Ephesians 4:1 I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,
Do you remember lying around on a Saturday or a Sunday afternoon with nothing to do when you were a kid? You might know from your own experience that without a purpose, we are often frustrated and unfulfilled – and sometimes we get into trouble.
During the Covid shutdown, kids weren’t allowed to go to school, the store, or the gym. They couldn’t go anywhere. A group of more than fifty kids started wandering around the neighborhoods around the church at night. A group of them came to the church several different nights over a couple of weeks and broke out most of our bus windows, our kitchen windows, and our office windows. They hotwired one of our vans and did donuts in the back lot until they crashed it. They didn’t have anything to do, so they got into trouble.
When God created Adam, He gave him a job to do. Genesis 2:15 tells us, “And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it.” Adam’s job had two parts: nurture everything that belonged in the garden, and keep everything out of the garden that didn’t belong there.
Just like every person ought to have a physical career (something we do with our life), every Christian has a spiritual career (something we do for God with our life).
God has a spiritual career for you that you can do to make a difference for eternity. It’s a custom-designed spiritual career that only you can do.
God calls every Christian into the spiritual career for which He made them.
God calls us all in different ways, using different circumstances, but you can be assured that He calls every one of us. That’s what He said, and you can take Him at His word.
God empowers every Christian to be able to accomplish the spiritual career into which He called them.
But unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ. Ephesians 4:7
Grace is divine enablement. Grace is supernatural ability. Grace is the Holy Spirit of God working in you and through you…leading and empowering you to do what God made you to do. Jesus has given you a supernatural ability to do what He made you for and called you to do.
You would be shocked if you knew how many preachers stuttered and were terrified of speaking in public before God called them to preach. I’m one of them. I don’t like to talk in public, and I don’t like conflict. That’s a bad combination for someone who is supposed to preach the Bible. When God called me to preach, there were plenty of people who wondered if God called the right person! Outside of God’s enabling, empowering grace, it would have been impossible. But with God, all things are possible!
God has called you to a spiritual career. Not only has He called you, but He has given you grace – His power – to do what He called you to do.
God has given you some people to help you.
Not only did Jesus call you into a spiritual career…and not only did Jesus give you His supernatural power to do what He made you to do…But he also gave you some people to help you along the way!
And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: Ephesians 4:11-12
Before the scriptures were completed, God gave the people of the early church the gifts of apostles and prophets to help them accomplish what God called them to do. Now that the scriptures are completed, God has given us evangelists, pastors, and teachers to help us accomplish our spiritual career. Evangelists spread the good news of salvation. Pastors feed, guide, and shepherd a church. Teachers help people learn God’s truths.
The perfecting of the saints
If you are saved, you are a saint. You’re not perfect, but you are a saint. Perfect means complete or finished. We all have a long way to go before we can say we’re finished, but if we will allow God to use His Word, and His preachers and teachers to lead us, along with His Spirit to enable us, we will achieve God’s purpose in the spiritual career that He called us to.
The work of the ministry
This is your vocation…your spiritual career. God has a plan to help you do what He made you to do.
The edifying of the body of Christ
When you do what God made you to do, you not only accomplish your purpose, but you also help the church in which God placed you. As a member of a local church, you are an important part of the body of Christ.
God works in every Christian to grow them and to make them effective in the spiritual career that He has called them to do.
From whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love. Ephesians 4:16
As the head of the body, Jesus Christ is the Master and Lord of His church. He does three things to help His body.
Christ joins the parts of the body together.
Jesus physically brings people together to form His body.
Christ compacts the parts of the body that are joined together.
Compact means unite, or knit together. This is not a physical joining, but something deeper. In a miraculous way, that is only by His grace, Jesus unites the minds of people who have been brought together. He doesn’t make us all exact copies of each other, thinking all the same thoughts. He unites our affections. Christ brings the minds of the people together in direction and desire, whom He has brought physically together in membership.
This is why it is so important to allow Christ to transform our minds to align with His mind.
That ye put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Ephesians 4:22-24
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. Romans 12:1-2
Christ individually and effectively works in each part of the body to grow each part to be what the body needs.
Jesus Christ is working in you to grow you and to make you effective in the spiritual career that He has called you to do.
Are you walking worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called? Are you serving God in the spiritual career that He called you to do?
Maybe you haven’t heard God calling you. He might be waiting for you to surrender yourself to Him before He calls you. God’s calling isn’t an option to be considered; it is a command to be obeyed. Don’t ask God to show you His calling so you can decide whether or not you are going to do it. Decide you’re going to do whatever God calls you to do – then ask Him what it is.
Don’t be afraid of God’s calling. He will only call you to do what He made you to do.
For Christmas a couple of years ago, I surprised our four kids with Gel Blasters. I soaked the little green beads overnight, and they grew into soft, squishy balls of ammunition. As soon as the kids stepped out the front door, the battle began – with the guns in the automatic setting. In the middle of loud shrieks and lots of laughing, Julia looked my way with an enormous smile and shouted, “This is the gift that I didn’t know I needed!”
That’s how God’s call to your spiritual career works. He’s calling you to do something that you might not have known you wanted to do.