Buechner Week IV The Coincidences that Add Up to Vocation

Who knows where those life changing moments come from - the ones where we finally decide, 'This is what I want to do'. Not everyone sees a glowing bush over in a corner of the desert compelling us to turn off the beaten track of the routines and habits of our comfort zones. I doubt many hear that voice in the small hours insistently waking us up by saying our name, and even fewer think to say, Speak Lord, your servant is listening.

 

No. Usually the voice of God calling us, (which is what vocation is), sounds most clearly in that coincidence of opportunity and circumstance, our own heart's desires, and that decisive act that enables us to put our lives where our best desires are, and to affirm who we are by putting ourselves in the place of new possibility. 

 

I know of nobody who says that better than Buechner, in one of his finest pieces of applied theology and spiritual direction, reduced to essentials:

 

 

"The kind of work God usually calls you to

       is the kind of work that you need most to do

              and that the world most needs to have done…

The place God calls you to

       is the place where your deep gladness

              and the world’s deep hunger meet."

– Frederick Buechner, "Wishful Thinking" - his definition of 'vocation'.