Don't let the unfamiliar stand in your way of your pupose

When I graduated from Ohio State many years ago, after a long and complicated college experience, I had in my hands a business degree. From that moment forward, that's what I was going to be - a businessman.

Shortly after, I saw an ad for a job in our local newspaper - obviously pre-linkedin days - looking for counselors to work with at-risks kids in a residential wilderness program. The job didn't require a social work degree - the organization simply wanted adult role models with ANY degree at all.

Long story short - a few months later I was no longer a businessman. I was an inexperienced counselor absorbing insults and threats from some of the state of North Carolina's most challenging young people. And in the midst of it all, I discovered I hadn't taken a job at all. I had responded to a calling.

I look back on that moment of staring at that ad in the newspaper. Everything in the world said that job wasn't for me. I hadn't been trained for it, had never worked with kids before, and outside of a couple of camping trips, I'd never spent much time living in the great outdoors. Yet something was drawing me to that job.

One of the things I'm most grateful for in my life is I didn't let being unfamiliar with that opportunity talk me out of pursuing it. Every meaningful next step in my life began in responding to that ad in spite of not feeling prepared to.

When I feel a call or a whisper these days, it's very rare that I ask myself "am I ready for this." Almost every meaningful pursuit I've taken on in the last 25 years I've been totally unprepared for in the grand scheme of things. Looking back, though, whether those pursuits worked out or not, they always had meaning.

Goff shared the following scripture this morning:

1 Peter 4:10

Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms.

Two pieces of that scripture jumped out at me this morning: "faithful stewards" and "various forms."

When it comes to being a faithful steward, I think we first have to accept that some of our gifts might live outside of our comfort zones. Part of being a faithful steward of our gifts, I believe, is being willing to search for them. To believe our gifts are only the things we feel confident with and competent at is to turn out backs on the possibility God has some hidden gems - some gifts He's been holding on to - curious if we'd be brave enough and bold enough to come looking for them.

And because God's grace comes through us to the people around us, and it comes in such various forms, when we AREN'T willing to search for those hidden gifts, it's not only us who suffers and misses out, people around us miss out as well.

I think back on that ad, and I think about all the young people and staff people I had the chance to lead and impact over 13 years, and I wonder what would have ultimately been missing in other people's lives if I'd turned toward the familiar instead of pursuing a gem. I wonder more what would have become of my life if I'd missed out on how those kids and those staff shaped my life going forward. What would have happened if I hadn't been there for them to point me in the direction of my next calling?

We spend so much time wondering, what am I here for? What am I called to do? Let me offer that it's quite possible the answer might not be found in what am I comfortable doing. The answer might not be found in what have I trained my whole life to do. It's possible God wants to use you to share his various grace in some way you're completely unfamiliar with - but in some way you are completely made for.

The answer might be found stepping out and searching instead of sitting back and wondering.