Thursday, April 3, 2008

Vocation is...

"the place where your deepest gladness and the world's deepest hunger meet."  -Frederick Buechner.

Something to ponder...on a humorous note, when I think about my deepest gladness, bed and sleep are somewhere on my list!  Yet, I doubt that's where it meets the hunger of the world, so naps are likely not my vocation.

Truly though...what then is vocation? When am I most deeply glad?  Lately, I am the happiest when I am working in the garden or on a project.  While I am not an artist, taking pictures, gardening, making things: all these acts of creativity I find peaceful and joyfully fulfilling.  I do not find it unrelated that as a child of God (the Creator), the most joy I experience is in acts that bring beauty.  Might creativity and desire for beauty be a visible aspect of the Imago Dei, the Image-of-God-ness in each of us?  

Vocation is a strong word.  Coming from latin: vocare, to call, and must be quite different from occupation, which would then be whatever keeps me busy, occupied.  What I am called to do as a child of God is to live as one created in the Image of God.  Far cry from what we normally translate as vocation...but I am only a pastor because I am appointed as one, it is my occupation.  I can succeed or fail at my vocation while being a pastor...but I assume that pursuing vocation will positively affect occupation.  

Any thoughts?




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