The truth is I have known I was called to preach for a very long time. But, I am a female who grew up Baptist, and this is a heavy load to carry.
I never told anyone.
I have spent decades finding my voice. In order to be free to speak and to serve in the fullness of my calling, to overcome my silence, I first needed to be convinced in my own mind that my calling was biblical. Over the years, I doubted the call or my ability to hear God because well... how could God call me to be unbiblical?
In college, I spent hours finding books on feminist theology and searching what others would say. I searched the scriptures and what the words meant in the original languages. I looked to women prophets, missionaries and preachers throughout history. I knew in my heart that what I had been taught was not the full story, but I could not speak out. I had to be convinced in my own mind.
I suspect others knew I was called. One day, I took a feminist theology book to my Biblical Interpretation professor to ask him what he thought of it. He looked me square in the eye and said, "Maybe someday you will have something to contribute to those works." As you can see, I have never recovered from that moment that felt prophetic, even at the time.
I had other friends who encouraged me to take a preaching class. Keep in mind I told no person about my internal need to proclaim the gospel. But, I was afraid to even ask if it was okay to take the class. (I know now it would have been fine. But, the power of your own historical theology is hard to overcome.)
While I continued to search for how God's calling would play out in my life, I became an English professor. I have spent a lot of time studying how to study texts. I have spent a lot of time studying rhetoric. I have spent a lot of time teaching students to write and to think (on the best days).
Over the last year, the silence has weighed heavy. I have finally been convinced in my own heart and mind of the rightness of my calling. I was always open to being wrong. That is why it took so long to arrive at this place. I needed the knowledge, the logic, to match my heart.
Only a little more than a year ago, I found the logic. I became convinced by this idea that we will all answer to God. I had been thinking about it wrong all these years. The burden did not rest on me alone to somehow prove I was worthy of this biblical calling. The burden of proof would also be on those who would try to silence me. In other words, those who would silence women called to preach, called to proclaim the saving power of Jesus Christ, they have to answer to God. In the same way, I will stand before God and give an account of my own silence during the call.
I can be silent no longer. There are hungry people everywhere that need the salvation only our Saviour can give. In our world where helpless people are tortured in the mountains of foreign lands and we sell children for a price into lives of unspeakable evils and despair, we need more voices to proclaim the gospel. As atheism gains a voice, there must be other preaching voices proclaiming hope and salvation.
It has been a long time coming. But amen and amen- I know that I know that I know I am hear to proclaim the good news to the captives. Here I am Lord, send me.
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