I heard a great comment last week at District Council from David Grant. He said, "I wasn't called into ministry, I volunteered." He remembers crying himself to sleep at about ten years old praying, "Lord please let me be a missionary."
When we feel called there is a sense of obligation, "if I don't do this God will be mad at me, I will be out of his will." This will cause us to have moments when we feel that God has forced us to live some horrible life of toil and frustration. But, maybe we need to rethink the moment of our calling. We are far more motivated to work when we have the heart of a volunteer, as opposed to the heart of a conscript.
I remember being filled with the Holy Spirit in the fall of 1987 at fifteen years of age. I remember thinking, "I want to help other people get this like my pastor and youth pastor have helped me." Either just before that or just after that, I don't remember, the Lord dropped it in my heart that I should be a pastor.
On some level, I think that every person who is called by God to full-time ministry responded to the call by volunteering. Let's keep that attitude that will shout out to God, "I will!" Let's keep that attitude that is willing to cross the line in the sand and be a volunteer.
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