At my grandmother's funeral yesterday someone said to me, "Oh yes you were one of those who were called to ministry later in life." My answer is that no, I was called early in life but I only answered "Yes" nearly 20 years later. In thinking through that as I drove home it made me appreciate both the Lord and those who did what Abraham did in saying yes at the start.
It is amazing to me that He waited on me for so long. It tells me something about the God I serve that in all the stuff I got myself into in those intervening years that He never gave up on me. For most of that time there was no reason to believe that my life would ever be as it is today. I realize that for most of that time I wasn't chasing anything in particular, mostly I was being chased and running as fast as I could and doing everything to avoid hearing His voice. Since I can't change the past I don't live with regret, but as I look at my life today and the things I have done and the people I have met, I look back wistfully on what might have been.
Men like Noah and Abraham amaze me. They just heard and did. In both cases though there were fatal flaws that in the end kept them from fully experiencing God's blessing. Noah got drunk and it ruined family relationships and Abraham took matters into his own hand to complete what God seemingly wasn't going to do Himself and even today we are paying the price. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. In spite of their sins, these men stand out from the rest to me yet I realize that I can't measure what might have been by projecting backwards, these men's lives tell me that.
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