Do It Anyway?

A while back, on my Facebook page, I shared a link to an article by the Junia Project: "And If They Don't Affirm You? Preach and Pastor Anyway." In it, the author writes, "God called me to preach and pastor long before I knew that God's call and peoples' opinions don't always jive. Before I knew that many people feel preaching and pastoring are not roles women can hold." After sharing some of her story, the author suggests six steps for women who find themselves in the very difficult position of living with a calling that has been rejected on the basis of their gender, which can be summarized by this closing advice: "Look at the work God has done in you and through you and continue to preach and pastor anyway."

A friend responded to my Facebook post, rightly questioning whether in fact anyone should proceed to preach and pastor if their calling is not affirmed by their church community.

This is a completely legitimate concern. Particularly in Mennonite circles, theology and practice have affirmed that a call to ministry must be discerned in the context of the faith community, and that a call to ministry must consist not only of the inner call felt by the person, but also by the affirmation of their community. Without both the inner and outer aspects of a call, the call is not considered valid.

I agree with this. My thesis research affirmed the importance of both the inner call and its affirmation by the faith community.

And, at the same time, I have often found myself in the very difficult situation that the author describes--God's call and people's opinions don't always jive.

In seminary, some of my male classmates were frequently invited to preach at churches looking for interim pulpit supply. One of them asked me if I would be open to preaching from time to time, finding himself with more opportunities to speak than he really wanted or needed. But the truth was that because of my gender, most of those churches wouldn't ever invite me to preach, regardless of my giftedness, or lack thereof. He continued to preach almost weekly. I, on the other hand, can count the invitations I received to speak at other congregations during those three years on one hand, with several fingers to spare.

One day in the foyer at church, during coffee hour, an older woman whom I admired stopped me to tell me that she didn't believe that women should lead from the pulpit, because if women stepped up to preach or lead worship, men would not take up their God-given leadership roles. The implication was that I was doing harm every time I exercised my gifts in preaching or leading worship. The words were delivered with sugary-sweetness, but landed like a lead balloon in my gut.

Years ago, after I had graduated with a degree in youth ministry and was trying to discern whether God was calling me to more than a role as a volunteer youth leader in my church, someone told me of a conversation in which someone had called him asking of whether they knew of anyone gifted for a role as a youth pastor. He said that he immediately thought of me, but that he couldn't suggest me because the congregation would only consider males for the opening.

I could give many, many more examples.

None of these are pleasant experiences, but people won't always like you or agree with you in life. Conflict and differing opinions are part of reality. Why is this such a big deal?

It's a big deal because God's call is a big deal. It is painful when something that is so very much a part of who you are is debated as an "issue of theology," as a largely academic or intellectual question, without the recognition that it is deeply personal, something that is deeply entwined with my identity as a human being created in the image of God.

I still remember my very first sermon, which I preached with great reluctance and only after much, much prodding and persuading on the part of our youth pastor. What stands out to me the most, to this day, is the fact that when I got home from church the only thing I could think about, the only thought running through my head, was "What if I never get the chance to do this again?"

Preaching, leading worship, providing pastoral care to God's people--these things are so deeply part of who I am. I feel God's pleasure when I exercise these gifts in the context of the church. I feel most fully alive when given the opportunity to serve in these ways. I don't quite know what to do with myself when I'm told that I can't possibly be called to those roles because of something as fundamental as my gender. It feels like being asked to rip yourself it two.

And yet, as a Mennonite, I agree that we need to discern a call to ministry in community. As someone once put it to me so beautifully, "Nobody wants to be that person who thinks they have a call, all the while everyone around them is thinking that they just don't see it."

So, what do you do? Do you preach and pastor anyway, in spite of the lack of affirmation (or, in many cases, the mixed responses) of God's call? Or do you suppress the call, try to live around it, out of respect for the collective wisdom of the body of Christ?

All I know for sure is that it's hard to ignore the joy, the hope, the right-ness of using the gifts that God has given you, of taking advantage of the doors that do present themselves as open, of exploring what it feels like to be a person fully alive.

Even if it means grieving at the same time the fact that in a perfect world the inner and outer aspects of a call would be aligned with one another. And praying that one day the pieces would align, one way or another.