Mister Preacher: In Which I Feel Called Not to Feel Called

Preston Sprinkle, whom I interviewed here, recently wrote a post (here) about whether “feeling called” is a biblical concept. You should go read it—after you finish reading this work of amazing insight and profundity, of course—so I won’t go into great detail here here. But, his conclusion is that it’s probably not so much a biblical concept (especially not in the way we think of it), and perhaps even a little dangerous (On which he promises to expand upon later).

I tend to agree with Dr. Sprinkle (whose name sounds like a My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic character when it's said like that. …Sorry, man). I think we over-spiritualize our faith to the point that it becomes about our personal feelings more than demonstrable, biblical truth. Due to a lot of wonky teaching, we tend to equate what we believe about God and God’s Word with God’s authoritative truth. In other words, we are afraid to question anything that we firmly believe because we feel like we’re questioning God. That creates this nebulous fear of God and an absolute acceptance of anything we view as coming from Him.

We also have this strange heritage that leads us to believe that everything we experience is a spiritual sign. (Every day your car won’t start is God saving you from a potential wreck—rather than poor maintenance on your part or a lemon battery. Every missed opportunity was God telling us we didn’t need that opportunity—rather than poor planning or readiness on our part. Worse, every crappy marriage is God telling us to move on—rather than seeking help in whatever capacity is needed.) We believe that every stray thought we have is God, or angels, demons or even dead relatives whispering in our ears.

With all that said, I am certainly not against the idea of the Spirit of God speaking to us, or God working in our lives. I recently had a life-altering experience that called on me to trust what God was doing in my life. I’m not saying God doesn’t speak. I’m saying that God lives in the practical decisions of everyday life as much—if not more—than the mystical ones we attribute to him directly. I’m saying, it’s too easy not to take responsibility for our actions when “God told us to it” is our excuse. Sometimes, perhaps often, our “feeling called” is just our preference rearing its head. As Preston pointed out by way of example, those who went into the ministry in the bible weren’t following some mystical call. The bible says they desired to be pastors, ...so they did it. (1 Timothy 3:1)

“Love God and do as you please” is not a bible verse either, but I think it comes closer to the truth than mere feelings. Doing what we love in the boundaries of knowing what pleases God is a much more valid system to live life by than ephemeral emotion. Because the problem with feelings is that they do change. And, as I mentioned, a lot of what we call feelings are just our preferences couched in spiritual language. We know we’re supposed to trust God with our life decisions, so we feel better confusing our desires (and, sometimes, our lack of desire—if we’re feeling “extra spiritual”) with God’s command.

By over-spiritualizing everything—equating feelings and coincidence with commands and providence—we are, I fear, often going places and believing things which are not ideal for us. We’re playing prophet and, often, being proved false.

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