There are numerous callings in the Scriptures. There is the “general call” of God which goes out to all men through the preaching of the gospel. This calls all men to repent for the kingdom of God is at hand and to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ for salvation. The general call of God came through the lips of John the Baptist, the Lord Jesus Christ and the apostles. Luke records this general call going out to the crowds gathered in Jerusalem at Pentecost as they heard through the mouth of the apostle Peter, “Men of Judea and all who dwell in Jerusalem, let this be known to you, and give ear to my words…” (Acts 2:14) It was upon these words that the Lord was casting the net broadly and generally to all men gathered there that day. To hear the general call of God is to be highly favored. There are millions of people in the earth who have not heard this general call.
There is also a vocational call in Scripture. This is a call to a particular job, position, or station in life. These callings are most familiar to us in the Old Testament. We read of Adam being called to rule and subdue the earth (Genesis 2:15). We read of Noah being called by God as a leader and savior of his family and caregiver of those animals that God chose to preserve in the earth after the flood. (Genesis 6-9). We read of Moses being called by God to be a deliverer of his people living in Egypt (Exodus 3). We also see this call in the New Testament. We see Peter being called from being a fisher of fish to a fisher of men (Matthew 4:19) or Matthew being called from being a tax collector to a disciple of Christ (Matthew 9:9). Paul speaks of this kind of calling in 1 Corinthians 7:20 when he says, “Each one should remain in the situation which he was when he was called.” The situation is the vocational calling or station which has been assigned (7:17). Therefore a calling may be in regard to your social or positional call in life. It is this calling that people tend to put the most significance or mark their own significance upon. This is the calling that most people are so willing to celebrate if they think it makes them significant or so willing to despair over if they think it does not measure up. But this is not the calling to celebrate. Though we should be thankful and content in the various callings we have in life, these callings are just that, for this life.
The third calling in Scripture that is the most to be celebrated is the effectual calling. It is what Paul is referring to in 1 Corinthians 7:20, “Each one should remain in the situation which he was when he was called.” Paul is referring to remaining in a situation or calling that they were in when God effectually called them to salvation in Christ Jesus. It is God who calls his own to salvation in the powerful, able and efficient call. Because man is incapable or unable in himself to come to Christ for salvation God must act toward him in his grace and power.
Jesus speaks of this call in John 6:44 when he says, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.” This verse speaks both of man’s inability to come and the Father’s effectual call to come unto Christ. Man’s inability is in his sinful condition. In the condition of man’s hard sinful heart there is no righteousness, no seeking after God, no want of blessed affections or right thoughts of God and his salvation. All the heart is in love with is self and for the glory of self it lives to die. Jesus is clear in saying “No one can come…”. There will be those who say it is the preaching of the gospel that will enable them to come. But I would say through the preaching of the gospel there goes forth a general call and man may believe the gospel preached for himself but not in himself. Others may say, “It is in how that gospel is preached. There are not many clear gospel preachers, or relevant gospel preachers, or cultural / missional gospel preachers, and this is why people are not coming.” But if you were to name the greatest preacher of all time who would name? If you named anyone but Christ Jesus himself you stand to condemn your judgment for he is God and the very author of his Word that he preached. Yet when he went throughout Galilee and Judea many heard but did not come. This is so because coming to salvation in Christ rests not on the preaching of the gospel, the one preaching or those hearing, but on the Father’s effectual calling.
The effectual call takes place when God by his free and special grace through his Word and Spirit calls men, women and children out of the condition of sin and death, to grace and salvation by Jesus Christ. He does this by enlightening the mind spiritually and savingly to understand the things of God, taking away the heart of stone and replacing it with a heart of flesh, renewing the will, and by his great power determining the person to that which is good and effectually drawing them to Jesus Christ. And in this the person comes most freely and willingly by grace. (Westminster Confession of Faith Chpt.X.1) God is gloriously gracious to bring us to see the grossness of our sin and the beauty of his righteousness in Christ so that we act against our old will according to the life of the new will made alive by the Spirit. This is the calling to celebrate in life toward life.
It is in God’s effectual call that we have a glorious social standing of being one in Christ Jesus (Gal.3:28) and a magnificent positional standing of having all things in Christ Jesus. This is the calling most of all to be celebrated in a life of love through obedience to his will in whatever social, cultural or positional condition God has assigned to us. It is here that we can learn most to enjoy his presence in love and serve our neighbors in love without fear of losing anything and with humility to not take our position or standing to the love of self.
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