The Call - Then and Now

Call. What is this? When we talk about calling in the United Methodist Church, we are referring to the moment when we knew God had a special plan for our lives that included ministry of some sort. Once we understand that we have a call, we discern what this calling is to. This looks very different today compared to calling in the early Methodist Episcopal Church.

In many cases, during this period, people would feel the calling and immediately be thrown into ministry. The call was usually interpreted as a call to preach, which was fine if you were a white man, but it was a problem if you were a woman or not of European descent. Sometimes, women and people of African or Native descent would still be allowed to preach, but rarely were the offered the opportunity to turn their calling into a vocation. For example, Richard Allen, a black man who would later become a bishop in the AME, was only ever considered a “local deacon,” an action that wasn’t ever recognized by the Book of Discipline (Richey, The Methodist Experience in America, vol. 1, p. 143). As for Native Americans, only few ever became preachers, among them being William Apess.

And what of women? As many do now, women helped to keep the church running, usually from behind the scenes. Once they lost the ability to be class leaders, though, they no longer held any power within the church. Women were not allowed to be preachers. However, many women who experienced a call from God would go on to become pastor’s wives. Hannah Pierce Reeves was one such woman (p. 151). She experienced a call to preach, and after she was married, she was an integral part of her husband’s ministry, often preaching in his place if he was sick. Other women, such as Sally Thompson, attempted to intenerate and preach on their own. In the case of Sally Thompson, it did not end well. The Methodist Church persecuted her, and she finally decided to leave for another denomination that did not try to oppress her voice and obvious call.

This is not quite the case today. Race and gender are no longer walls put up to keep people from preaching. What happens when we experience our call? Instead of immediately being thrown into ministry, there is a long and arduous candidacy process each person must go through. It is a chance to truly understand one’s call before going into fulltime ministry. It is understood now that some people are called to preaching, some to pastoral care, some to chaplaincy, some to work with children, some to work with youth, some to work with young adults… the list could go on and on. The goal now is not to fill pulpits and convert the masses but to truly understand the gifts and talents of each individual. When these are plugged into the right place, amazing things happen.

Seems like call and discernment happens in a much better way now.