Part One: When the Ground Isn’t Ideal

What if your calling doesn’t begin under ideal conditions? Just like this little 18” tree growing out of a rock in my neighbor’s yard, it has no business thriving at all. 

In nearly three decades as an entrepreneur, I’ve learned a few things about how ideal conditions are rare. 

If you’re reading this, you’re probably 50+ and remember the days when we were taught to perfect whatever we were doing before launching it out into the world. The marketing plan, the written word, or the outfit/makeup we wore. It was an expectation. Everything we did was planned, and much of what we were taught was about performance and presentation. Remember the saying, “Presentation is everything?”

So when we got to the age when God gave us something to steward, and there was no way for us to perfect our presentation or performance, we were lost. The calling wasn’t supplied to us with the money, time, confidence, certainty, or support we needed to make it happen. 

What did you do?

How did you handle the calling if the conditions weren’t ideal? 

• Did you blast through anyway and trust God would make up the difference, or did you…like me, wait? 
• Or did you… like me, begin to strive for perfection BEFORE getting to the meat of it? 
• Did you…like me, simply put it off while waiting for some random sign that it was time to begin? 

I feel certain that I could list more of the ways I didn’t trust God, but I need to preserve at least a shred of dignity here. 

Yet Scripture repeatedly shows me that God works through imperfect environments.

In Exodus 4:2 has said to Moses, “What is that in your hand?” With God’s help, Moses already possessed the thing God would use.

In Zechariah 4:10, the Lord said: “Do not despise small beginnings.”

Matthew 13:31–32 tells us about how the mustard seed is the smallest seed planted yet becomes the largest of the garden plants and becomes a tree.

In our endeavors to rise to the calling God has for us, my encouragement to you is this…

I believe scripture shows us over and over that God’s presence in the calling is the focus. While the world around us will stick with its narratives, God doesn’t work within the world’s narrative. 

It is no accident that you are living in this exact time in history, with some very impressive gifts and talents placed inside of you for such a time as this. He has a unique calling on your life, and He will give you exactly what you need when you need it so that you can steward that calling. 

Take a look at the photo of the little tree again. Against all odds, it is growing in a crack on a rock, a foot off the ground. There’s a tiny bit of soil. It shouldn’t be able to grow, yet it does. The seed landed there and somehow remained there through the winter and our crazy spring winds. 

But through it all, it’s there, growing…thriving. 

Journal Prompt:

In what areas of your organization did you find yourself working with very little to nurture the calling while still being surprised by continual growth? 

Prayer for you…

Abba Father,

I pray for the one reading this. I pray for their business or non-profit. I pray for them to be able to use the talents and gifts in new and fun ways they’ve not considered before. I pray that any heaviness that sits on them right now be lifted so they have clarity around your purpose and plan for them. “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”