Calling to Christ
Where’s My Place?
by
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This season of spiritual formation for the Christian, Calling to Christ, is the second of four seasons of Gospel transformation designed to shape us into the glorious likeness of Jesus Christ. It assumes that we have a reasonable grip on our identity in Christ. It also prepares us for the last two seasons of spiritual formation; namely, intentionality and legacy.
The evil trinity--the world, the flesh, and the devil--is seeking to kill and destroy us during each of the four seasons of spiritual formation. In the spring Evil confuses our identity, in the summer our calling, in the autumn our intentionality, and in the winter our legacy. The world escorts us to the pit; the flesh entices us to fall in; and the devil pushes us over the edge. “The pit,” as it were, represents other voices besides God’s telling us what we should do. It is a place of confusion, greed, and autonomous attempts to make our idealistic dreams of being exceptional come true. It turns darker as unmet longings and failure may lead us down the paths of resignation, romanticism, or self-righteous bitterness. It is not your place in this season of calling to Christ.
Embracing your true sense of calling to Christ has much more weight than you may give it at this time. The better we become solidified about who God says we are in Christ, and about where He is calling us, the more the season of intentionality in our forties and fifties will be fruitful and the season of legacy will be rich in our latter years. It is foundational as an adult, formational during our twenties and thirties, and progressively solidifying for all Christians to become intentional for Christ in the third season of spiritual formation. Finally, we enter the fourth season of spiritual formation until we come to cross the river of death with a legacy from Christ. So, let’s begin with asking what is a Christian’s calling to Christ.
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About the Book
Although there is nothing sweeter than the Gospel, there is more sweetness to be enjoyed after one’s conversion to Christ. Many Christians fail to experience transformation in the discovery of God’s call on their lives in the areas of work, family, and service. Even the idea of calling has been relegated to full-time vocational service, leaving out the other 90% of God’s people. What if we could overcome the major obstacles to joyful fulfillment in our callings to Christ? What about the importance of being called to an ordinary place that counts for eternity?
What if we begin to live out of the heart God gave us rather than the demands and expectations of others we had not considered are ruling us in negative ways? Dr. Bob Smart walks his readers through the practical steps to owning God’s calling of us in all areas of life, which promises to lead to freedom and meaningful living in this second season of spiritual formation. This is the second book of four seasons of spiritual formation.
About the Author
Robert Davis Smart has served in the Christian ministry both on college campuses with the Navigators and as the senior pastor of Christ Church for the last thirty years. As an author and editor, he published his PhD on Jonathan Edwards, contributed chapters on the Great Awakening, and written articles and reviews in theological journals. Bob is married, has five married children, and is a grandfather of twelve grandchildren. Bob has taught seminary courses on spiritual formation and theology in over twenty-five nations, and he speaks often at conferences on marriage and family.