Sharing A Call Story Deanna Scheffel (Senior at the College of William and Mary) January 20, 2008

When I was looking at colleges, I didn’t know what I wanted to major in, what I wanted to be when I finished school. I chose William and Mary because of the beautiful area, the great reputation, and the amazing sense of community I felt when I stepped on campus. I had to pick an area of study right away to be placed with a freshman advisor. This is when a new pattern emerged in my life: taking the path of least resistance. I knew that I didn’t like memorizing dates, so history was out, and it was torture to write papers in high school, so English was out. I was pretty good at math and enjoyed science, so I told William and Mary that I wanted to be a biologist. After my first semester of classes, I found that I was really not cut out for biology, but I excelled at chemistry. So I followed the path of least resistance, and switched to chemistry. My roommate worked in a pharmacy, and she helped put ideas in my head about chemistry and pharmaceutical companies and research labs. I was easily convinced that this sounded like a great life plan for me. I was making life decisions based on what was easy and what was familiar. My whole family is science and math oriented, so it was a comfortable path to follow. They could walk me through each step: how to write a resume, how to get a summer job, what grad schools to look at.

I grew up in a house where there was always a plan. Schedules were written down way in advance, tardiness was not acceptable, and every step you made must lead to a goal. This has made me a very organized and dedicated person, but it has also made me feel I have to force myself into some kind of path. Once I decided on chemistry my sophomore year, I had to hurry up and get the plan into action. I had to score the perfect summer internships, start lining up recommendations, and make contacts that would help me land a spot in grad school and eventually a job. There was no time to waste, and certainly no time to second guess my decisions.
But academics is only half of the story. While I was playing around with majors and getting a career plan together, I also got involved with various ministries. My faith has always played an important role in my life. I have been blessed with wonderful parents who not only raised me in the church, but also provided great examples of faith filled living. Growing up, church was a big part of my life, as was serving the community. In college God has blessed me with opportunities to serve Him through the Lutheran Student Association, and through Young Life in local middle schools. I know that God is present in every aspect of my life, but in my obsessive organization, I scheduled certain hours for ministry, and certain hours for school work. My job track and my life track were two separate paths that I jumped back and forth between.

It was at this point that Pastor Ballentine, with some encouragement from my hometown pastors, said something that initially made me very angry. He caught me looking at a course catalogue for Gettysburg Seminary while eating dinner in the college room, and told me that he had just visited with my hometown pastors at a synod youth event. They had told him I should consider going into ministry. I responded that the classes looked really interesting, and I’d love to go to seminary just to get the knowledge, but that wasn’t what I wanted to do with my life. As he walked out of the room, Pastor Ballentine said, “Well you know, if it’s what God wants you to do with your life, you don’t really have a choice.”

I was so upset by this statement because the idea that I might not be able to control my future was a radical idea to me. I was in the process of controlling my future. I had chosen to become a chemist, and did not take well to somebody telling me that this may not be the right path for me. I was knee deep in physical chemistry classes. The demands were increasing: grad school, lab research, internships. This class was a test of endurance as the professors seemed to find joy in breaking your confidence. But I was determined to show that I could do it, I wanted to be a scientist, I wanted to show that this was what I was supposed to do. But the hours of study were creeping into the hours set aside for ministry, and I wasn’t happy about that. I began to realize that as stubborn as I was, my heart was not with chemistry; my passion really was for working with kids and helping them grow in Christ. I realized that no matter what I did, I would never be happy with the amount of time I could give to the church.

I knew I needed to take a step back and look at what I was doing. I decided to go on a discernment retreat put on by Project Connect, an organization in the ELCA designed to help young adults understand God’s call in their lives. Here, I first learned the word vocation.

In What Shall I Say, a book given to those in the discernment process for rostered leadership in the church, vocation is defined as God’s call at baptism to belong to God’s family and to be a worker in the kingdom of God. In baptism we are called to follow Jesus, to live in community with fellow believers, and to serve the world God created. We are marked with the cross of Christ, transformed by the water and the word. In baptism we are called to a journey, to follow in the footsteps of Christ and find who God made us to be. In the first reading today, the prophet Isaiah says “the Lord called me before I was born, while I was in my mother’s womb he named me.” God knows who we are, He knows what He wants us to do in this world.

We are sent out from baptism with this purpose, but we are not alone. In the Gospel today, John references Jesus’ baptism, saying “I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him.” In baptism, God sends the Holy Spirit to be with us, to help us listen, and to help us act. By opening ourselves to receive the Holy Spirit, we see how God uses situations and people around us to help us discover our vocation. It is both an internal and an external call. Frederick Beuchner says, “The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.”

Vocation is more than a job. It is more than a way to pay the bills. Vocation is stepping into God’s plan, finding your passion, and serving the world in your own unique way. When I finally realized this, and listened to God speaking through the people around me, I felt great peace. I am no longer struggling and fighting to succeed, trying to be someone I am not, but am at rest knowing that God will lead me. As Henri Nouwen says, “We are good enough to do what we are called to do. Be yourself!”

I am now on a journey to seminary and ordained ministry in the Lutheran church. It is a path my family and I know very little about. But I trust that God has given me the gifts necessary to carry out His will, and I trust that He will be with me every step of the way. Vocation is one step in the never-ending baptismal journey. In the words of Martin Luther:

“This life, therefore,
is not godliness, but the process of becoming godly,
not health, but getting well,
not being, but becoming,
not rest, but exercise.
We are not now what we shall be, but we are on the way.
The process is not yet finished, but it is actively going on.
This is not the goal, but it is the right road.”