Anna Anderson
CBF Field Personnel, North Carolina
A significant spiritual marker in my life occurred when I was a student beginning to learn more about vocational ministry. The spiritual guides were mentors from different walks of life, but all were people who had given their own lives to mentoring students and young adults just starting out in ministry. I got to know many of these folks in a weeklong orientation. We had communicated by written mail (before the days of email, texting or any other kind of instant communication), but spent time getting to know each other better in the weeklong orientation process for summer student ministry.
At the end of my orientation week, I was in a commissioning service for summer missions. It had been a very good week, exploring more and more about the call of God on my life. I was anxious to get to my place of summer service, but very unsure of all the particulars that I would face relating to the job I had said a resounding yes to. Uncertain of the ways everything would unfold, I was nervous. I was a little afraid of failing or not doing a good job. I wanted desperately to succeed at this kind of “trial run” for ministry. After all, summer service was only 10 weeks.
Was I ready for a lifetime of vocational ministry? I had no idea if I was. During that service, we prayed, we sang, we listened, we waited. And while we waited on God to speak, I distinctly and clearly in a way unlike anything I had ever experienced before, heard God say to me, “I choose you.” I was so caught in that moment, I wasn’t really sure someone else had not spoken aloud. But it was the voice of God clearly calling me into that space of uncertainty, fear and anxiety reassuring me that I had indeed been chosen by the Creator for something I didn’t even begin to understand.
Those who walked alongside, most of whose names I do not even remember, nurtured and encouraged and guided me to a place where I was able to hear and believe that I was going in the right direction for ministry. I am so thankful for that opportunity. It still encourages and reminds me how significant a thing it is to listen. God still speaks in ways that are clear. God still calls. God still chooses. And thankfully, God uses others in our lives to remind us of and to call out what we cannot even articulate ourselves. I remember the mentors today and I give profound thanks for their leadership and love for me.
Pray. . .Give. . .Go.