Two weeks into the new job I knew I had made a mistake.  Sitting at my desk, trying to make it through the afternoon, trying to figure out how I would come up with a new plan, and the phone rang.  It was Alex Joyner, the campus minister for the Wesley Foundation at UVA.  I was an alumna and a Board member there and it was the middle of the afternoon.  This is all he said:  “I know you just started a new job, but – ”    I interrupted and said to him, “Whatever you are about to ask me, the answer is ‘yes.’”  It was the craziest and wisest thing I’d ever done. 

I had finished seminary 5 years before this and, like Jonah, I had gone traveling in the other direction for a while, hoping what I heard wasn’t God calling my name.  I ended up back in my college town, volunteering at the Wesley Foundation, wondering around the edges how I could finally figure out this vocation thing, but still not certain ordained ministry was my calling.

And then that phone call.  Alex had money for a part-time associate and he wanted me to do it.  I didn’t know that when he called or when I interrupted him.  My response was completely unexpected and made no sense, except that my whole being was finally ready to say “yes” and something in his voice sounded like God saying my name again.

But I could start this story with Cindy Maupin (now McCalmont).  She was the youth director at my church the summer between high school and college.  She had just graduated from the school I was about to attend.  After the summer she was headed off to serve as a US-2 missionary across the country and then on to seminary.  I don’t know if she specifically encouraged me to consider seminary but her example was enough to open that door in my imagination.   I had never had a female pastor but watching her I could envision what one might be like.  I could envision how I might be one.

When I got to college, campus ministers Brooke Willson and Barry Penn Hollar made it explicit:  “Why don’t you go to seminary?”  They asked me this more than once.  I wasn’t entirely sure what they saw in me that made them say this, but I was intrigued.  When I started testing out the idea with friends at the campus ministry, no one laughed.  Our United Methodist understanding of ordination is that both the individual and the faith community need to recognize a person’s call to ministry.  Sometimes, with us stubborn Jonah-like folks, the community hears God more clearly than the individual.

That’s how it was for me for a long, long time.  Even when I rashly answered “yes” to Alex on the phone and worked with him for an academic year, part of me held back, still questioning if this was it.  Then, at the end of that year during our baccalaureate worship, Jessie Smith, a graduating student, got up to speak.  Before her remarks she thanked Alex and me for our ministry and our roles in her journey.  When she mentioned me she called me her “spiritual guide.”  Simultaneously, I had two reactions:  1) I am not her spiritual guide! and 2) Oh crap, she’s right.  Jessie was the straw that broke this strong Jonah-camel’s back.  She was the last in a long line of people who could hear God calling my name long before I was willing to hear it and respond in full.

Thank God for each of them.  The ones I’ve named here and the many others who encouraged or challenged me.  As surely as God has spoken directly to me, God has also given them words I needed to hear.  Maybe they were words I could only hear coming from those people at those times.  One by one, they chiseled away at my resistance and helped me to claim what I was reluctant to claim on my own.

God doesn’t just call once and then give up on us and move on.  Not every call sounds exactly the same.   But I can tell you this for sure:  God’s call is more persistent than we are stubborn.

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Today’s post is part of a group blogging day for ordained clergy, devoted to answering the question “Who called you on your journey of ministry?”

The United Methodist Church is hosting an event designed especially for those considering or wondering about a call to ordained ministry:   Exploration 2013, being held November 15-17 in Denver, Colorado.  It’s a great opportunity to meet other young adults (ages 18-26) pondering similar questions and to explore what God is saying to you and how you might respond.   You can also check it out on Facebook.