Some of our Kairos University students and staff at a recent Student Social Mixer at Covenant Bible Seminary.
For today’s article we return to: Journey to Covenant Bible Seminary. In this series, our new Registrar and Director of Student Life, John Golling, is sharing with us a little bit of his story. You can read HERE about his childhood impressions of God drawn from his experiences in the Greek Orthodox Church, and HERE about a teacher who impacted him in significant ways.
Today, John shares some thoughts and Scriptures about how a person might discover his or her calling or purpose in life, and we begin a discussion about the idea of vocation.
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
When you were a kid, what did you say when adults asked you this question?
Did you want to be a fireman? A ballerina? A football player? The president of the United States?
If you are a parent, have you ever asked your kids this question?
I am sure most of us changed our minds about our career goals many times before we finally landed where we are today.
I have one daughter who, when she was pretty young, became interested in the medical field. By the 10th grade, she knew that she wanted to be a nurse.
When her younger sister was getting close to graduating from high school, she still didn’t know what career path she wanted to pursue. I asked her periodically if she had decided what she might want to study in college, and on one of these occasions she said, “Can you please stop asking me that, it’s putting pressure on me and it makes things difficult. I will let you know when I want to talk about it, okay?”
I said, “I am sorry about that. Thank you for letting me know how you are feeling. I will back off, and we can talk about it when you are ready.” And I did back off.
This brings up the important issue of how do we decide what we want to be when we grow up?
In our country today, many of us have adopted this idea that we can grow up to be whatever we want. We live in a place in the world and a time in history where we have more choices than ever before. We are often told that if we apply ourselves, and work hard enough, we can be whatever we want to be.
But with so many apparent choices, and with so much at stake, it is no wonder that many young people are experiencing such high levels of stress, and many others are failing to launch out of the nest. Perhaps it’s time to consider how we talk about these ideas, and take a closer look at some of the underlying assumptions behind our choice of words.
When the children of Israel were redeemed by God from slavery in Egypt, God invited them to meet with Him in worship as they traveled through the wilderness. To facilitate this, He gave them blueprints for the Tabernacle, so they could have a mobile-place-of-worship to meet with God. In Exodus 31:2-5 we read about a man who was called to help with some of the artistic elements of the Tabernacle:
See, I have called by name Bezalel the son of Uri, son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with ability and intelligence, with knowledge and all craftsmanship, to devise artistic designs, to work in gold, silver, and bronze, in cutting stones for setting, and in carving wood, to work in every craft.
It is interesting that the Bible mentions Bezalel and his God-given ability to do this kind of work. His calling was connected to these gifts and skills that God had blessed him with.
And in the New Testament, we read about spiritual gifts given to followers of Jesus, as well as this statement in Ephesians 2:10,
For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
The word for handiwork is translated as craftsmanship in some versions. What a beautiful picture, to see ourselves as the craftsmanship of God. The Greek word translated craftsmanship is poiēma, from which we get our English word poem. Wow! In a way, we are like … God’s poetry!
He is a Master Artisan and you are His handiwork, an expression of His creative genius. And He created us for specific work which He prepared in advance for us to do.
It seems to me from these passages as well as other verses and principles in Scripture, that God has designed, gifted, and created each one of us in a way that is consistent with specific work that He calls us to do.
In other words, this idea that we can grow up to be whatever we want seems that it would create an inner struggle, because if God has designed each of us for specific kinds of tasks, then to embrace a value of self-determination in this area would set us up to push against … the very design of God Himself! Could it be that our way of speaking to children and young people, in an effort to encourage them, actually puts unnecessary pressure on them? Could there be an alternative vocabulary, that embraces different underlying values, that would turn out to be more helpful?
So, what are your thoughts on this subject?
Do you believe that we were designed for specific kinds of work?
Do you think that God has uniquely made each of us for a certain type of vocation?
Or perhaps these passages are meant to apply to something other than our job, and the work we do is really very much up to our own choice?
Maybe those verses are about our volunteer ministry, or hobbies that we do aside from our primary career, and we can still grow up to be whatever we want?
In the next Journey to CBS article, John will share how he went from being a Computer Science major at Seattle Pacific University, to studying Bible and Theology at Multnomah Bible College- a pivotal moment on the path that eventually led him to Covenant Bible Seminary.