E is for Endeavor ~ Guest Post by Elizabeth Danna

 

 Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”

And I said, “Here am I. Send me!” Isa. 6:8

The Calling

The British TV series Endeavour is a prequel to the series Inspector Morse, which is based on Colin Dexter’s novels. The series’ second season ends with Detective Constable Morse and his mentor, Detective Chief Inspector Thursday, facing down a group of corrupt policemen. The conspiracy is unmasked, but Thursday is shot and seriously wounded, and Morse is falsely accused of murdering the Chief Constable and imprisoned. In the third-season opener, “Ride,” Thursday has recovered and returns to work, but Morse, vindicated and released but traumatised, has gone into hiding. He doesn’t know whether he wants to go back to the police. When Thursday finds Morse, Morse asks him, “Why would you go back?” Thursday answers, “There’s a town wants looking to, and that doesn’t change just because I’ve lost a suit size.” In other words, there’s work to do. Police work is Thursday’s, and Morse’s, calling, and Thursday can’t turn away from it, in spite of the cost to himself. Neither, it turns out, can Morse.

Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Paul are Bible characters who knew how it feels to have a calling you can’t turn away from. Isaiah and Jeremiah were both warned that Israel wouldn’t listen to them (Isa. 6:9-10; Jer. 7:27). But they said what God wanted them to say, even though Israel’s unreceptive response broke their hearts (Jer. 20:7-10). And Paul mentions the sufferings that he went through, and the constant pressure that he was under (2 Cor. 11:24-29). But he also wrote that while he would rather go to be with God, it was better for his readers if he stayed, because there was still work for him to do. So he knew that he would stay (Phil. 1:22-25). 

God has placed a calling on the life of every believer. A person’s calling may be to preach, or to raise godly children, or to serve their community at a food bank. Whatever it is, they’ve probably had to pay a price to carry it out. To make sacrifices of time and effort, and maybe money as well. Maybe they’ve given up a glamorous career opportunity for something less attention-getting but more worthwhile. 

As writers, our calling is to say what God wants us to say. But that takes time and effort. It involves the discipline of scheduling time to write rather than doing something else, and it may involve the discipline and effort of doing careful research. But you’ve probably also found that you can’t turn away from it. Carrying out God’s call on our lives isn’t always easy, but whatever price we have to pay is worth it. 

Elizabeth Danna, Ph.D., was born and raised near Toronto, where she still lives. She has worked for Crossroads, a large Canadian ministry, for many years. Her hobbies include music and needlework, but her main passion is the Word of God. She is trained in New Testament Studies, and has a desire to help people understand the Word so that they can grow spiritually. She recently published Through the Lens of Faith: Devotions on Life, the Universe, and Everything, from Resource Publications. She has also written two small-group Bible studies, From Gethsemane to Pentecost (2011) and The Stories of Jesus: A Study in the Parables of Jesus (2016) both from Wipf & Stock.