Calls for Reality

You never know where you will find yourself when you start investigating topics on the internet. My search led me to a newsletter and I had to scan the majority of the newsletter before I found the word that the search engine had keyed into. But as I read through I grew disoriented. It sounded so familiar:

• First Presbyterian Church – check
• Orders for poinsettias – check
• Angel Tree – check
• Joyful Noise – check
• New Member classes – check
• Prayers for our Military - check
• Game Night – check
• Food Pantry collection – check
• Good Sense Program – check
• Schmidts, Snyders, Campbells – check
• Breakfast Club – check

Wait, Breakfast Club, really?? Had I stumbled into a parallel universe? Was I confused with reality again? Then it was affirmed as I re-read the opening paragraph from the pastor:

When God calls and you listen, you never know where you’ll end up or how long you’ll stay there. But I can guarantee if you listen to God’s Call, if you somehow, some way discern what it is God wants you to do, and you then follow his voice, your life will be, at the very least, interesting. That reality is forever in my mind when we ordain elders during the month of January. When God calls, strange things can and will happen…
Rev Tom Cook, First Presbyterian of Grand Haven, Michigan, January 2009

My prayer for the congregation?

Dear God, You make peace out of chaos and unearth the rooted. Our opinions are dismantled as we allow your Truth to submerge our thoughts. We are forever changed if we but submit ourselves and follow. You call us to be leaders, singers, mentors, builders, dreamers, counters, guardians, teachers, laborers, organizers, musicians, cooks and bottle washers. Let us quiet our objections, doubts and busyness and listen. You are calling our name. Amen

Rev Cook continued
…Most gratifying were the times I witnessed real transformation in peoples’ lives when they heard God’s Call, stopped running from it, surrendered to God’s will, and then followed.

...When it comes to answering God’s Call, and following it, you never know where it will take you. But if you are open to the grace of this special Call, I can personally witness to you that it will be a life changing, life fulfilling experience and a wonderful ride.

God calls and it’s up to us to answer him. Listen to your life. If you have not yet experienced it, listen and somewhere in your living you will hear Christ calling you to drop life’s nets and follow him.