Two Ways I Met My Calling this Month

I spent about six weeks with my family in Indiana. As I was coming back to Mississippi, I had a lot of thoughts about my work. What kind of missionary will I become? How will I do ministry in the next few months? I have to find something to do!

Something that I thought about a lot was just meeting with people and listening to them, having conversation, and praying for them. There are so many people right now who need someone with a ready ear and a smile. How will I find them, though? I thought. I'm not used to willy-nilly asking folks if they want to have coffee sometime. I can be pretty awkward.

Months ago, on a drizzly day, I recognized a woman in a coffee shop--I'll call her "May,"for the sake of this story--whom I had met once in high school, in another state. I never expected to see her, but there she was, having coffee in my own little city! (I even looked her up on the internet to be sure it was her.) I walked over and said hello, and we talked for a bit. May had a get-away house just outside of town, and was just visiting for a few days. Not many people in Starkville knew her; she was having some family troubles. I was very glad I didn't think up some reason she wouldn't want to talk to me when I saw her, and choose to walk away. What a coincidence that I would meet May again, I wondered.

Cut back to July, when I am wondering how I'm going to meet up with people. The third day that I was home, May contacted me to tell me that she was in town again after the family troubles came to a head, so to speak. She would enjoy getting out for coffee if I had free time in my schedule, she said, and so we did. Both of us were blessed by the conversation, I believe. She gave me a lot of good advice and wisdom. Had she texted me a day earlier or a day later, I would have had to decline.

While I was in Laurel the next week, there was a conversation about ways that the Holy Spirit works with and through people. At the end of the conversation, as the five of us talking were praying for each other, one prayed for me, that the Holy Spirit would move in me. I noticed momentarily that I wanted to go and pray over the two leaders in ministry who were with us, or hug them, or something.

The next day, my little outreach team had intercession prayer for that couple. Our plan was to write down verses or sentences or words we believed were from the Lord, and give our notes to the couple before we left town. I got a few different words of encouragement to pass along to them, but I knew that some were to write down, and some were to speak to the lady, face-to-face. So I did. I was scared to, but when I did, she starting crying, and told me just how accurate that simple sentence from God was. I had no idea. I was just being obedient.

In two weeks, God plainly answered the questions I had about my calling and work. I am called to exhort leaders in ministry, like May, and like this couple. If I hadn't seen May out my peripheral vision the day I happened to be in that coffee shop, if she hadn't texted me the very day that she did, if I hadn't met her once three years ago, I wouldn't be as sure as I am today of my calling, and she wouldn't know hardly anyone in Starkville. If the couple in Laurel hadn't prayed what they did, if I hadn't been obedient to God, I wouldn't be as sure as I am today of my calling, and they wouldn't be either.

I have always felt empathetic towards leaders, and leaders in ministry, even as a child with no reason or way to feel empathetic towards them.

Now I know why.

I am meant to exhort leaders in ministry.