The Call

Watercolor

Samuel Carter

"The place God calls you to is the place where

your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet."

Frederick Buechner

Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC

     The 17th Century poet, George Herbert, said, "Life is half spent before we know what it is." E.E. Cummings said, "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are." 

     My life is surrounded with words of prophets and poets- the storytellers and imaginators who flavor my conversations, the men and women who share dreams and impart to me a title- Dreamer. At age ten I was an astronaut. By sixteen it was music. When my twentieth birthday arrived, I was a painter. But, musical astronauts who paint are an odd lot- too odd for most. In my twenties I was a part of the family business- a maker of tombstones... a storyteller of a different sort. Then something happened, something I did not expect. God called me to teach.

     We hear through the filter of our history. The distant voices cry, "You must ..." and "You cannot ..." 

     As I walk in the place where God calls the voices din. And it is good.