Called to Preach

    When the Lord decided it was time to call me to preach the gospel, it was no less exciting than the day He called me to believe in His Son Jesus Christ as Lord.  Although the days that transpired between these two life changing events were a constant experience of His love and power, once I recognized, or I should say “once I accepted” His call to give my life to the preaching of His gospel, those experiences would take on an even deeper and more powerful reality.

         In my early years of marriage and faith, Betsy and I were living in the Matanuska Valley of Alaska. At that time, we had both recognized the need to dedicate our time and energies to serving Jesus Christ.  Nevertheless, we still filled out papers to apply for homestead property in the isolated areas of inland Alaska. We had drawn up plans for the cabin we intended to build, and were making plans to bring in livestock, seed and supplies necessary to live a subsistence lifestyle.   Making those plans consumed a large part of our activities and even more of our thought life. However, those plans took a drastic change of course one day as I was making the hour drive from my work in Anchorage to our home in the Matanuska Valley.

          While driving along the Parks Highway north of Anchorage, I came to the series of bridges that crossed the inlet known as the “Knick Arm”. My old Ford Pickup was faithfully chugging along as I played the local Christian music station on my radio.  That day a song came on the radio that would forever change our lives and plans, a song has continued to be the rallying call in our faith since that day over forty years ago. It was not the first time I had heard it on the radio, but the Lord made sure it was a time that I would never forget. I was hearing Amy Grant singing “I'd Love to live on a mountain top, Fellowshipping with the Lord. I'd love to stand on a mountain top, 'Cause I love to feel my spirit Soar... But I've got to come down from the mountain top to the people in the valley below; or they'll never know that they can go to the mountain of the Lord”.

          As I said, I had heard this song before, but that day it was as if I was hearing it for the first time. What made it so different that day as I drove across the Knick Arm was that I was also hearing the voice of the Lord telling me this is what He was calling me to do. I knew beyond any doubt that He was calling me to lay aside the homestead life that would have taken us into isolation, and live a life where I could make a difference in the lives of others. Only such a clear and concise word from the Lord could have caused Betsy and I to surrender our dreams and plans of homesteading.

          The years that followed allowed us to slowly learn to do what the Lord had called us to that day. We became more involved in our church, working with kids, teaching classes, serving as deacon. helping out in worship, and just generally sharing the love of Christ with more people. When we moved from Alaska back to the San Diego area, we continued this path of involvement. However, what we also continued was the pursuit of my career and the normal plans that come with having a family and establishing a lifestyle.  I did not at that time in any way see serving the Lord full time in ministry as anything I would ever be called to do.  In fact, I had actively rebelled against it.  One day a man in our church in Alaska said to me that he believed the Lord had called me to preach.  I almost punched him in the nose. I angrily told him, “If the Lord calls me to preach, He will tell me and not you”.  I later told another person that it would take the Lord hitting me over the head with a bat to get me to go into the ministry.

       It was while we were living in Ramona California that the Lord decided it was time to take out the bat.  Betsy and I, although we were working with the teenagers in the church, were still not in any was considering going into ministry. I could state many reasons for this, but the reason that most stood out in my mind was that I did not believe I possessed the skills to preach. I was not a good speaker, nor was I overly social. And although my knowledge of the Word of God was growing, I knew it was still very elementary. 

We were having meetings at our church one summer with an evangelist from Australia. She was an anointed messenger of the gospel that reached many souls there in Ramona. One Sunday evening, Betsy and I were sitting in the fourth row of our little church enjoying the time of worship before the evangelist would come forward and speak. As I became caught up in the worship, eyes closed and hands raised, I heard someone behind me speak to me. It was so clear, even above the ongoing worship, that I turned to see what the person behind me was saying. When I turned, I found only others consumed in the worship. I turned back to continue praising the Lord and soon heard that voice again. I turned quickly this time thinking I might catch a friend playing a trick on me, but again found only souls lost in sincere worship.  Returning to worship again, I heard for the third time an audible voice speaking clearly in my ear. It spoke the same words I had heard each of the previous two times saying “I have set you aside for my purpose”.    

            Probably because of my resistance to preaching, I was still slow to hear. However, with this third time the message was so consistent and the words were so clear that I could not deny the Lord was speaking to me. Yet, still I did not surrender. Instead, I chose to argue with the Lord. I responded “Lord if you are calling me into ministry, I can’t do it”.  I pleaded with him saying I had none of the skills or qualities that make up a good preacher.  The Lord cut short my argument saying “Not be might, nor by power, but by my Spirit”. I was familiar with these words out of Zechariah 4:6, but was still not convinced that even the Spirit of God could make a preacher out of me. So, I asked the Lord for another testimony. Do not the scriptures say that it is “by the mouth of two or more witnesses that everything is established” (Deut. 17:6).

            We had not yet finished the current worship song when the evangelist stepped up to the podium, gently pushing aside the worship leader. She took the microphone, and announced in a very forceful way ‘the Lord says right now, not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit says the Lord”.  I was so overcome with the Lord’s evident calling that I fell back in my pew, only able to mutter words of praise and wonder. The three declarations I had heard combined with the prophetic word of the evangelist were an unmistakable witness. The Lord was calling me to give my life to the preaching of the gospel

            The many years since that day have taken us to preaching the gospel in a variety of cultures and environments. It has taken us to the Kenai peninsula and the Islands of Southeast Alaska, to Apache reservations in New Mexico and churches in California, an LDS community in eastern Idaho, and now the northern Rocky Mountains of central Idaho. Two things have remained the same in all these years. The first is that I still recognize my own inabilities to be an effective minister of the gospel message. The second thing, and the most important thing, is that the Lord has been true to His promise, empowering whatever we do or say for Him with the presence and power of His Holy Spirit.

Paul wrote, “how can they preach unless they are sent” (Ro. 10:15). Without the assurance of the Lord’s calling and the promised empowering of His Spirit, there have been many times that I might have given up the call to preach. With the knowledge of His calling, and the reality of His empowering Spirit, these years of ministry have been fruitful and effective, regardless of my own limitations. Those who recognize the reality of their own limitations while standing upon the promise of His presence and power can know the abundance of the gospel message that comes “not only in word, but in power” (1 Co. 4:20).