Deep Gladness Meets Deep Need
/As part of an ECF small group, Pam and I are exploring John Ortberg’s challenging and humorous book, If You Want to Walk on Water, You’ve Got to Get Out of the Boat. Last week, I came across this insightful quote from Frederich Buechner. God’s calling is “the place where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need.”
This has certainly proven true in our lives. Our deepest gladness comes from using the gifts, talents, and opportunities God has provided to advance his purposes. Years ago, in the film Chariots of Fire, Eric Liddell tells his sister, “When I run, I feel God’s pleasure.” God had gifted Eric with an incredible ability to run fast. And when Eric ran, he felt God’s pleasure because he was using the gifts that God had given him.
In a similar way, Pam and I feel God’s pleasure when we use the gifts that he’s given us. Using Buechner’s terminology, this is our “deep gladness.”
As far as the world’s deep need, this never changes. The world needs hope. The world needs justice. The world needs change. The world needs kindness. In sum, the world needs Jesus.
As a teenager, I remember hearing over the airwaves an arresting song by Dionne Warwick called “What the world needs now is love, sweet love.” Some of you will remember its beautiful melody and heart-felt lyrics. This was long before I had a faith experience. But the song resonated with the ache in my soul even as a teenager. Then, and now, the world has been filled with hate, acrimony, selfishness and evil. What the world needs now, is love, sweet love. And his name is Jesus.
God’s calling is “the place where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need.” We are experiencing this in new ways in Costa Rica. ECF is now cresting over 100 people in our Sunday services on a regular basis. Seeing God’s purposes prevail brings us deep gladness. We’ve seen this in Chile, in Wisconsin, in Nevada and now in Costa Rica.
In our last blog, we commented about how much energy was required for our recent mission trip to Chile. I mentioned that we felt like we lived an entire month crammed into one week while in Chile. It was exhausting to the max. Morning, noon and night pouring ourselves out. A vacation it was not!
But we’re glad we went. We’re glad that neither fear nor the need for comfort held us back. And we’re also glad we came to Costa Rica. It’s not been a vacation. We’ve still not made it to Europe to see castles and cathedrals. But we’re fulfilled.
God’s calling is “the place where your deep gladness meets the world’s deep need.” That doesn’t mean it will be easy. Later in his book, John Ortberg comments, “Everyone in Scripture who said yes to their calling had to pay a high price. So will you and I.”
That said, I wonder if you have allowed your life to be put on cruise-control. Lately, I’ve been repeating this phrase with some regularity: “Don’t die until you are dead.” Is there another challenge that you’ve been avoiding that would allow your “deep gladness to meet the world’s deep need?” What’s keeping you from launching out?
