How many of us have gotten a response like this when applying for a job? I would venture to guess that at least once or twice many of you have heard those words. This past week I have been thinking much about qualifications. I have had some covert convos with some people regarding different opportunities that may present themselves in the future. Quite honestly, I feel qualified to do very little. I don’t have a college degree, let alone a seminary degree. I have various amounts of lay and paid experience in ministry and various amounts of “professional” experience in the secular world. I describe myself to people sometimes as a jack of all and master of none. I know a lot about a little. It is in this thought line that I found myself searching to get some technical experience in fields ranging from welding to radiography. I had really just longed to know how to do something. It would give me some instant cred. Qualifications….I have come to the conclusion this past week that the view of qualifications from the world’s standpoint and the God’s standpoint are quite different.
The world says that with the right qualifications you can do anything, but the Lord’s view is quite different. There is a cliche says something like, “God doesn’t call the qualified, he qualifies the called.” This thought came back to me this past week when I was doing some Bible reading and some guitar playing. One of my friends wrote a song that comes directly from I Samuel 3. I was playing through this song, really praying the words into my life because of the aforementioned convos and decided to reread the story found in the chapter. Several ideas jumped off the page at me, a couple of which fit into the whole flow of this writing…I shall share them….
Samuel is laying down in the Temple when the Lord starts to call out to him. Samuel thinks that it is Eli who is calling him and keeps running to see what Eli wants. Eli tells him first off to just go back to bed. After the third time that Samuel comes running, Eli starts to think something else is up and instructs Samuel to tell the LORD to speak, for he is listening. It is pretty easy to read this passage and glaze right over a nugget that I have glazed over many times and didn’t really see until this time reading it. Between the second and third time Samuel hears someone calling him the text reveals that Samuel did not yet know the Lord. My first thought is that how can a boy who is living in the Temple and evidently ministering under Eli not know the Lord? That seems pretty illogical. Wouldn’t it stand to reason that in all the time that conducting ministry and living there with Eli that the subject of the Lord might have come up? I suppose that one could argue that the term “know” could mean that he didn’t have the Lord in his heart or that he didn’t believe in the Lord. There probably is some truth to knowing the Lord in the context that the word “LORD” in all caps is YHWH, the covenant making God, so taking it to mean this would suggest that Samuel didn’t have the relationship. He didn’t know God in a governing sort of way. So why does the LORD call Samuel if he doesn’t even know Him? We have seen in other parts of the Bible where God chooses someone who seems to be illfit for the position to which God appointed them. Abraham. Moses. Noah. David. Jonah. The evidence is alarmingly in favor of underdogs beating the odds stacked against them. Had Noah ever built an arc? Had David ever slain a giant? Had Abraham ever been a father at such an advanced age (I guess that one really doesn’t work that well unless old Abe was Hindu as he would have been old only once….)? While I am not a fan of cliches, the one that started this discourse is pretty darn true. God doesn’t call the qualified, he qualifies the called. If God called Samuel before Samuel even knew him, how much more can he do with me, or with you, that have been walking with him for years??!
In my life I need this reminder almost daily. I have many things inside of me that are welling up to get out, but the fear of unqualifications hinder me. I have never planted a multi-site church, I have never written a book that wasn’t about a pet monkey, I have never had to raise missional support for myself. I have also never rode a unicycle wearing a bear costume, but that doesn’t stop me from serving God. I think that it is humbling to come to the realization that I don’t have to be the best or know the most, but I need to have the heart of Samuel that says, “Speak LORD, for your servant is listening” and then give the words legs by doing what God says. This is my prayer for me and for you.
