Over the past few years my spiritual formation has taken me to many places, many of which were pretty unpredictable. One of those places that I never thought that I would be again was within a renewed interest in formal ministry. The irony in this is that the very paradigm shift that has brought so much renewal and healing personally has also taken me away from the absolutism of “calling”. While I see a “calling” as a absolutist’s approach to choosing a vocation or set of behaviors, I, rather, have come to value embracing my destiny isntead. I see one’s destiny as the act of living out who that person is fully. While a calling is linked to teleological ethic, it also demands both deontological and virtue ethics to be accepted. This simply means that a calling is linked to our purpose, but also demands that it is absolute. This convoluted approach to dealing with ethical responses is typical in evangelicalism. I, however, am attempting to move toward an ethic that pulls from various ethical theories (rather than trying to adhere to all of them inconsistently) for the purpose of responding to God more naturally. And that is what I mean by destiny. However, even though I am now seeking out what my destiny is, the only way I know how to explore that is through seeking out my calling. This is perhaps the first time my old life and my new life have collided in such a way.
Let me try to explain the difference in a different way. In Notes From the Underground, Fyodor Dostoevsky is addressing the importance of struggling. In the paragraph below he is talking about the existential angst that would come from a humanity that was hyper-rationale. In this paragraph he is contrasting the value of struggling to the rationale of simply being a key on a piano.
For it seems to me that the whole meaning of human life can be summed up in the statement that man only exists for the purpose of proving to himself every minute that he is a man and not an organ- stop! Even if it means physical suffering, even if it means turning his back on civilization, he will prove it. And how is one after that to resist the temptation to rejoice that all this has not happened yet and that so far desire depends on the devil alone knows what…
A little later on he continues to explain the value of the struggle,
And why are we so firmly, so solemnly convinced that only the normal and positive, in short, only prosperity, is of benefit to man? Does not reason make mistakes about benefits? Is it not possible that man loves something besides prosperity? Perhaps he is just as fond of suffering?... All I plead for is that I should be allowed my whims, and that they should be guaranteed to me whenever I want them. In light comedies, for instance, suffering is not permitted, and I accept that. In the Crystal Palace it is unthinkable: suffering is doubt, it is negation, and what sort of Crystal Palace would it be if one were to have any doubts about it? And yet I am convinced that man will never renounce real suffering, that is to say, destruction and chaos. Suffering! Why, it’s the sole cause of consciousness! And though at the beginning I did argue that consciousness was the greatest misfortune to man, yet I know that man loves it and will never exchange it for any satisfaction.
So how does one embrace the negative of struggle, sacrifice of benefits, and ambiguity of doubt for the purpose of being fully alive when our entire paradigm for experiencing that life fully lived is seen through the perspective of certainty, prosperity, and assurance? How does one discover one’s purpose when there is no more purpose than seeking one’s purpose? And how does one work through this struggle in a community that continues to hold to certainty, prosperity, and assurance? Let me be a little pragmatic. There is an incongruence within me. I am pursuing a life fully lived: one that is meaningful, obedient, fruitful, relational, and dynamic. Even though I believe this life is best (not only) discovered through faith, I attempt to find it through certainty. Within this struggle I have to discover who I am, what I aspire to be, how I want to live, who God wants me to be, how God wants me to live, and all of this within the context of a beautiful and broken world. While I don’t criticize those who feel that holding to an absolute calling and see every bad thing that happens as a work of Satan and/or the orchestrating of God to place people within their true calling, I believe that life is simply that- life. It is messy, unpredictable, and often tragic. It is how I and God relate within that reality that will shape meaning.
But my point here is not to negate my previously held evangelicalism for the purpose of elevating existentialism. My purpose is to address the irony of part of that existentialism. Within this new paradigm I value struggle but often feel that that value is battling against my previous evangelicalism. But perhaps that struggle (between existentialism and evangelicalism) is just as much a part of the struggle. I don’t have to work out my evangelicalism before I can embrace existentialism; I simply have to see that as part of the struggle. Call it meta-existentialism. The fact is evangelicalism is a part of me that is real and a part of me that I don’t have to denounce. Perhaps the pursuit of destiny is understanding my desire for a calling.
Let me try to explain the difference in a different way. In Notes From the Underground, Fyodor Dostoevsky is addressing the importance of struggling. In the paragraph below he is talking about the existential angst that would come from a humanity that was hyper-rationale. In this paragraph he is contrasting the value of struggling to the rationale of simply being a key on a piano.
For it seems to me that the whole meaning of human life can be summed up in the statement that man only exists for the purpose of proving to himself every minute that he is a man and not an organ- stop! Even if it means physical suffering, even if it means turning his back on civilization, he will prove it. And how is one after that to resist the temptation to rejoice that all this has not happened yet and that so far desire depends on the devil alone knows what…
A little later on he continues to explain the value of the struggle,
And why are we so firmly, so solemnly convinced that only the normal and positive, in short, only prosperity, is of benefit to man? Does not reason make mistakes about benefits? Is it not possible that man loves something besides prosperity? Perhaps he is just as fond of suffering?... All I plead for is that I should be allowed my whims, and that they should be guaranteed to me whenever I want them. In light comedies, for instance, suffering is not permitted, and I accept that. In the Crystal Palace it is unthinkable: suffering is doubt, it is negation, and what sort of Crystal Palace would it be if one were to have any doubts about it? And yet I am convinced that man will never renounce real suffering, that is to say, destruction and chaos. Suffering! Why, it’s the sole cause of consciousness! And though at the beginning I did argue that consciousness was the greatest misfortune to man, yet I know that man loves it and will never exchange it for any satisfaction.
So how does one embrace the negative of struggle, sacrifice of benefits, and ambiguity of doubt for the purpose of being fully alive when our entire paradigm for experiencing that life fully lived is seen through the perspective of certainty, prosperity, and assurance? How does one discover one’s purpose when there is no more purpose than seeking one’s purpose? And how does one work through this struggle in a community that continues to hold to certainty, prosperity, and assurance? Let me be a little pragmatic. There is an incongruence within me. I am pursuing a life fully lived: one that is meaningful, obedient, fruitful, relational, and dynamic. Even though I believe this life is best (not only) discovered through faith, I attempt to find it through certainty. Within this struggle I have to discover who I am, what I aspire to be, how I want to live, who God wants me to be, how God wants me to live, and all of this within the context of a beautiful and broken world. While I don’t criticize those who feel that holding to an absolute calling and see every bad thing that happens as a work of Satan and/or the orchestrating of God to place people within their true calling, I believe that life is simply that- life. It is messy, unpredictable, and often tragic. It is how I and God relate within that reality that will shape meaning.
But my point here is not to negate my previously held evangelicalism for the purpose of elevating existentialism. My purpose is to address the irony of part of that existentialism. Within this new paradigm I value struggle but often feel that that value is battling against my previous evangelicalism. But perhaps that struggle (between existentialism and evangelicalism) is just as much a part of the struggle. I don’t have to work out my evangelicalism before I can embrace existentialism; I simply have to see that as part of the struggle. Call it meta-existentialism. The fact is evangelicalism is a part of me that is real and a part of me that I don’t have to denounce. Perhaps the pursuit of destiny is understanding my desire for a calling.
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