Four Keys to Exploring the Call of God On Your Life
The Walk of Faith
Four Keys to Exploring the Call of God On Your Life
I’m giving it all to you. Genesis 13:17.
What a marvellously complete promise. There’s no conditions. It’s not a weaselly, manipulative statement, with enough loopholes to drive a train through.
It’s a promise by an all powerful God to a man doing his best to follow Him. It’s beautiful, wonderful, exciting and scary all at the same time.
It’s a promise God is making to each of us. To you, to me, and to all our friends and family. To explore the precious, individualised calling He’s given to every person.
I believe that within the passage of scripture I’m writing about today is four keys on how we can explore this wonderful call God has given us.
Picking up the Story of Abraham
We find ourselves in amongst the story of Abram (who goes on to be called Abraham). At this point in Abram’s journey, he’s definitely gained some life experience. Here’s a quick recap (Genesis 12–13):
- At the age of 75, Abram gets a call from God to leave his country, his family, and his fathers’s home for a land that I (God) will show you. Gen 12:1
- Abram gets up and leaves, but takes his nephew Lot with him
- Abram and co arrive in Canaan, at which point, God turns up and expands on the promise He has already given Abram. The implication being that this is where Abram needs to be.
- A extremely tough famine arrives, and Abram and co have to move to Egypt in order to survive.
- Abram, afraid for his life, pimps out his wife to the Pharaoh
- Eventually the Pharaoh gets wind of this, and disgusted with Abrams behaviour and deception, kicks him out of Egypt
- Abram and co travel back to Canaan
- Conflict erupts between Lot and Abrams business empires due to their respective extreme wealth
- Abram recommends that they split up to preserve the peace, and magnanimously offers for Lot to pick his preferred place to settle
- Lot, in somewhat of a jerk move (my opinion), deliberately picks the best and most luscious looking land, leaving Abram (by implication) land which doesn’t look the best.
And that’s where we find ourselves.
We see Abram having accumulated some life experience. He’s hit the heights of following the calling of God on his life and see God show up and show off. He’s also experience what it’s like to be in a place where there’s no good options to be seen. What it’s like to look around and metaphorically see the storms of life feeling much bigger than the promises of God. He’s seen the impact of decisions made years ago on his current experience.
Abram has done his best. Just like many reading this, he’s made some pretty massive errors, and displayed some pretty incredible faith. In short, just like each of us, Abram’s being doing his best to figure it out.
Now he finds himself in the land of promise. His safety net of Lot has been stripped away, and he’s been moved into a land which is very deliberately not mentioned in the bible as being luscious and green.
It’s in this place that God turns up again and says the following:
After Lot separated from him, God said to Abram, “Open your eyes, look around. Look north, south, east and west. Everything you see, the whole land spread out before you, I will give to you and your children forever. I’ll make your descendants like dust — counting your descendants will be as impossible as counting the dust of the Earth. So — on your feet, get moving! Walk through the country, its length and breadth; I’m giving it all to you.” (Genesis 13:14–17 MSG)
And that’s where we’ll enter into our story.
Open Your Eyes
The very first thing God says to Abram after all of his experiences is to “Open your eyes”. It’s a pretty odd statement. One would think that by this time Abram is pretty well aware of where he’s at.
Or maybe he isn’t.
Maybe what God was indicating was a need for Abram to see things the way God is seeing them. To reframe his experience through the lens of God’s story, not Abrams story. In Abrams story, the place is the same, but Abram is different. And maybe Abram needs to see that.
In God’s story, Abram’s story is a critical part of His salvation plan. The place where he’s at and the people he meets are form the heart of an incredible redemption plan. He’s well on his way to becoming the father of our faith.
But Abram doesn’t know this. He doesn’t have a bible in front of him. He doesn’t know that several thousand years later we’d all be reading his story.
Maybe, just maybe, God is reassuring us to consider things from His perspective. Maybe, just maybe, even though we’re in the same place, we are different.
Maybe it’s scary and worrying and intimidating to be looking at our calling again. We’ve picked up some scars, made some errors. We’ve realised that is in God’s strength we rest, not our own.
And God is saying: “Open your eyes”
Just like in 2 Kings 6:15–18 where Elisha’s servant is terrified to see a hostile army surrounding them — only to open his spiritual eyes and see a God army of horses and chariots of fire protecting them.
Just like in Luke 24:31, on the road to Emmaus, where two weary, dejected disciples are at their lowest faith point. They’ve seen Jesus tortured and brutally sacrificed on a cross, and all of His lofty promises about being the saviour of the world destroyed. In a beautiful example of love, compassion and authenticity, we Jesus come alongside them and guide them back to Himself. They see that the salvation story Jesus promised them is more alive and well than they could have imagined. In a moment, their perspectives are transformed.
So let’s open our eyes to see God’s perspective on our calling. It’s not a barren land. This is God’s land, and He’s working out His story.
Look Around
How interesting that the phrase is “Open your eyes, look around…” It seems obvious, but maybe it isn’t enough just to open our eyes to Gods perspective.
Maybe there’s an active curiosity to be engaged. Maybe there’s a vast ocean of things God is looking to achieve through your life, and God is incredibly excited to explore it with you. Maybe there’s a call to look to the north, south, east and west (just in case the words ‘Look around’ weren’t explicit enough).
Maybe when we have a God perspective, we need to re-explore the calling He placed on our lives. Maybe there’s far more to it than we saw at first glance. Maybe what was stressful and contentious the first time around is actually a land full of milk and honey (which in those days was a good thing).
In my mind I see Abram looking around like a superhero in a super hero movie. The super hero finally realises the power which was always inside of them and now everything is different. They’ve changed.
I feel like someone reading this article needs to hear that. The call God placed on your life isn’t gone, destroyed or burnt out. You’re not discarded on some pile of ‘failures in life’. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Instead, God has brought you here to this moment, at this time, in this place to say to you “Open your eyes, look around…”
🤜
On Your Feet
I read this and wonder what God’s tone of voice was.
Was it a gentle encouragement to get up? Was Abram feeling tired, exhausted, over it and God comes with His gentle, healing voice?
Was it an excited, energetic exhortation to get up? Was Abram feeling well rested and pondering about his next move, and God is like “Let’s do this! Let’s go?”
Was it a stern bootcamp instructor voice to Get UP? Was Abram feeling on his last legs, with nothing left, but just needs that final push to make it?
We’ll never know.
What we do know is that right after saying to open our eyes and look around, God says to Get up. To actively choose to get involved in our calling. To make a deliberate decision to re-engage with whatever it is He’s putting before us.
To engage passionately and authentically with our incredible God. To say ‘Yes’. To say Yes because God is amazing and incredible, and His calling is wide and spacious. Not because it’s the ‘right thing to do’ or because ‘we should’.
To say Yes to His incredible and authentic call for us.
Walk Through the Country
The final key is my favourite.
In my mind, I see Abram going on giant hikes through the country. I see him finding streams and cool looking caves. I see him roaming around, delighted at what he finds. I see him mapping out plains and good locations for cities and farms, wondering if this will be where his descendants will settle.
I think this is the ultimate expression of love and appreciation for what God has given us. To commit ourselves to exploring the personalised, individualised and unique calling each of us has been given. To invest our days joyfully exploring everything He’s given us.
To realise that each of us has a vast, incredible and beautiful calling on our lives. We’re all different and God created each of us uniquely. And His call to us is to explore everything He’s given us.
Authentically.
Faithfully.
Openly.
Ciao ❤
