But you also have something standing in your way. Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s worry. Maybe you don’t think you’re good enough.

Or maybe it’s your personality. Sometimes what you’re like makes it hard to be who God is calling you to be.

When this happens, you have to ask yourself 2 questions:

1. What is God calling me to do?
2. What is stopping me from doing it?

What is God calling me to do?

God gives each of us a unique calling, or summons, to join alongside Him in the mission to reach the world for Christ. But he does this in infinitely unique ways.

When you talk about calling, there are sometimes two things at work: what God is calling you to do right now, and what He’s calling you to do in the big picture. Here I’m talking about the first, what God wants you to do right now.

I don’t know what He’s asking you to do. But like I said, I bet you do.

Is it to start volunteering at church? To go back to church? To reach out to that neighbor?

Maybe you need to understand who you are and how you’re gifted first. Here are some resources that can help.

Once you know what God is calling you to do, it’s time to ask yourself the next question.

What is stopping me from doing it?

I know what He’s asking me to do. But man…I’m afraid to do it.

I have the spiritual gift of teaching, but I’ve never really engaged it. Never tried to develop it. Why?

I’m scared to speak in front of people. It’s hard to teach when you’re afraid to talk to people. It’s something I’ve known about for a while, but never really did anything about.

I’ve been letting fear stop me from doing what God’s calling me to do.

Ron Edmonson is a pastor and blogger, and he writes about introversion from time to time since he leans that way. A pastor once wrote to him asking if he should quit his job in ministry because he couldn’t seem to make it work with his personality.

In response, Edmonson said something I really needed to hear. He said,

“I wouldn’t negate your calling because of your wiring. God didn’t let Gideon or Moses have that excuse. That one would be too easy!”

I’ve been studying Moses and Gideon lately as I’ve been going through how to face this, and Edmonson hit the nail on the head. Moses’ and Gideon’s callings were both so much bigger than them. God knew they weren’t the prototypical leaders and speakers, but He chose them anyway.

And for some reason, He’s choosing to use me to do something too. He also chose you for something.

So what’s stopping you from doing it?

When you can answer that, it’s time to face your fear by meeting it head on.

Jumping head first into your calling

I recently stepped into a ministry role after leaving the marketplace. It’s been an incredible ride so far. But even before I accepted the job I knew it would cause this tension, this fear, to come to the forefront.

In many ways, taking the job was the first step to facing my fear and jumping head first into my calling. I’m the Director of Community, so to think I wouldn’t have to speak and teach would just be deceiving myself.

The way I’m beating this right now is to say yes to everything my fear tells me to say no to. Not in an irresponsible way, but in a way that steam rolls my fears.

I’m called by God. It’s time I start acting like it.

I don’t want to look back at the end of my life and feel a crushing sense of what could have been if I had only pushed past the fear. When you get to heaven and see the glory of God’s face, how small will that fear seem? How insignificant?

This is the perspective you must have to get past your personality when it stands in the way of your calling.

So what do you say? Are you ready to jump into your calling and stop letting your fears stand in the way? Leave a comment and let me know.

Photo courtesy: The California National Guard (Creative Commons)

The post Don’t Negate Your Calling Because of Your Wiring appeared first on A Parched Soul.

This is a guest post from Dave Arnold. Dave blogs at Reflections from the Alley. You can follow him on Facebook or Twitter and pick up a copy of his book, Pilgrims of the Alley: Living Out Faith in Displacement.

Years ago as new believer, when I was at a Christian school in the Midwest, I was surrounded by classmates who came from Christian backgrounds with both parents in the home.

My parents were divorced, and I didn’t grow up in a Christian family. This was tough for me, and I remember sitting in my dorm room praying, “God, why can’t I be normal? Why did I have to grow up the way I did? Why couldn’t I have a Christian family?”

Shortly after I graduated, I worked as a youth pastor in the Detroit-area. The youth group changed dramatically the first few months I was there, and we began to attract new kids who didn’t go to the church.

I remember sitting across from one kid at a restaurant, listening to him pour his heart out about how angry he was with his dad. I could relate. And it hit me:

Perhaps I had to go through what I went through growing up so I could be here at this moment, to understand Ryan.

The Bible says:

“He (God) comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us.” 2 Cor. 1:4, MSG

Oftentimes, our purpose is forged in challenging and unexpected places.

That said, here are two key truths about understanding our purpose:

1. God allows you go through challenges to add value to others

It was amazing how many people God brought into my life who went through similar things as I did. And because of that, I earned their trust.

One of the best ways to know you are fulfilling your purpose is if you are adding value to another person. There’s a lot of talk about self-help and having a good self-esteem.

But I think our purpose shines the brightest when we take our eyes off ourselves and place them on others.

Instead of self-help it should be other-help: that is, how can I bless and serve others?

This is the beauty (and mystery) of the gospel. Jesus says to gain we must loose; to live we must die. If God is all about giving value to people and loving them, so should we.

2. We always have a choice to learn and grow

I used to believe I was a victim. Because of how I grew up, because of the hardships I faced, I would lament, “Why did this have to happen, it’s not fair?

But I realized this is unhealthy thinking and doesn’t help me grow in my purpose. It does the opposite.

The truth is, we always have a choice: the choice to either respond or react to life. React-ers stay trapped, always blaming others for their woes. Conversely, responders face their pain, their past, and their disappointments through the lens of learning.

Responders chose to move forward because they’ve learned to take responsibility for their lives.

Questions: Can you relate to this? How have you discovered your purpose in struggle? Leave a comment and let’s talk.

Photo courtesy: jot.punkt (Creative Commons)

The post Discovering Your Purpose Through Struggle appeared first on A Parched Soul.

Your cubicle seems to get smaller and feel like it’s closing in on you. The drive to the office feels more dreadful at every stoplight. Nothing seems to go right. You spilt coffee on your pants as soon as you got to work. Throughout the day you just feel like curling up on the couch and nodding off.

Hey, it happens. We’ve all been there. But it doesn’t have to stick. Today’s bad day doesn’t have to continue tomorrow.

3 steps to a better tomorrow

I want to share with you 3 steps to make sure tomorrow is better than today.

Step 1: Be quiet

If you’re like me, when you’re having a bad day it seems like every sound and sight is multiplied a hundred times. Everything annoys you. That’s a cue to go off and be alone for a little bit. This world’s a busy place, and it’s more and more distracting by design. You may not be an introvert, but I bet you still need some peace and quiet nonetheless.

God tells us simply,

Be still, and know that I am God! (Psalm 46:10)

You might think this just means slow down, and it does to a degree. But the original meaning is much deeper. The term “be still” meant something more like “to be weak, let go, or to release.”

Wake up early, go on a walk at lunch, find a hiking trail, or turn off the TV. Just be quiet. Let go of whatever it is you’re holding onto. Release your worries.

God might be trying to tell you something through those feelings you’re having, but you’re not giving him a chance to be heard. You’ll find most of life’s answers when you’re quiet enough to hear them.

Step 2: Ask for help

After you’ve found some time to be quiet and you’ve given God a chance to say something, it’s time to ask him to help. Get on your knees and ask God to take those feelings of sorrow and numbness. Ask him to replace them with joy and peace.

If you’re in a rut, my guess is you haven’t been praying a whole lot. Corrie ten Boom said,

“It could be that Satan is pushing you into too much work so that you cannot take time to pray.”

Sound familiar? Take the time. Bow your head. Beg for help. When you come to God in your weakness you’ll find him in his strength.

Read a psalm out loud if you don’t know what to pray. David has plenty of razor sharp honesty for you to draw from. Like this:

O Lord, I have so many enemies…

But you, O Lord, are a shield around me;

you are my glory, the one who holds my head high.

I cried out to the Lord,

and he answered me from his holy mountain. (Psalm 3:1, 3-4)

Step 3: Make it about someone else

Anytime you’re feeling down, it’s always helpful to make it about someone else. I don’t mean project your feelings on someone else. I mean do something for someone else.

You were created to exist in community with other people, and you are intended to love them by doing things for them. Sorry if you don’t like that. You can run from it as long as you want, but you’ll never find a different key to happiness like this one.

If you’re feeling like a train just hit you, think of the people in your life who might be feeling the same. Order a cheap pizza and send it to their house to surprise them. Drop by and say hello. Pick up some flowers for your spouse.

Just do something for someone other than yourself. Selfishness will sap the life from you like nothing else can. Do something for someone and push back those feelings.

Here’s to a better tomorrow

You can shrug these things off if you want. Maybe tomorrow will even be a little better if you do. But I promise it won’t last long. A life can’t go on finding fulfillment without the 3 ingredients above. That’s just the way it is.

It’s not my design. I’m just telling you what I’ve found to be true. And I think if you’re honest, you know they hold the key to a better tomorrow too.

So here’s to quiet time. To giving up and reaching up. To serving someone else’s needs.

And to a better tomorrow.

Are you in a rough patch? How do these 3 things make you feel in your life when you practice them? Leave a comment and let’s talk.

Photo courtesy: Filippo C (Creative Commons)

The post 3 Steps to a Better Tomorrow appeared first on A Parched Soul.

We were still dating when Maggie, my then-to-be wife, said it. It’s always been one of the most endearing things she’s ever said to me.

It was simple, but held so much meaning.

She said,

“It’s always an adventure with us.”

And she was right.

Somehow, no matter what we’re doing, we’ve always found a way to make things fun and adventurous. Simple trips to the drive-thru turn into an stories we laugh about. Days at home morph into some of the most memorable we have.

All without leaving our zip code.

What is adventure?

Adventure has much more to do with how you do something than where you do something. {tweet that}

When my family has fun it’s not because we were thrust into an adventure, although sometimes that does happen. When we have fun it’s because we made the adventure.

This past fall, we started making fire pits on the back patio on Friday nights. It started out as me liking to burn stuff (…and my wife wanting a smore) and it morphed into our weekly adventure.

What started as a night where we “just stayed at home” turned into an adventure of finding firewood by the lake, juggling cooking dinner with feeding our son and starting the fire, and getting the neighbors outside to hang out for a while.

The secret to having adventures

And we did it by injecting energy into each one of those moments.

That’s the secret to having adventure without leaving your zip code: injecting energy into the moment.

It’s no different than playing with little kids. The more energy you inject into the moment, the more you’ll have their attention. Adults are no different.

You’re not running errands with the kids so you can get home — you’re on an adventure to the jungle (aka Target).

You’re not just on a road trip — you have the chance to sing along to epic songs and play punch bug.

It’s about living life with an attitude of intentionality versus passivity.

God has given you these moments. Make the most of them. Have fun.

Who knows? You might even have yourself an adventure.

Do you want more adventure in your life? How can you turn your ordinary moments into ones full of energy and excitement?

The post How to Have More Adventure Without Leaving Your Zip Code appeared first on A Parched Soul.

I had the pleasure of interviewing Keith Jennings recently. Keith is a writer that inspires many creatives through his weekly newsletter, Root Notes (sign up for it here), and he’s hinted at a soon-to-launch new project which I can’t wait to hear about. He serves creatives  causes, and companies that exist to serve others. You might also recognize his name from the wonderful but sorely missed blog Keitharsis. You can learn more about Keith here.

Without further adieu, here’s our conversation:

Grayson Pope: Who are you and what do you do?

Keith Jennings: I serve those who serve some higher purpose—creatives, change agents and champions of ideas and causes. I  primarily do this as a writer and marketer.

GP: Can you briefly explain how you ended up doing what you’re doing?

KJ: Ha! No I can’t.

I entered college to get a marketing degree, but felt like I was selling my soul to Satan. My interests were Literature, Psychology, Religion and Language. The weekend before I had to declare my major, a family friend (who was very successful in the healthcare industry and had an English degree) said, “Your major isn’t that important. You’ll learn what you’ll need to when you start working. Pick a degree that trains you how to articulate your thoughts in writing and verbally.” So I majored in English Literature, minored in Psychology and specialized in the German language.

As the son of a very successful hospital executive, I refused to work in the healthcare industry. But over time, I figured out that a) I had no interest in marketing products, b) I had no interest in working for profit-obsessed executives and c) I knew a lot about the healthcare industry. So I went to work as a scriptwriter and video producer for the guy that gave me that great advice in college. And I fell in love with the healthcare industry.

My strength as a writer, speaker and thinker has been what’s catapulted my career. Today I head corporate communications for a national healthcare organization. I’m essentially a storyteller and therapist for organizations having an identity crisis. (See how I’m still connected with my original interests?)

GP: What does the word “calling” mean to you?

KJ: For years—too many years—I searched far and wide for my “calling”. Was I a poet? An essayist? A preacher? A marketing executive? Or was I called to be a husband and dad, and everything else was periphery?

The more I prayed, the more I read and reflected and the more I waited, the more disturbing the silence became. Until it dawned on me: God steers more often than He points. The burning bush wasn’t God pointing. It was God steering. Same with Saul on the road to Damascus.

I thought one’s calling came first, then faithful action followed. But I’ve found faithful action must lead, then God does His thing. Our faith (through our actions) precedes God’s call.

That said, I don’t believe in a single “calling” these days. We’re eternal beings. There will be many callings.

GP: What one piece of advice would you give to someone trying to find their calling?

KJ: Don’t try to find it. Instead work hard to serve others in some way today. And be open to God’s prompts. He seems to like showing up through inconveniences or disappointments.

GP: Do you feel like you’re living God’s calling for your life? Why or why not?

KJ: As you might guess by now, I no longer think like this. My wife doesn’t have a call for our marriage. My kids don’t have a call for fatherhood. My friends don’t have a call for my friendship with them. We all just want to spend as much time together as we can and go as deep as possible in our relationships. I think God seeks the same. Spiritual, intellectual and emotional fruits spring from our relationships, not our work/calling.

Relationships thrive in communion and community. By communion, I mean intimate one-to-one sharing. And, by community, I mean group sharing.

Hmm, maybe God’s calling is for us to cultivate relationships with Him and each other!

GP: What was the single most influential piece of advice you ever got about finding your life’s purpose?

KJ: Nearly all the life advice I’ve been given has proven to be myths. If faith is about going wherever God prompts and doing whatever God asks, whenever God asks, no matter the costs, then our sole purpose in life is to cultivate a relationship with God and stay open to whatever He steers us through. I often wonder if those with “life plans” are available to receive and respond to God’s divine interruptions in real-time?

GP: What do you wish you knew when you were 21 years old that you know now about your life’s calling?

KJ: I wish someone had told me to ignore all the life-plan noise and focus solely on my relationship with Christ.

Let’s have a conversation in the near future about causal vs. effectual leaders. The causal crowd are the life planners. They tend to be executives. But the effectual crowd claims the entrepreneurs and creatives.

GP: Are you content with your life’s direction? Why is that?

KJ: I’m content with my life’s orientation. Because letting God be God injects serendipity into each day.

GP: What do you hope to do more of in the coming year?

KJ: A year ago, I stopped blogging and writing regularly to focus on the adoption and attachment of my fourth child. I’m now preparing to launch a project I hope will blow minds and open hearts! My goal is to enable, enlighten and inspire creatives to adapt to life in a nonlinear world.

GP: Who is your biggest source of inspiration when it comes to living a purposeful life and why?

KJ: Overall, my dad is my role model. From a faith perspective, Brother Lawrence is a go-to. And from an artistic perspective, there are too many to name!

GP: In one sentence, what is your life’s calling?

KJ: To convince others not to have a life calling.

The post God Steers More than He Points: Q&A with Keith Jennings appeared first on A Parched Soul.

Some crisis at work distracts you from what you were doing, so you end up working at home. Or you end up getting dragged somewhere by your friend when you so badly wanted to spend time alone, perhaps reading.

Face it, much of the time you’re simply a victim of your schedule, not the manager of it.

I sometimes wonder if I tell my phone what to do or if it’s the other way around. Many times I suspect it’s the latter.

The tyranny of the urgent

Charles Hummel wrote about this in an essay called “Tyranny of the Urgent,” saying,

“Your greatest danger is letting the urgent things crowd out the important.^“

There’s something awry when you never get to things you consider to be important while you carve out plenty of time to fight smaller, less impactful fires.

So why then, do you do this? Why do you continue to pursue the urgent rather than the important?

A problem of priorities

Most of the time, you make poor decisions about what to do with your time because you didn’t choose to spend your time according to your priorities. Or as one journalist wrote,

“The issue, Hummel said, is not so much a shortage of time as a problem of priorities.”

And isn’t that true? Everyone wishes there were more hours in the day. But isn’t the real problem that we don’t spend the hours we have doing the things we should?

You have to establish and abide by your priorities if you want to have an eternal focus. When it comes to your schedule, if you don’t set it, someone else will. And trust me, they won’t have your same priorities in mind.

Ready to make your own priorities and take back control of your schedule?

Good, let’s keep going.

Write down your real priorities

For starters, if you want to schedule your time according to your priorities, you have to know what they are. The best way to do that is to sit down and write them out.

Sometime today, when you get home or when you have a few minutes (or when you make it a priority…see what I did there?), sit down and ask yourself these 3 questions:

1. Who is most important in my life? God, your spouse, kids, friends?
2. What are my goals and plans for the next week, year and 5 years? This is important in making strategic decisions to ensure success with those goals.
3. What are my strengths, gifts and abilities? These are the areas you’ll want to focus they’re where you have the greatest chance to succeed. (Links to personality and spiritual gifts assessments here.)

List out no more than 10 bullet points answering these questions. Save it in a file or keep it in your wallet. You’ll need to refer to these day in and day out to make sure you stick to what really matters.

These things are now your musts of the day. The other stuff is just noise.

Now that you know your priorities, it’s time to actually schedule accordingly.

Schedule your priorities

There are many ways to schedule your time. Some people do it every Sunday before the week starts or every Friday before leaving work. However you do it, this is where you put in the work to make sure you stay focused on what matters.

To really schedule your time according to your priorities and escape the tyranny of the urgent, ask yourself these 2 questions before scheduling anything:

1. Does it align with my priorities?
2. Can it wait?

It if doesn’t align with your priorities, it’s either something not worth doing, or at the very least it shouldn’t get your premium time. And if it can wait, then it should.

This is how you do the actual urgent tasks in your life instead of the seemingly urgent ones.

There are only 24 hours in the day, and to make the most of them you’re going to have to say no to some things in order to say yes to others.

Make sure you say yes to what really matters.

How do you avoid the tyranny of the urgent? Do you find yourself getting sidetracked by things that don’t really matter? Leave a comment and let’s talk.

The post The Tyranny of the Urgent appeared first on A Parched Soul.

It’s not a bad job, it’s just not something that fulfills my calling. The people are great, and the company has been incredibly gracious to me, promoting me several times over the last few years.

But no matter what I did, I couldn’t help but feel it’s not what I was meant to do. Maybe for a season, but not for a lifetime.

And that’s draining.

So why am I telling you all this now?

Because I’m leaving my job.

What’s next

At the end of this month (March 2013) I will be leaving my job as a quality assurance manager and entering into full-time ministry at my (awesome) church.

This is something I’ve been dreaming of doing for about 2 years now, and it’s finally time to start. I’ll be working with small groups, assimilation and more.

It utilizes my gifts of strategic thinking, connection, discernment, and knowledge in incredibly cool ways. Certainly ways I never saw coming.

Why am I just now telling you?

Like I said, my discontent with my job is nothing new. (For the record, I want to say my discontent had everything to do with me and nothing to do with the job itself.) So why, after all the posts on calling and finding your purpose am I just now talking about this?

Two reasons:

1. It would be unfair to my employer to openly discuss discontent with a position in a public space. It’s not fair to risk putting them in an awkward position.
2. It’s hard to speak to something as you’re going through it. Looking back allows you to discern what was really going on under the surface. I haven’t talked much about it because frankly, I didn’t know what to say.

Why are you going to work at a church?

As I’ve told people at work that I’m leaving and I’m going to work at my church, I’ve gotten a range of reactions. But the words aren’t what I look for. It’s their body language and their eyes.

I can see the genuine shock in most of their eyes every time I say, “Oh, I’m going to work for my church.” For some, it’s almost a look of despair. Why would you want to go and do that? You have a fruitful career ahead of you and you’re going to go work at a church?

To understand that, you may need some background. As I go through this, please don’t mistake this for boasting. I simply want to frame the reality of what I’m doing so you understand.

For the past 12 months, I’ve been leading a quality department of 25 people for a growing beverage manufacturing company. I am one spot removed from the Director of Manufacturing, and two removed from the CEO of the company. My company manufactures for the two largest energy drink companies in the world, among many other brands. And soon the company will be opening its second manufacturing location halfway across the country.

Long story short, I would have been the quality assurance manager for a multi-location, internationally shipping beverage manufacturing company.

There’s one thing I didn’t mention in all of that. Something very important. Mission.

My company has a mission, obviously. But here’s the thing – it’s not something I want to give my life to. Many people are very tuned in to their market place missions, and there’s nothing wrong with that. The problem is that I’ve known about a mission that perked my ears, tingled the hairs on my neck, and gave me flashes of inspiration.

The mission of the church.

You know what that is right? To be the light shining in the darkness, a force so expansive and powerful that not even the gates of hell could withstand it. To be on the frontlines of the spiritual warfare that plays out every day in this sin-stained world. And to be a place that gathers the lost sheep of the world and tells them about the One Story that could save their eternity, not just their lives.

Is your spine tingling now?

Yes, that’s the mission I want to be a part of. Ever since I learned the real mission of the church, I wanted to get it on the action.

So why ministry? Maybe a better question would be why anything else?

The journey ahead

I’m obviously very excited about starting this new journey. But I’m also excited about opening the dialogue with you about everything I’ve gone through in the last season of my life as I worked towards this next step.

If there’s anything you’re interested in reading about or emailing about, then let’s talk. I would love to hear from you.

Do you feel like you’re fulfilling God’s calling on your life, either in the workplace or in your free time? Leave a comment and let’s talk.

Photo courtesy: http://www.martinprint.com.au/

The post What I’ve Been Wanting to Tell You appeared first on A Parched Soul.

So today I want to say to you the 2 words I always want other people to say to me when I’m struggling:

It’s OK

It’s OK not to know what you’re purpose is. It’s OK not to understand your gifts. Forget about “you should know by now.”

It’s easy to feel like you’re spinning your wheels.

But I want you to know that you’re not.

Our God is shrouded in mystery. If our real calling is to be in companionship with Him, we are bound to experience mystery throughout our lives.

Don’t confuse that mystery with a lack of prayer or trying. You’re giving it your best. It just hasn’t been revealed yet.

Don’t listen to others who think you’re wasting your time. And most importantly, don’t listen to yourself when you start to think it’s all meaningless.

It’s not.

You’re on a journey and you just haven’t gotten where you’re going. But you will.

It’s OK.

Click here and tell someone else it’s OK.

Photo courtesy:  PhotKing ♛ (Creative Commons)

The post It’s OK appeared first on A Parched Soul.

But does it apply to prayer?

I pray for many things, like wisdom and God’s will for my life to be revealed. But do I really know what I’m asking for?

At times, I can be cavalier in my approach to prayer. I want X, so I pray for Y to take place that it might happen. That seems logical.

What I so often forget is that Y is not going to happen in most cases, and X is the wrong thing to pray for entirely.

But God listens and works anyway. And it’s what He will make happen that I ought to be careful of.

If I pray sincerely for God to send me wherever He needs me the most, I had better understand that John the Baptist was called into the desert and Paul was called into chains on more than one occasion.

Praying for happiness at work might mean losing your current job and being led to another career.

Eugene Peterson urges caution this way:

“Be slow to pray. Praying puts us at risk of getting involved with God’s conditions…Praying most often doesn’t get us to what we want but what God wants, something quite at variance with what we conceive to be in out best interests. And when we realize what is going on, it is often too late to go back.”

Be careful what you pray for.

Have you experienced a different result than you expected from a prayer? Leave a comment and let’s talk.

Photo courtesy: futureshape (Creative Commons)

The post Be Careful What You Pray For appeared first on A Parched Soul.

The interview was with a guy in the surveillance sales business. The reason for his success of late?

“Distrust is a growth market.”

Hearing that made me feel sad. It also made me think about my own life and search for my purpose.

Am I trusting God, watching Him work, and then growing that trust even more? Or is distrust a growth market in my own life?

Am I trusting that God knows my purpose and is revealing it to me over time, or is distrust growing for the very same reasons?

What about you? Is distrust a growth market in your life?

Leave a comment and let’s talk.

The post Growing Trust appeared first on A Parched Soul.