Defending God's Calling

As a parent with grown children that choose not to tell me even rudiments of what is going on with their lives, I read their blogs. My son is a poet while studying to be a pastor. He posts his poetry frequently on his poetry blog. His poetry and his blog don't really tell me much of what's going in his head or heart. He will answer email I send him, but it's standard male one-word grunt-speak. That's ok. I used to be fluent in male one-word grunt-speak. Fluency fades quickly if you don't use the language much. Thank God for small miracles :-).

My daughter, my beloved daughter... My daughter does not email with me and only rarely talks to me on the phone because she wants, "to hear my Dad's voice." So read her blog and the churches website to glean what little I can about what is going on in her life.

My daughter is called by God to be a pastor, and called to be a church planter. In 2000, she began college as a Theology major at a local Christian University. From the beginning, she has had to answer the question of what she, as a woman, thought she was doing on a Divinity path. She graduated in Theology, very near the top of her class. She went to a conservative Christian graduate school in Boston to get her Masters of Divinity. She was not well treated there. She left early with a Masters in Christian Education. She finally received her MDiv, but not without challenges to her calling.

About 2 years ago, she was called by a denomination to plant a church. It took some time and a great deal of effort and God's own support, but her little congregation is beginning to fly with wings of angels. Thinking of how Poppa has blessed her ... somehow my darn glasses have gotten wet and I can't see my keyboard. Must be the rain... Anyway, the little church God has given her to shepherd makes an impact all out of proportion to the size of the congregation.

She is new to the denomination which has called her. She is taking advantage of some classes in this denomination's Theology. The other day the question posed to the students was, basically, "How do you address the protest of people in the congregation who believe that women cannot be spiritual leaders." Her initial response to the question is that it needs to be asked, but her heart, I can feel it being twisted and wrung dry, is just breaking that she has to write the same paper she has been writing for 10 years. She laments,

"how deeply i long to never again defend the calling God has placed on my life...and how deeply i know this probably will never end.

i will be writing the same paper as long as God continues to call me to this life."

My heart just breaks for her.

As I thought about her writings, the parallel between my beloved daughter having to defend the Calling on her life to be a woman and a pastor and the Father creating me to be transgender and called to be His servant to the people of His flock. Jesus, the One Who Loves Me, responds to the questions of sin in the life of the man born blind [or born transgender] in John 9:3, Jesus answered, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.(ESV)" I pray that Poppa uses me for His Glory. Like my daughter, I know I will be defending God's calling on my life to be transgender and to be a part of His loving arms reaching out to the ones he loves.