Callings in the Church


I think we need to think of two aspects of callings. One is that people are offered them for two main purposes. One is to serve the Church - it cannot run except through us. For this a person called needs to have the capacity to perform whatever duties are required, if not immediately, then to learn them within a fairly short time.

The other purpose is that they should learn, through exercising the calling, to develop qualities of heart, mind and spirit that they did not have before. That is absolutely as important, and in the eternal perspective even more so.

Therefore the person who can fill the calling most effectively may not be the best person for it at all.

Possibly they have little more to learn from being in that position, and would benefit far more from another! Maybe they need to learn humility, how to stay silent and let someone else learn, to watch mistakes or inadequacies and then help - not correct critically and make the other person feel foolish or publicly humiliated.

Second fiddle is not always easy to play, especially when you have been a soloist! But helping others to play solo is a big part of who we need to be, whether we like it or not. It is not "always about us!" Everybody else matters just as much.

- by Anne Perry
[source unknown]
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