer we can be excused from participation. Right? Wrong! Because Father knows our hearts, He knows the thoughts we think and for real for real, He knows that we are faking! It’s like when I’m on my way to work and my son texts me to ask if he can stay home from school because he’s “sick”. 9 times out of 10, my response to him is, “nice try but no. There’s nothing wrong with you. Get up, get dressed and get your behind to school”.
For me, these two questions revealed an area of struggle and stronghold. And I believe that they represent areas of struggle and stronghold for you too. Frankly, a lot of us already KNOW what are callings are, but because we don’t see the ability for us to make money in the calling, we feign confusion. Can I keep it all the way real? We try to monetize the calling, we try to place a price tag on the assignment, we try to calculate how much it is going to cost us to walk this calling out in order to compute our ROI! And we’re not analyzing the cost to us spiritually but rather, the cost to us financially. This is error, Loves! I’ve discovered that when we ask “what is my calling?” we are really asking God, “how am I going to economically PROSPER in my calling”?
This, my friends, is obviously the spirits of Fear, Mammon and Double-Mindedness in action. However, I must expose another spirit in operation here that we rarely hear called out; merchandising spirit. The Hebrew word for “merchandise” is “amar” (H6014) and one of its definitions is, “to manipulate, deal tyrannically with; to treat as a slave”. The root word for it in the Greek is “emporos” (G1713) and it is defined as, “one on a journey, whether by sea or land, especially for trade”. Understand this, I knew being called by God was synonymous with receiving an honorable mention. Nevertheless, that merchandising spirit manipulated my focus, my thoughts and my intentions and bound me to my 8-5pm job so that I would have money (barely) to take care of my family and pay my bills. I was spiritually, mentally and physically paralized; I was literally unable to “walk” out my Holy calling. Akin to how a slave imagines their freedom, I too imagined the liberty contained within exercising my calling. But the shackles kept me stuck.
My heart was exposed. For where my heart lays reveals where my treasures are. Sadly, my heart was in Egypt and not in heaven. A sobering truth indeed.
If what I have shared thus far is piercing you in the heart and gut, be encouraged! We don’t have to stay here! I want to submit the following for your consideration and meditation:
1. Our calling and our assignments don’t have a monetary value associated with them. This is very important for me to state and for all of us to comprehend. When Father says “walk worthy of your calling and assignment”, He didn’t follow that up with a wage contract. He doesn’t say, “If you walk worthy of your calling and assignment, then I will pay you x amount of dollars”. This isn’t a contract negotiation. This is an honor! Our love of money, our pursuit for money, the things we do for money, are not pleasing to God. Instead, when we do these things, we put God on trial, similar to what the Israelites did at Meribah. The result is the same; God is vindicated and we’re disqualified. Rest assured, Father understands that we have needs. It is we who must understand that He is able, and willing, to meet every single need we will ever have.
2. The word calling (aka vocation in the KJV) is defined as “an invitation to a feast; of the divine invitation to embrace salvation of God”! Can you feel the glory of that privilege? We are invited to the feast, we are invited to embrace the salvation of God, but how many of us know that there is a lapse in time from the receipt of an invitation to the date in which the party takes place? My grandmother, Dada, always used to tell me, “late invitations are for fools”. Why? Simply put, it takes time to prepare a party. The party planner has to search for and then book the location, the caterer needs time to prepare the meal, the staff needs to decorate the space. And we, the guests, need time to get ourselves cute! Ain’t nobody trying to show up to a party looking a hot mess, now. We need to get our hair and nails and makeup done. We need to shop for the right dress and get the shoes to match. Come on, you know how we do! With all of this in mind, if we receive a same day invitation, that is the evidence that we were not previously considered, and not previously valued. But that is not so for us. Our Father says that He knows the plans He has for us. Father says that He has engraved us in the palm of His hands. How then, can we, the apple of HIs eye, receive a same day invitation?
3. Don’t get so puffed up with the pride of being called and invited, that we forget there is another stage of equal importance, being chosen. It is a privilege to be called and not found, but it is a glory to be chosen by God! To be chosen means that you have walked worthy of your calling in a manner that is pleasing and acceptable to God. It means that we took a step, then another, all the while, recalculating and re-calibrating our steps along the way. We didn’t just dream about it, we are doing it! No matter how many times we fall, we get up and take another step! We strengthen our legs, our stance and our stamina!
Whatever it is Father has called us to do, and we all know what that is, today is the day that we must start to walk. Fear, pestilence, disease and hunger is in the land. But that is not our motivation for walking. Our motivation is only in doing those things which are pleasing to our Father for the glorifying of Jesus!
Love, peace and blessing!
Reina
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