The Crazy Call of God

I knew that this was the word of the Lord; so I bought the field at Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel and weighed out for him seventeen shekels of silver. -Jeremiah 32:8-9 (NIV)

Tomorrow marks the 13th anniversary of my father's death. I couldn't help but think of a specific story about him when reading the suggested scripture readings for today.

I went to Ole Miss with dreams of being an attorney. While at Ole Miss, however, I began experiencing the call of God to enter ordained ministry. Despite his meager earnings, my father was helping put me through college and was planning to continue supporting me financially when I went to law school. When I told my father, who was not a Christian at the time, that I was going to seminary instead, my father said, "Well, if you're going to seminary to be a preacher, God can pay for it because I'm not."

I remember looking at my father and thanking him for all his help to that point in my life. I also remember telling my cash cow (sorry, dad) that this call of God was so strong that I was just going to trust that the God who called me would provide.

To make a long story short, I graduated from seminary with a tremendous amount of school debt. But by the time I was ordained, through a significant gift from my father (who had since become a Christian) and another from the church I was serving at the time, my seminary debt was completely erased.

In the Old Testament reading for today, the Babylonian army has surrounded Jerusalem. Jeremiah is in prison and God tells him that the Israelites are about to get the daylights beaten out of themselves and taken into exile by the Babylonians. So what does Jeremiah do? He purchases a piece of property in the town that's going down! Why? Because of the call of God that told him to buy it!

People who hadn't heard God's call to Jeremiah must have thought that he was nuts, which was probably my dad's first thought when I told him about God's call to me. But Jeremiah does what God tells him to do and God promises him that the land he purchases has a future.

Sometimes God calls us to do things that don't make sense to other people. If you're like me, you can come up with all kinds of reasons NOT to do these things. And oftentimes, there's only one reason to do what God calls you to do: because God says so. In Jeremiah's case and in mine, what God was calling us to do didn't make a lot of sense to some people, but God promised a good future and God kept that promise.

Has God been calling you to do something that doesn't make sense to a lot of people, maybe even you? If so, may God grant you the courage to do what God is calling you to do and may your future be bright.

If you're interested in reading through the Bible in a year, tomorrow's suggested readings are Jeremiah 33-34. Psalm 74, and 1st John 5.

NOTE: This morning, my son Nicolas is scheduled to have surgery at Maury Regional Hospital in Columbia. Several weeks ago, a mysterious lump appeared on his left shoulder. Doctors think that it just a fatty mass but it must be removed and biopsied. I invite my faithful devotional readers to pray for Nicolas and his family today. I'll update everyone on Thursday.