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Online
Chat with Dr. Os Guiness Note:
The following conversation with Dr. Os Guiness was conducted via Instant
Messenger on the evening of July 2 Q:
I'd like to have that sense of devotion and dynamism that you include in
your definition of calling. But mostly I feel like I'm just trying to
survive as a Christian and not be dominated by sin. I know I'm called to
follow Christ nd I'm doing that. How can a clearer sense of calling help
me live a more dynamic Christian life? Dr. Guiness: One of the characteristics of a human being living with a
sense of purpose, and the trouble with many people, is that they take
their sense of purpose from people and events and circumstances around
them. But just as Achimedies looked for a leverage point from which to
change the world, the great sense of calling is that it comes outside of
the world, outside of ourselves. So if we start everyday by asking how we
are living for the Lord, we have something to give the highest and deepest
sense of purpose. Q:
If someone doesn't have any spiritual interest, but still believes that
life should have meaning and purpose and is searching for that purpose,
what would you say to him? Dr.
Guiness: There are three main families of faiths that attempt to give
an answer. The desire for individual purpose is almost universal. There
are billions of people born before us and billions will follow us. And
billions are alive at the same time as us. And yet we each have a unique
sense of destiny. Is it real? Or is it only a conceit and we are only dust
in the wind? There are three big answers in the modern world. One is the
eastern answer--Hinduism, Buddhism, and the New Age. And put simply, it
says just forget it. The desire to have purpose is part of the fact that
we are caught in the world of illusion. The
second family of faith is the secularists. Its answer is yes, create your
own meaning yourself. In other words, meaning is not there to be
discovered. It is there for each one of us to create ourselves. And
the third big family of answers is the Biblical of Jewish and
Christianity. It says that the deepest answer is to rise and answer the
call of the God that created us. And there is no question that that third
answer, by far, is the deepest answer in history. So I would say one of
the big things about calling is that it is the very deepest answer to
human longing, purpose, and fulfillment. Q:
You stated that there is no life without a Caller. What if a non-believing
person feels called to sacrifice for a cause? (Like protecting the
environment.) She feels very fulfilled and passionate that she is doing
something very valuable. Dr. Guiness: I said in my book that there is no calling without a Caller.
In other words, can there be any true meaning in that without God? The
word calling has come out of the Bible and has been taken over by our
modern, secular society and used without any real strong sense of purpose
and passion. I guess another way to ask the question is, "Can God
call an unbeliever to do His will?" But when secular people use the
word calling, it is like a cut flower. They've borrowed the meaning but
they have cut off the root. And that's really cheating. The word calling
only comes into its own with depth and richness if there is a personal God
who calls. The secular people have used the word, but they really don't
have a right to it. God can definitely call unbelievers. And the strongest
biblical example of that is the way God called Syrus, the pagan king, to
be his servant and work on behalf of the Jews. And bviously, the reason is
that the creator can call his creatures even if the creatures don't
acknowledge him. But calling comes into its own in the idea of
relationship. When creatures come to know their Creator as they do in
Jesus, the idea of calling is rooted in a deeply intimate relationship.
We not only follow our Caller, knowing we love Him. I think even if
human beings don't even acknowledge God or know God, they are still made
in His image. So when they exercise the gifts that God has given them,
there is tremendous satisfaction to them as well as service to others. So
they don't have a higher fulfillment and joy of doing it for Him when they
know Him. Q: I am happy as a process engineer but I often have the thought that I
am not putting my life to best use for God. I just can't see how most of
what I'm doing every day builds the kingdom of God. Do I need to consider
a special calling? Dr. Guiness: Your question touches the very heart problem of calling.
Ever since the first century and a theologian called Eusbius, we've had
this heretical idea that the spiritual is higher than the secular, and
full-time ministry more valuable than secular work. And this is almost the
universal, catholic position--a very common protestant position. In
contrast, Martin Luther stressed that is everyone, everywhere in
everything. In other words, there is no higher or lower.
There is no sacred or secular. There is no full-time or part-time.
If you do what you do by faith, to the glory of God, as a calling, it is
just as valuable as being a minister or missionary. So I would say beware
of the seminary trap that the idea of the spiritual is higher than the
secular. On the other hand, always remember that your job, your paid job,
is not necessarily the heart of your calling. For example, the famous
French Christian lawyer, Jacques Ellul, used to say that the heart of his
calling was not being a famous lawyer and professor. It was his work in
his free time among the delinquent boys of Bordeaux. Q: Did Jacques Ellul have a sense of frustration? Dr. Guiness:
Not at all, it was almost like Paul's. In other words, the paid work made
him free to pursue his calling, which was unpaid. Q:
How does understanding my calling help me answer the question, "Who
Am I?" Dr. Guiness: That's a very deep question. Because three deep questions
come together. One is the search formeaning. One is the search for
purpose. And the third is the search for identity. The biblical faith
provides us with the answer to meaning. Calling provides the answer to
purpose. That's obviously very close to identity. Because
God not only calls us to do something, he names us and therefore
calls out our identity. It's important to remember that it would be an
insult to define someone's identity in a sentence. It's far too intimate
and deep. The same is true for calling. Sometimes we can talk about things
we do. But the deepest part of it is God calling us out, that is our
identity. Q:
Will God call me to do something I'm not gifted for or feel totally
inadequate to accomplish? Dr. Guiness: God usually calls us to employ the gifts that He has given
us. And that's the clear teaching of Jesus. For example, in the parable of
the talents and the pounds in Matthew. On the other hand, God sometimes,
and this is his extraordinary call, God sometimes calls us from what is
normal and natural to something special. For example, Amos, who was a
farmer, was called to be a prophet because the normal prophets were so
decadent and corrupt. But normally God calls us along the line of the
gifts that he has given us. The puritans used to teach the great danger is
to focus on the giftedness and forget the giver. So we need to remember
that if we are using God's gifts to us, we always have to be grateful to
the giver and use His gifts in clear dependence on Him.
The mark of the great ventures that we do for the Lord is that they
are so much beyond us that they would never succeed without Him. So the
gifts come from him and the success depends absolutely on Him. So
everything we do, we do by faith. Q: What is the place of career counselors and testing in determining
God's call? Q:
I want to follow God and I want to feel like my life is special, but I
don't want to be a hero. Everyone I have looked up to has disappointed me.
I know if I am put on a pedestal I will fall and I don't want to
disappoint others. I feel stuck between wanting to know my calling and
afraid I can't live up to it. What should I do? Dr. Guiness: That's a very deep question. Part of our following His call
includes the Christian virtue of honesty and humility. So it would be
wrong to avoid rising to God's highest just because we know we will trip
up, just as the man in Jesus' story hid his talents in the napkin in the
ground because of his view of the master. If we are a model to younger
believers, part of our example is being honest about our failing. The
calling should never be a matter of hypocrisy or pretense. And I would
just challenge you to rise to the full height that God is calling you to
rise to. Q: I can relate to what you said about having too many choices. I feel
paralyzed. I don't know which job to choose. I have several career options
and I want God to make clear which I should choose, but He is silent. So
am I really free to pick the job that seems best to me? I would feel
better if there was some sense of divine confirmation. Dr
Guiness : It is very important not to confuse calling with guidance. We
need to remember the entrepreneurial part of calling. In the parable of
the talents and pounds, the master never told them what to do. There was
no micromanagement. They were simply given gifts, talents, and praised or
blamed at the end according to what they had done. When we confuse calling
with guidance, we get paralyzed wondering if this is truly God's will and
then we do nothing. Whereas calling is a venture and there is always risk.
So I would not wait until you hear "it" from the Lord, but
rather weigh up the talents of gifts and opportunities and figure out how
best you can add fruit or value to the world. And recognize that there is
always a process of trial and error. Q: How realistic do you think it is for a student or someone right out of college to have a deep sense of God's calling? Dr.
Guiness:
Because calling is so badly taught today and there is so much ignorance
and confusion, it is a more lengthy process to discover it now than in the
past. I came to Christ when I was 18 and it wasn't until really my late
20s when I came across the notion of calling and even later still began to
understand what my calling was. I
came to Christ at 18 at a time in England if you were really spiritual you
became a minister or missionary. And my parents were missionaries so I
knew that wasn't my life. Though
I went to the ministry, I wasn't ordained. I worked in a church for nine
months, and to be honest, I absolutely hated it. I liked the pastor, I was
pretty good at the things I did, but it simply wasn't me. And it was in a
time of very deep frustration that someone introduced me to the idea of biblical
calling. And it was an incredible liberation for me. I as invited to
consider to be the minister in the church that Preacher Martin Lloyd Jones
used to preach in. I sweated it for the whole weekend because I was
horrified by the thought. And when I had the freedom to say no because I
knew it wasn't my calling, I never looked back and I had a tremendous
sense of liberation and peace. Part of my calling is as an apologist,
though I am always happier in the secular world. And it is a great relief
to me to not be stuck in the Christian subculture. Whereas some people are
the opposite. Their calling is to direct full-time ministry.
When I came to Christ, the present view of calling was almost
absent. I came across it when someone gave me William Perkins' A Treatice
on Calling. He was described as a puritan C.S. Lewis. Today it is not very
easy to read, but it is incredibly liberating when you understand it. I
had to translate it to the 20th century and I've taught on it for nearly
30-odd years. Q:
If you could give any two pieces of advice to a young 20-something, what
would it be? Dr. Guiness: I would line up a number of very simple things in your life.
First, be sure you have a deep intimate knowledge of the Lord. Second,
develop a rich theology and know why you believe what you believe. Third,
think through a very deep Christian world view so you understand the whole
of life within the theological perspective. Fourth, think through and pray
over your own sense of gifts and calling (so you know what you want).
Fifth, cultivate a group of friends who will be a great encouragement and
accountability to keep you going for life.
And if you line up simple things like this, your life will start
surge forward in usefulness. I
have a new book coming out in September, Long Journey Home, on meaning --
identity, meaning and purpose. The one that answers the other two is
meaning. It is because of our faith that we know who we are in terms of
identity. It is because of faith that we know our purpose in terms of
calling. Calling and identity are very close. In rising to answer
the call, that call names us. In fact, George MacDonald argues that only
when we see the caller will we get our name.
Because we've become who God called us to be -- identity.
So obviously if we call to each other by name, the calling, naming,
and identity are very, very close. People can't wait around to discover
their identity. They will discover their identity in following their
calling. Q:
What do you mean by meanings? Dr.
Guiness: Human beings have a deep longing for meaning. Meaning and
belonging. The search for meaning is the search for making sense of the
world. The search for belonging is the search for security in the world.
Faith is the deepest answer to both them. So meaning is that hunt, how to
make sense of our world. What is humanist? What is right? What is wrong? The postmodern world is characterized by crisis of meaning.
It doesn't fit into a larger whole. And it is only that larger
whole that gives you that sense of meaning. Well, our modern world is very
technological. We think of things as mechanisms, a machine assembled by
its parts. What do you do with a car? You drive somewhere. The meaning is
always the highest framework that makes sense of the whole. You go from
the origin of the universe to the prospects of the human race after the
end of this earth... all of this throws light on it. It gives meaning too.
We are suddenly born into a world as human beings and the world doesn't
make sense of itself. So we have to make sense of the world... By asking
questions...We always want meaning. The most awful things for us is pain
and evil because apparently there is no meaning.
Beacher says that he who knows why only knows how. We can cope with
the worst things we face if they have sense and meaning. Of course the
gospel is not only the deepest meaning, it is true meaning. Everything
else is just fiction.
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