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Have you ever wondered why God doesn’t just call you on your cell phone or send an e-mail message outlining what he wants you to do and where he wants you to go?

At a recent conference at Southeastern Bible College in Birmingham, Alabama, students expressed frustration about the “missionary call.”

“You should not consider missions unless you are called,” declared one missionary veteran. Students responded with a reasonable question: “How do I know if God has called me?”

The word “call” (kaleo) appears 296 times in the New Testament. Almost all refer to relationships and Christian standards. We are “called” as saints to be like Christ and to experience peace, grace, liberty, hope, glory, holiness, suffering and blessing.

Only two uses of the word “call” in the New Testament refer to missions. The Holy Spirit spoke to the church’s leaders in Antioch, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them” (Acts 13:2). After Paul’s vision at Troas, Luke wrote, “we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us” (Acts 16:10).

These two biblical accounts are unique. One involves a voice and the other a vision. Neither seems to convey the modern use of the word “call.” People who advocate a “missionary call” usually don’t insist on a voiced command or heavenly vision.

It seems to me that those who speak of God’s call are really speaking of a settled conviction about God’s guidance. To say, “I have been called to missionary service,” probably means, “I have come to the conviction that God wants me to serve as a missionary.”

A Dallas Seminary student once told me, “I would be a missionary, but God hasn’t called me.”

I asked, “What do you mean?”

He quickly responded, “Well, you know, I haven’t received his call!”

I persisted. “What do you mean by a ‘call’?”

After a long pause, he admitted, “I don’t know.” He realized that he was using the “call” as a convenient cop-out to missions.

It might be helpful to drop the term “call” and speak more of commitment to God’s guidance and a confident conviction of his leading.

How does God bring a person to the conviction that he or she should serve as a missionary? The Lord can make his plan clear in at least seven ways: 1. Persistent prayer 2. Precepts of the Word 3. Peace of Christ 4. Persuasion of the Spirit 5. Providential circumstances 6. Perceptive counsel of others 7. Personal gifting, training, experience and preference

I am convinced that the person who honestly seeks God’s direction and is willing to follow his guidance, will come to the settled conviction he or she needs to enter missionary service. The seven factors listed above are but a few of literally thousands of ways in which God can make his leading clear. I cannot predict how he will do it, but I am sure he will.

God could give you a ring on your cell phone or send an e-mail message. If you were to receive a message like this from God, you’d probably conclude someone was playing a trick and dismiss it altogether.

Instead of awaiting an audible call or mystic vision, we should seek his guidance and be obedient to his direction. Actually, we need no call. We have his command. “Make disciples of all nations.” He simply says, “Follow Me?”

Don’t wait for a call. Follow his guidance.

Ron Blue is international mobilizer for CAM International.