God, the Spirit Of Life, calls on us to do things and live in ways that, at times, feels like a mighty stretch for us. We are asked to do things that we believe we would have never chosen on our own and yet here we are faced with challenges which seem overwhelming and perhaps, even, not possible to accomplish.
The old joke is, "If you want to hear God laugh, tell God your plans." Life sometimes has surprising things in store for us, and do we shut down or open up? It is only human to be protective, defensive, resistant, and skeptical if not down right angry.
The word "vocation" comes from the Latin word "vocare" which means "to call." A vocation is a calling from God whether it be to be a butcher, a baker, a candle stick maker, a vocation is more than just a job or a career, it is one's life work.
All reflective people struggle with questions about what to do with one's life. Should I get married or stay single? Should I stay married or get divorced? Should I take this job or that job? Should I hang around with these group of friends or find new friends? Should I join this club or church or that club or church? Should I get involved in this activity or that activity? The answers to these kinds of life creating questions are difficult to answer and scare us.
I suggest to people that the way to answer these life creating questions is to ask yourself whether your deciding to do this will help you become the person that deep down in your heart you believe God is calling you to become or detract from it? Will your staying married help you to become the person which deep down in your heart you believe God is calling you to become or detract from it?
We will struggle with God, we will wrestle with God. Our ego often does not want to follow God's will and yet in the Christian prayer of the Our Father we say in part "....thy kingdom come, thy will be down in earth as it is in heaven." "Thy will be done", God's will be done, not mine. St. Paul also says in a letter to Timothy, "If God is with you who can stand against you?" Indeed, bringing your will into alignment with God's will for you makes you and God a dynamic duo, unstopable.
And so, as the song says, "Here I am Lord. I have heard you calling in the night." God often calls us in the murky night. Things are not clear. It is hard to see the light sometimes. God whispers, rarely shouts, and we are too afraid to listen, afraid that something will be required of us which we cannot provide, cannot successfully do, can't imagine how it would be possible for us to do what is asked.
The only way it can work is if we move foward in faith trusting in the Spirit of Life with a humble heart and a commitment to do our best.
Unitarian Universalism does not promise us success only the possibility of a free and responsible search for truth and meaning, and the hope of justice, equity, and compassion in human relations, and the intent to acknowledge and rejoice in the inherent worth and dignity of every person. We profess a faith which imagines the goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all, but do we have the courage, the guts, the willingness to do what it takes to pursue it enthusiastically? We cannot do it alone, but in concert with the Spirit Of Life we might have a chance.
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