The Divine Call that a minister of the gospel holds is from God through the church. Could God use visions, lightning bolts, or carrier pigeons to call people into his service? Sure, he could. But normally he uses the church, a body of Christians.
How Divine?
How divine is the call? The church is full of sinful people who have biases, anterior motives, and sinful flesh. So where do Christians get off saying that the call to serve a church is divine? The Bible, of course! There are a number of examples of direct calls from God on the pages of Scripture. The basis or the sedes doctrina for the divine call can be found in the book of Acts. In Acts 20 the Apostle Paul writes that the Holy Spirit is the one who gave the leaders of the church in Ephesus their positions. God gave them their positions, but when you look back to Acts 14 we see that is was Paul and Barnabas who appointed the leaders. God doesn’t need to use lightning bolts. More often than not God uses leaders to appoint pastors or the congregation to call pastors. There could be an interview process too. I suppose we could cast lots. God has not mandated the method that we use. In our church body these calls are not solicited. Pastor Guldberg could not ask for a job offer from a church even it he wanted one. When there is a vacancy at a church the District President provides a list of names for the members to pick from.
Two Calls
Pastor Guldberg received a call to serve Star of Bethlehem Lutheran Church on Call Day at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary in May of 2002. Since that time he has received 14 other calls, or job offers from other churches. This 14th call is to serve Grace Lutheran Church in South St. Paul, MN. Pastor Guldberg received this most recent call on November 10th, 2024. That means, at the time this blog post is written, Pastor Guldberg is holding two calls to separate churches. There is no way he can faithfully carry out both calls, so he will have to return one of the calls.
Want to hear more? Please watch Sunday’s Bible study on The Divine Call.