The Myth of a Single Calling
I used to believe that a calling was like a lightning strike. One moment you’re ordinary, and the next you’re ablaze with purpose, certain of what you were born to do. I thought it would be clear, maybe even glamorous, something that made introductions easier, something you could tuck neatly into a sentence when people asked, “So, what do you do?” I thought my calling would give me a sense of wholeness, a sense of finally arriving. I imagined myself standing on a straight road with no bends or shadows, just a well-lit path and a future I could walk toward without fear.
But life has not unfolded that way. My days have been less like a single road and more like a field of worn-down trails, some winding back on themselves, some leading to dead ends, some marked by detours I never saw coming. There have been moments when I’ve sat in the quiet of a kitchen at night, staring at a pile of dishes, wondering if I missed it—if God had whispered once, long ago, and I didn’t listen closely enough. Maybe I turned left when I was supposed to turn right. Maybe I dropped the ball and the calling moved on to someone more qualified, someone who didn’t make such a mess of things. The ache of that thought can feel like failure, like maybe the best parts of your story are already gone.
But I’ve learned something in the hollow years, in the silence between what I wanted to hear and what I actually received. Calling doesn’t always arrive in neon lights. Sometimes it doesn’t look like one thing at all. What if calling is not a single assignment written in stone but a series of invitations - some small, some enormous, some so ordinary they almost don’t feel like callings at all? Maybe the truth is we are called differently in different seasons. Maybe the myth isn’t that we have a calling, but that it is only one, only ever steady, only ever the same.
There was a season when my calling was survival. Just getting out of bed, just showing up for a little boy who needed me, just taking another breath when I felt like the air had turned heavy. There was a season when my calling was paperwork and phone calls, the ordinary rhythm of work that felt endless and thankless but kept food on the table. There was a season when my calling was simply learning to pray again, my words breaking in the middle of the night, more tears than sentences. And now, maybe my calling is here - in writing words that might remind someone else that they are not alone in their wondering, that uncertainty does not make them unworthy.
I think we’ve been sold the lie that a calling must be big to matter. That it must look impressive, or public, or unshakably certain. But I no longer believe that. I believe in the small callings, the shifting callings, the callings that might never get applause but shape the hidden corners of our lives. Folding laundry can be a calling. Choosing gentleness when you want to be sharp can be a calling. Cooking dinner for yourself when you’d rather skip can be a calling. Forgiving someone who doesn’t deserve it, or whispering a bedtime prayer when your eyes are heavy, or showing up one more time when you feel unseen - these are holy, too.
And maybe that’s the deeper truth. Maybe the point isn’t whether we’ve discovered the “right” calling, but whether we’re listening to the One who calls us daily into love, into mercy, into faithfulness. If God Himself is our Caller, then the call will never be only one thing. It will move with us, stretch us, surprise us. Sometimes it will look ordinary. Sometimes it will look like loss. Sometimes it will look like joy that bursts through the cracks when we least expect it.
So if you are holding your breath waiting for the big reveal, the perfect assignment, the one sentence that sums up your entire life, hear me: maybe you’re already living your calling. Maybe it’s not waiting at the end of the road. Maybe it’s right here in the mess and the miracle of today. And maybe it will change tomorrow. That doesn’t mean you missed it. It doesn’t mean you’re behind. It just means that you’re alive, and God is still writing your story in chapters too holy to rush.
“And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” - Colossians 3:17
And so I pray:
Lord, remind us that Your calling is not fragile, not something we can ruin with one wrong turn. Teach us to trust the seasons You place us in, even the ones that feel ordinary, even the ones that ache with uncertainty. Give us the courage to believe that small faithfulness is still holy, and that Your voice is steady even when we feel unsteady. May we learn to release the pressure of finding the one big thing and instead hold fast to You, the One who calls us beloved before we ever do a thing. Amen.
