Killing Your Ox

In 1 Kings 19:19-21, Elijah anoointed Elisha as prophet to Israel.  Elisha asked for and was granted permission to say goodbye to his family.  In his farwell, he killed the oxen that pulled his plow and chopped up the plow to burn, roasting the pair over it.  His goodbye was final, he was burning his bridge in a literal sense behind him.  For Elisha, there was no turning back, no backup plan, no backing out.

When I felt the call to ministry, I was encouraged to stay in the military until retirement and then go to preaching school.  That way, I'd have retirement pay and medical to get me through training and a way out in case it wasn't right for me.  As I came to the end of time at Harding, I was advised to stay and complete a business degree as I already had two years under my belt and it would give me a back up plan.  I was not, however, choosing a vocational path, I was answering the call of God.  I didn't want and didn't need something to fall back on.  I would fall into the arms of God.  Never have there been any guarantees but never has God let me fall.  Through it all, God has seen me through.

When one answers the call of God to become a Christian, to become a minister, to become a missionary, whatever the call might be - there must be a reliance on God and a commitment to the calling or one is actually making a personal choice rather than answering a personal call.  Do you think God would call you to a ministry that was beyond your capacitty to fulfill?  Perhaps on your own you would fail, but not with His empowering.  If you think you might not be able to fulfill it, that means you don't think God is able to sustain you.  In other words, you aren't really certain God is calling you.

Even if what God calls you to seems implausible, it most certainly is not "for with man this is impossible but with God all things are possible" (Matt 19:26).  When God calls you and you respond in faith, "Nothing will be impossible for you" (Matt 17:20).  It's not time to develop a backup plan, it is time to devote yourself to God's purpose.  So, go ahead, kill your ox.  Jus' Sayn.