Accepting An Impossible Call
Episode 15
In Luke 1, Elizabeth receives an impossible calling to bear a child in old age after YEARS of barrenness. God may call us to something impossible too. How will we respond? Let's learn from Elizabeth how to react with faith.
Show Notes
In Episode 14, Answering God's Call When I'm Not Enough, We started talking about Elizabeth and her impossible calling to bear her child in old age after YEARS of barrenness.
Today, we’ll talk about how to respond: Accepting An Impossible Call
Important, because: God calls us the impossible. It’s a fact.
He doesn’t call us to what is easy. Or what makes sense even.
It’s not what we can do without Him.
Here’s the question: Why would God call us to the Impossible? Maybe it’s because it's only WHEN it becomes impossible, that we know it’s JESUS at work and not us. We know we CAN’T work hard enough to make it happen maybe we’ll stop long enough to get out of the way.
Let me ask you: RIGHT NOW:
do you feel Jesus calling you to something new?
A new surprising place of service?
Needs to meet?
But does it feel impossible to do?
As we enter this second half of life, there are places we need to work. Build the Kingdom. Share Jesus.
Ladies: there’s no retirement in the Kingdom! No matter where Jesus has called us before, we have new places He wants us. Privilege of partnering with Him.
How do I respond? Because it’s probably going to sound crazy.
Let’s look at LUKE 1: Zecharias and Elizabeth.
First, Zecharias responds with doubts and questions.
Luke 1:18-19- And Zechariah said to the angel, "How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years." And the angel answered him, "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I was sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news.
He comes home not talking
I’ve asked God the same question. How do I know?
How respond? Let’s look at Elizabeth for that.
When God calls us to the impossible: Respond with thanksgiving and faith
Elizabeth responds differently
Luke 1:25 ESV- "Thus the Lord has done for me in the days when he looked on me, to take away my reproach among people."
Who does she give glory to? The Lord!
She felt the need to hide what God was growing in her. What would people say? What if she made a fool out of herself? Lost the baby?
She’s been subject to the “reproach” of life and gossip her whole life. What will they say about this is an unexplainable occurrence?
While she’s growing her holy secret:
Her faithful response SET HER UP TO MINISTER TO MARY.
Found place of praise and service
She got to pour out all her emotion on her young cousin.
2 Corinthians 1:3-4- Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.
Mary, who was sitting in the gossip seat, had someone to run to.
To comfort her.
To understand.
To say, yeah, me too.
I will believe WITH you that this is God and this is good.
Luke 1:41- And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, ...
Our impossible equips us to help someone behind us with theirs.
If you are wondering WHO or WHAT you are called to, look behind you. Find someone younger who needs that encouragement. Because if nothing else we KNOW we’re called to that
Titus 2:3-4- Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children,
When God calls us to the impossible: assume it's going to be hard.
Luke 1:15- for he will be great before the Lord. And he must not drink wine or strong drink, and he will be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb. …
No pressure there!
Let’s just think a moment about being a parent to John the Baptist. A man willful and determined enough to live in a desert eating bugs.
Luke 1:80- And the child grew and became strong in spirit, and he was in the wilderness until the day of his public appearance to Israel.
Can you imagine? I can. I raised one of those “strong in spirit” kids.
And let me tell you, I believe there just might be a jewel in the crown, sort of like a merit badge, for those of us who survived that.
One of my most read blog posts is How To Not Raise A Strong Willed Child. Still read every week, years later. Here’s a link:
But I talk about how I need to change my focus to be able to pray for those precious stubborn tendencies to be used for the Kingdom. I sure didn’t want them to be fuel for evil!
Elizabeth KNOWS her son is to have a Kingdom impact. But Elizabeth is OLD. And she’s parenting a “different” child with an OLD husband.
Luke 1:15, 41, 57-66- Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. And her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her. And on the eighth day they came to circumcise the child. And they would have called him Zechariah after his father, but his mother answered, "No; he shall be called John." And they said to her, "None of your relatives is called by this name." And they made signs to his father, inquiring what he wanted him to be called. And he asked for a writing tablet and wrote, "His name is John." And they all wondered. And immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, blessing God. And fear came on all their neighbors. And all these things were talked about through all the hill country of Judea, and all who heard them laid them up in their hearts, saying, "What then will this child be?" For the hand of the Lord was with him.
The impossible didn’t point to Zechariah and Elizabeth. It pointed to the Most High.
Zechariah, one of the many priests woven in the fabric of the Tribe of Levi, without power or position. Not influential. But after doubting, here he is prophesying. What a change.
Don’t doubt, because what you’ve done up to now is quiet and unrecognized. You can still be called to the forefront to some moment of extreme Holy Spirit filling for those around you.
Luke 1:67-68, 76-80- And his father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied, saying, "Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for he has visited and redeemed his people … And you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways, to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby the sunrise shall visit us from on high to give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace."
Here’s what I see Elizabeth and Zechariah teaching us about hearing our second-half calling:
Our obedience up to now prepares us
Long, quiet faithfulness matters
YET, we might be shocked or doubtful of what God wants us to do
BECAUSE, God might call us to impossible
And when we walk in that calling, the second and third level consequences may threaten to do us in
But it is in the impossible we have opportunity to minister to those behind us. It gives us credibility to speak of all the Lord can and will do
We’re a walking example to the Lord’s power. Which might make us want to hide, like Elizabeth, but trust the Spirit to fill us and enable us to say exactly what we need to say
BUT as we walk in that calling- Jesus gets the glory. We proclaim Him.
What is God calling you to do?
It will probably seem impossible
Respond with thanksgiving and praise
Even though you can be assured it’s hard
Enter into the hard with the joy that something eternal is happening. That’s all that really matters.