Hunt challenges Southeastern family, future missionaries to obey the call

by Lauren Crane

The greatest call of God on your life is not the call to an opportunity, but first to Christ and then to a place of service.

In a message entitled “The Call,” Johnny Hunt challenged the Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary family to examine how and to where they have been called, and think about what the call of God has meant for their lives. Hunt, pastor of First Baptist Church of Woodstock, Ga., spoke during Southeastern’s chapel service on April 15. The service, which is known as the commissioning service, also was a special time to pray over the many students and families about to enter service on the mission field.

“Over and over again I have heard God saying, ‘Preach on the call. Preach on the call.’ Then, when I come in here and hear all the news on the call – and I wish I could say this every time I preach – I thought, ‘Jesus, we got it right,’” Hunt said. “Oh, if we only knew the difference God’s call makes.”

Hunt said the first thing to do is to see how the call of God has affected your life.

“What has the clear call of God done in my life?” Hunt asked. He said it has given him confidence in the undeniable calling of Christ, courage and boldness to speak freely – though not meanly, concreteness that makes you afraid to abandon the call, commitment to the place of the call and clarity on your purpose.

“We’ve not been called to an opportunity!” Hunt said. “We’ve been called by God to the place of the call…God put me here. I am a soldier in the army of Christ. I will not be AWOL. I will not back up or shut up. I’ll stand my post until the commander-in-chief moves me.”

Speaking out of 1 Timothy 1:8, Hunt said Timothy had the call to serve God and serve the church and his commission. He, as people are now, was duty-bound to obey the Lord in that calling.

“I’m under divine mandate to do it,” Hunt said. The mandate is to worship the Lord and make his name known among the nations.

“When you know what you’re called to do – you’re called to preach the word, to embrace Christ, to love him and to make him known – then you don’t have to read the latest book to decide what you’re supposed to do. You just keep doing what you’re called to do. It doesn’t change every two years with the latest fad. ‘Well, the only way you’re going to reach people…’” Hunt said. “I’ll tell you what I’ve found in 31 years: The only thing that is going to reach anybody is the gospel of God’s son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Preach the word!”

Hunt said there is a call from without, which is the call to obey. This type of call is an affirmation from the church of the call God has placed in a person’s own heart.

“Paul was serious about God’s call on his life and he passed it on to Timothy, who was the generation coming behind him,” Hunt said. He said this was an example of how God calls people and uses the church and other believers to affirm the call. “I am enlisted as a soldier (for God) not because of my denomination and not because of any institution. I’m telling you, a holy God out of heaven spoke into my life and confirmed through the church the call of God on my life, and made me a preacher of the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

Using the example of Paul serving in Philippi, Hunt said he was special not because of his location, but because he was following the divine mandate of God.

“In regards to those who are going to serve, wherever you’re serving, I hope you say, ‘It’s because I got to,’” Hunt said. Speaking of missionaries and those called to the mission field, he said, “I thank God for them…But, sometimes I hear people say they are our heroes because of where they are. You are not our heroes because of where you are, you are our heroes because of where he is in your life and in your obedience…It’s not your place of service that makes you special. It’s your position in Christ that makes you special.”

Hunt said people also must have the conviction within themselves. Despite knowing they face danger and death, people must answer the call to follow God, whatever the circumstances.

“A servant of the Lord is duty-bound to carry out his ministries,” Hunt said. “I’d like to say to everyone, regardless of where you serve or where you’re going, I hope you’re going for one reason: ‘I got to.’ Then, when you come to the place where you’re saying ‘I got to’ you’ll begin saying, ‘I get to.’”

“If you’re called to do it, God forbid you tell the commander-in-chief you won’t serve there,” Hunt said. “Wherever you go, answer the questions, ‘Am I doing it because I am called?’”

At the end of Hunt’s message, students who are about to deploy to various parts of the world came to the front of the chapel to be prayed for. Many of them are going overseas for two or three years as the final part of their Master’s of Divinity degree in International Church Planting, also known as 2+2 or 2+3. Along with those degree students and their families, students and faculty going overseas on short-term trips this summer also came down to be prayed over.