Last week’s old testament reading was from Jeremiah 1, which was Jeremiah’s call. This week we have Isaiah 6, which is Isaiah’s call. That is paired up with the gospel reading which is Luke’s telling of the call of Peter, which is slightly different than the Matthew and Mark versions. Not different in any “that one has to be false’ way, Luke is just more expansive of what lead up to the call itself. Matthew and Mark simple have, “Peter, follow me…and he dropped his nets.” Which always makes you wonder at the immediacy. Luke tells you what happened before that.
I’m usually one who is arguing for leaving room for the mystical. As Shakespeare wrote, “There are more things on earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” But if there is one place where I tend to think we don’t ground things enough it is when we are talking about calls. The fancier and more expansive word is vocation. And unlike the Roman Catholic tradition that reserves that word for specifically religious vocations, the Lutheran understanding of vocation covers both the kingdom of the law and of the gospel.
We all have vocations. We probably have multiple overlapping vocations. In Luther’s Small Catechism he introduces this idea in a section that gets skipped in many of our catechism classes. (Why? I don’t know.) That section is called the Table of Duties. The vocations that Luther works through in outline there are: Bishops, Pastors, Laity, Civil Magistrates, Citizens, Husbands, Wives, Parents, Children, Workers, Employers, Youth and Widows. He ends with “everyone” so that you can grasp the basic idea that the number of vocations is practically limitless. Everyone of us can apply the rule “love you neighbor as yourself” to our specific place in life. And that is the Lutheran idea of vocation at its simplest.
As we move through life there are many roles in which we have the duty or responsibility of love. Vocation is primarily how God tends for his creation. Adam and Eve were created to care for the Garden. God could do lots of things directly. He could speak and it would be done. He could snap his fingers and things would happen. But in his wisdom God typically does things like say to someone “follow me” or “take care of this one.” When you have a child that is God saying “take care of this one.” When you have a job that is God saying “take care of those who need this good or service.” These same vocations are how God takes care of us. None of us are completely self-reliant, as much as that might be the American ideal. We are bound to each other by our vocations which should be and are bonds of love.
Some of the complexity is that our vocations sometimes contradict each other. The most simple form of that contradiction is when we just don’t have the time/money/energy to meet everything those bonds of love demand from us. Take it to God in prayer. Part of his promise is providence. That we shall have what we need for this body and life. If we don’t have it, there is someone who does.
The tougher complexities come from our sinful nature and a fallen world. Many of our vocations have turned inward on themselves. Instead of being opportunities to love those given to us, those vocations become honors or means of extracting from others. We desire the trappings of the call, but not the duties. We might know we have a call but run from it. We might also just neglect it growing weary in love. Because love is costly.
When Jesus called Peter to be a fisher of men, it was a call to the cross. In Peter’s case a literal cross. All vocations in this world, being calls to love, are calls to the cross. But it is through these that the love of God is made manifest in this world. It is through your vocations that God’s love is made known to call creation.