The Calling

As much as people talk about the call of the Lord and weather the Lord has called me to go into Tribal Missions or called them to be here in the States or to do something else in particular, I have often wondered what that really means. What does the call of the Lord mean?
People will come up to me, give me a hand shake and say, “Lord bless you brother, so glad the Lord has called you to do this and that you are responding to His call!” And I’ve often wonder, “What is that call? And if He has called me to go then why has He called them to stay, or has He not called them? Perhaps He has only called a few?”
As I think about it I realize that the Lord is Holy but most of the time we live our lives consumed by the flesh, consumed by the mentality that governs this world. We live in a fleshly manner. We don’t live a holy life. And if you say you do then your are fooling yourself. If you walk with the Lord then the entirety of the the rest of your life will be spent with Him revealing how truly awful your flesh is, and how unholy, and undeserving you are of grace. (Of course He does this in a gentle merciful manner but He does it none the less, for He is conforming us into the image of His Son.)
Given these two circumstances: the Holiness of the Lord and our depravity as Human beings, I suspect that if the Lord is calling for us to do something, or calling for us to act in a certain way, or to think in a certain way then it is going to be a call in the opposite to who we normally are. His call is going to be calling us away from something we consider comfortable, away form our normal pattern, away from our stereotypical, earthly way of doing things.
In that case I believe that the Lords call in one’s life is usually going to be a call away from what they would like to do. (Although this is not always the case.) As humans we are normally going to revert to our depraved flesh. And if the Lord is Holy and He calls then I suspect that His call is often not a call we would often like to hear. And so to those people who say, “I am so glad you received the call, but I don’t think I have received the call to go,” I pose this question: “Have you ever felt like the Lord has called YOU to do something you didn’t want to do?” If not, perhaps it is time to rethink the nature of His calling.