When God calls us, it’s both an invitation and a summons.
To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours.
When God calls us, it’s both an invitation and a summons. God reaches out to us in loving grace, inviting us into his family and his family business. God does not force us to comply. Yet, the one who invites us is also the Sovereign of the universe. His invitation comes with unique authority as we are summoned by the King of kings and Lord of lords.
In our effort to make sense of the biblical notion of calling, we’d do well to keep in mind a summons to jury duty. In fact, if you look up the meaning of the Greek verb “to call” (kaleō) in the standard New Testament lexicon, you find these options: to call, call by name; to invite; to summon. The first meaning is like what we do in English when we say, “I’m called Mark.” The other meanings are of greatest interest to us here, however. When God calls, this is a kind of invitation. God doesn’t use his superior power to force us to respond. Rather, God invites us to join his family and his work. He extends this invitation with grace rather than compulsion.
But God’s invitation comes with distinctive clout. Though God does not compel us to accept his invitation, it really is a summons. It comes, after all, from the Sovereign of the universe, the King of kings and Lord of lords. So, in 1 Corinthians 1:2, when Paul writes that the Corinthian Christians – and by extension, we ourselves – are “called to be saints,” he doesn’t mean they have received an invitation they might ignore without consequence. Rather, when we are called by God, we are summoned by the supreme authority. God’s invitation comes with unique clout. We would do well to take it seriously.
As we consider our relationship with the Lord, we hold in tension the way in which God’s calling is both an invitation and a summons. We hear the invitation in so many passages of Scripture, including for example, when Jesus says, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). We hear God’s gracious invitation in Hebrews 4:16 as well, “Let us, therefore, approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” At the same time, we rightly understand that God is summoning us to follow Jesus with our whole lives and to live each moment for the praise of God’s glory (Ephesians 1:11-14).
Let me encourage you to reflect on the invitation and summons dimensions of God’s calling.
Comments