Jim Van Gelderen: Welcome to the Thee Generation Podcast. This is Jim Van Gelderen and I am broadcasting from Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. It’s kind of unusual this summer to be in Menomonee Falls, even though it’s my home.

We had the privilege of being out for, I think it was over a month in the country of Canada, and my wife and I had a wonderful time doing revival meetings. And I know this sounds kind of funny, but I got a chance for the first time driving down the road to see a black bear. So I think we saw about ten of them going up, way up north in Alberta.

We were just a few miles from the Northwest Territories, farthest north I have ever been. It was kind of interesting because the sun didn’t go down to well after midnight, and they say it was only down for about an hour, and then it came back up. And so kind of a unique place, but it was really neat.

A church of one hundred people on a Sunday morning in a town of three thousand. And so it’s exciting to see God working in all kinds of different places. Well, I just wanted to challenge you this on this podcast with a simple truth out of first Thessalonians five twenty four, faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it.

Young people often struggle with, what does God want me to do with my life? Well, I want every young person listening to this podcast to know it doesn’t matter what you end up doing as far as foreign occupation. God wants us all to be ministers in the sense that we’re all servants of the Lord.

We all ought to be soul conscious, conscious. We all ought to be burdened about other believers growing in the Lord. All of us, in a certain sense, are ought to be in a ministry mindset reaching out, helping people, encouraging people, giving the gospel.

That ought to be everybody’s mindset. Whether or not we’re in full time Christian work or out in the so-called secular workforce. But there is a specific calling.

Although God wants all of us to serve him. There is a specific calling of what we might call full time Christian work, or being in the Lord’s work as a preacher or a preacher’s wife, missionary missionary’s wife. Certainly, the Lord calls some to give their lives in that fashion.

And you might ask yourself, well, how do I know? How do I know I’m called to preach? Let me just simply say it’s not gesture native skill set.

If I had to look just at my skill set when I was a teenager, I would have never yielded the ministry because I personally did not have the giftings as a skill set to do this. But the Bible tells us very clearly God does not call the gifted. He gifts the called.

We know that from this very verse. First Thessalonians five twenty four faithful is he that calleth you. And here’s the key, who also will do it.

So it’s important for you to realize God does call, and if he does call, he’ll do it. Now, what he means by do it is he will gift you to do what he’s called you to do. And the gifting is supernatural.

Uh, I’ve certainly witnessed over the years watching God in a young person’s life do something supernatural. And it really is remarkable to me because many times they don’t have the maturity. In fact, I’ve sometimes made the mistake of assuming that the gifting operating was maturity.

And many times later on I realized there wasn’t very much maturity there because the gifting is powerful. And so God calls you. And when you yield to that, uh, he, there’s, there’s a actually, even if you don’t yield, there’s a gifting there, but it’s obviously not going to be used if you’re not yielded.

But there’s a supernatural gifting there. And you might say, okay, well, that that ought to be an encouragement. So don’t don’t feel like I can’t do this.

Well, we’ve all said that I think every preacher said, I can’t do this. But when he yielded to the call, he realized that God gifted him or is enabling him to do something he could not have done unless that gift was given to him. So you might say, how do I know I’m called to preach or called to missions or whatever?

And I realize that sometimes there’s a step in it. I was sixteen, I yielded to the call to preach. I didn’t know what that meant.

I think for a while I thought it was going to be a youth pastor, but I followed my burden and my burden was teenagers. And really, more than being a youth pastor, it was teenage evangelism. And now teenage revival work as well.

And it’s been step by step. In fact, I know this sounds funny. I was in evangelism for several months and I realized, you know what?

I think I’m an evangelist. Kind of backwards, I realize. But I followed my burden, began to reach out to teenagers, developed a program, got led in it.

Of course, the Lord really is the one that developed it. We began to take the war on the road, and I began to realize, this is what I’m supposed to do. And I’ve been doing it for thirty five years.

But it started with a call to preach at sixteen, knowing God had called me. And then step by step step, God led me to the specific way that call to preach would be lived out. And for me, it’s been teen revival and evangelism work with a program that didn’t exist as one that God led us to create and has continued to tweak over these thirty five years.

So you might be here and say, well, how do I know? Well, the key is just real simple. You’re just going to know.

I don’t know if you’ve ever heard that before, but sometimes people ask me, well, how do you know? You call to preach and I’ll answer. Look at them kind of smile at them and say, you just know.

And what I mean by that, it is not just a human knowledge. Obviously. I’m talking about God.

I love first John one five, God is light in him is no darkness at all. And although the passage is talking about light in a in a different sense than leadership, there’s a principle about God. God is completely light.

He’s no darkness. And so, young person, let me tell you that God will make it absolutely clear. Now, you may fight it, but he will make it absolutely clear.

In fact, if you’re fighting the call to preach pretty good, pretty good chance you are called to preach. Because as I’ve said for years, you don’t fight nothing and you’re not going to wrestle about a call to preach if you’re not called. And so many times the very wrestling match, the very fight indicates, okay, what am I fighting?

I’m fighting the fact that I know deep in my heart, I really do know God wants me to preach. Or for a young lady, God wants me to yield to being a pastor’s wife, evangelist, wife, missionary, wife. Now that can be specific, more specific later on.

Okay, yield to preach. And then maybe later on missions becomes the thing and that becomes clearer. And then the actual field and those kind of things can be incremental.

But the point is God will lead. He’s light. There is absolutely no darkness at all.

You just know. And God will lead every step. Remember that God doesn’t always lead you thirty years before it happens.

He leads you step by step. And the olden days, they’d put lamps on their feet. So when they took a step in darkness.

Of course, this is before lights. Like we live in such a modernly lighted up culture. But so they take a step and there’d be just enough light to take another step, and then just enough light to take another step.

And that’s often the way God works. He’ll give you just enough light to take the next step. And so, young person, if you’ve been sensing in your heart God may be calling you to full time Christian work, first of all, you got to be willing and say, Lord, if you want me to do it, I’ll do it.

He will make it clear there will be a certain amount of knowledge. And then when you take that step, I’m going to do it. Then you’ll begin to note that God will equip you to do what he has called you to do.

Now, gang, and I’m telling you, young people don’t miss it because it is a journey. I will tell you, I’m not done. I’ve got thirty five years under the belt.

I hope another thirty five. To be honest with you, I’m having so much fun. But I feel sorry for people who miss God’s will because they don’t miss it.

They actually stiff arm God’s will because they’re missing out on the greatest life that God that you could ever have. The greatest thing about the will of God is clearly the. Because it’s the greatest thing.

So don’t miss it. Don’t fight God on this deal. And you be willing to do what God wants you to do.

He’ll show you God’s light. There’s no darkness at all. And that’s really what the the generation is all about, because it’s all about being totally surrendered to the will of God and totally dependent on his grace to live it.

And the same thing works for his call on your life.