Follow Your Calling
One of the hardest thing about starting a new ministry is staying on track.
Whether you call it a calling, or a response to prompting, or obedience to the Lord, at some point you got the notion that you would pursue ministry in some direction.
No sooner has the desire been birthed in your heart, what happens? Doubt creeps in to try and destroy what the Lord has planted in your heart...
doubts like
Will others understand my mission?
Will the problems of my past invalidate me?
Do I know enough?
Can I finance this thing?
Will my family and friends think I'm crazy?
Am I crazy?
And on and on the doubts can swirl in your mind.
2nd Peter 1:10 Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall.
Peter knew about doubt as well as anyone ever could I imagine. Always sticking his foot in his mouth, or rather being willing to vocalize what others were thinking but too afraid to say. Peter was writing this to encourage believers in their faith when he tells them to be diligent to confirm your calling and your election, but goes on to say that if you practice these qualities that you would never fall. What qualities is he talking about?
Verses 3-9 give you the qualities and qualifications
His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.
But verse 11 gives us the reason why we would go through all the qualities and qualifications to make our calling and election sure...
For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Why would we go through all the time and effort, battling the mental anguish and spiritual oppression, jumping through financial hoops, to be able to go through the endless work of a minister? Because God set this before us and called us to do this, and for the prize that lays before us, the entrance into His kingdom, how could we refuse?
