Recall, Relearn

Returning to moments in my life is generally very unpleasant. I have committed enough errors, sins, and mistakes to accumulate the necessary amount of guilt to want to forget my past entirely. Sometimes it's a blessing. Because I'm so averse to remembering my life, I can listen more intently to others when they tell me a story from their lives without interrupting and distracting with that far too common blurt out, "Oh, yeah, me too!" or something horribly similar. Mostly, though, it's not a blessing at all, because I don't even want to recall the happy moments in my life. Too often I find that even those happy moments can have guilt inserted in somehow. Maybe I recall a particularly good family vacation, but then I remember I never told anyone in my family I loved them on the trip and lost a perfectly good opportunity to bring our family closer together. Also, I might have the rare ability to love better in the present because I'm not hampered by the past, but then again, I am too weighed down by the future because I don't look to the past in my life often enough to find inspiration for the things to come.

My bad habit of never looking back creates spiritual problems, too. When I start doubting God's existence or God's love, I doubt with some serious intensity but never look back. I don't look back to my confirmation, when my pastor asked us confirmands (I swear that's a word) to stand in front of the congregation and close our eyes, putting our hands out to feel the wind of the Holy Spirit. I did it just because I was young enough that I did everything I was told. I was completely taken by surprise when I actually did feel a wind on my hands. Suspecting foul play, I looked around for a fan--nothing, no fans anywhere. Then I thought, "Well, the doors of the church are open because it's so hot and humid out, the air is probably moving around some." That settled me a down a bit... until I realized that it was, indeed, very humid out in the middle of June, and the air wasn't moving one bit. I swore then to God that I would never forget that moment because I felt that He was calling me to witness to His presence in our lives.

Unfortunately, I feel as if every action I've performed in life has been evidence of my forgetting that moment. I never look back and say to God, "You know, God, I may be struggling right now but I know I've felt your presence before, so give me the strength to get through this because I know you can." Instead, I always say, to myself, "What the frick, man... I feel so terrible I just want to get out of this."

Similarly, I never think about my "call" moment. The moment when I sat in a church one day, very frustrated with the lack of passion in the pastor and the congregation, and heard a voice tell me "I called you here for a reason, to know that you could do better and stand up there." Once I was called, I was called. I listened to the voice that I believed to be God's and never looked back. Some might say that's a good thing. I heard the call and never questioned God's judgment, I just listened, got on the path and went on my way--God's way.

But what the frick is God's way? I have no idea, because I never once looked back in reflection upon that moment, that day. Until one day, when my candidacy mentor started asking me questions about my call moment. At first, all I could say was, "Well, I just know that I'm called to be a pastor because I heard this voice." But then, with more and more questioning and with good pastoral care on the part of my mentor, saying things like, "Well, what I'm getting from your experience is this..." I learned a great deal about my call story that I had previously not known. I had previously not known because I never took the time to know. Upon recalling my memory of my call and, simultaneously, God's presence, I learned more about where my life is supposed to go and relearned what it means to be called by God to a life of ministry.

I won't go into the details, mostly because it's a long story and my fingers would grow tired, but what I want to get out of this post is this: continually recalling your call moment or moments, or maybe recalling those moments that you think God was directly present in your life or you think God was calling you, and discussing those moments with other caring individuals can help you learn a whole lot about the nature of God and the nature of God in your life. Hearing the call is always a continual learning experience. We must always keep an eye open for God's voice, by reflecting on our lives with God Himself and with those loving individuals we come across.