Monday 3rd November - Jacob's Calling

DAILY BYTE

Have you ever discovered something that brought unexpected joy into your day? Like putting on a pair of jeans you haven’t worn in a while and discovering money in the pocket!

Or looking up the answer to a long-running argument you were having with your spouse and discovering that you were right all along! What a fantastic feeling ... that must be. I say ‘must be’ because that actually hasn’t happened to me yet, but here’s hoping that maybe one day ...

After making a start on it last week, this week we will continue discussing the topic of ‘calling’ – this is the idea that God has created all people with a special purpose and destiny in mind and that central to life and fulfilment itself is living in a way that is obedient to this calling.

However, the topic of calling seems to be an area where there are many misconceptions and misunderstandings clouding something that should actually be joyful and life-giving for us.

We live with so many questions surrounding our callings that we are prevented from moving forward into them in any meaningful way. Questions such as: What exactly is my calling and how do I find it? If I do find it then how am I meant to express it? Why do others seem called by God and have these powerful dreams for their lives but not me? I understand how God could have used wonderful people like Mother Theresa or Bishop Tutu, but what possible use could he have for someone like me?

This is what I love about the story of Jacob. When Jacob is first called by God, he has just totally messed up his life. He has lied and weaselled his way one time too many, and then been caught out and so forced to flee for his life. In the middle of his journey, late one dark night, Jacob flings himself down with a stone for a pillow and has a dream.

It is an incredible dream where God affirms and calls him. Yes, God promises Jacob, lying, deceitful, little coward that he is, that he would be used by God in a quite wonderful way.

This is why I think that if we spend some time in the company of Jacob’s dream it could teach us much about our own. If we recognise the sheer grace that was behind Jacob’s calling, then we might create some space in our hearts to receive that also.

We may even make some joyful and unexpected discoveries about God’s plans to use us to make a difference in this world.

Do some thinking for yourself around the topic of call. Do you feel called by God? What larger purpose does your life have? Commit your thinking to God in prayer.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Gracious Father, help me to understand something more about my life’s larger destiny and purpose. Help me to move through any misconceptions and misunderstandings I might have. May this week be one where I joyfully discover truths about my life that I was not fully aware of before. Amen.

FOCUS READING

Genesis 28. 10-15 NRSV

Jacob left Beer-sheba and went toward Haran. He came to a certain place and stayed there for the night, because the sun had set. Taking one of the stones of the place, he put it under his head and lay down in that place. And he dreamed that there was a ladder set up on earth, the top of it reaching to heaven; and the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And the Lord stood beside him said, “I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and God of Isaac; the land on which you lie I will give you and to your offspring; and your offspring shall be like the dust of the earth, and you shall spread abroad to the west and to the east and to the north and to the south; and all the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring. Know that I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.”

Sunday 2nd November - Udobo

Weekend Blurb

The BDC is a weekday devotional aimed at anyone and everyone who struggles to keep up with the stressful demands of daily life.

This is why there are no weekend devotions prepared; however look out for your next update which will be this Monday.

Every weekend we will use this space to focus on a different mission project. This is an excellent opportunity to see how many people are striving to make a real difference in this country, and also how you might become involved.



The Udobo School is a pre-primary school that gives hope through love and education to children from poor and marginalized backgrounds in the urban area of Montwood Park, Durban, South Africa. Some of the children are orphans as a result of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The name ‘Udobo’ is the Zulu word for ‘fishing rod’ and is based on the adage, “Give me a fish and I’ll eat for a day, teach me to fish and I’ll eat for a lifetime”. The school program provides for social, emotional, cognitive, intellectual, aesthetic and physical development of the children within a loving, caring, and safe environment. A Trust called ‘The Udobo Ed-U Foundation’ was established to receive funding on behalf of the school both locally and abroad.

The Udobo Ed-U Foundation
First National Bank of South Africa
Branch No. 221026
Branch Name : Mobeni
A/c : 62061351442
Forex SWIFT No. FIRNZAJJ762

Saturday 1st November - Udobo

Weekend Blurb

The BDC is a weekday devotional aimed at anyone and everyone who struggles to keep up with the stressful demands of daily life.

This is why there are no weekend devotions prepared; however look out for your next update which will be this Monday.

Every weekend we will use this space to focus on a different mission project. This is an excellent opportunity to see how many people are striving to make a real difference in this country, and also how you might become involved.



The Udobo School is a pre-primary school that gives hope through love and education to children from poor and marginalized backgrounds in the urban area of Montwood Park, Durban, South Africa. Some of the children are orphans as a result of the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The name ‘Udobo’ is the Zulu word for ‘fishing rod’ and is based on the adage, “Give me a fish and I’ll eat for a day, teach me to fish and I’ll eat for a lifetime”. The school program provides for social, emotional, cognitive, intellectual, aesthetic and physical development of the children within a loving, caring, and safe environment. A Trust called ‘The Udobo Ed-U Foundation’ was established to receive funding on behalf of the school both locally and abroad.

The Udobo Ed-U Foundation
First National Bank of South Africa
Branch No. 221026
Branch Name : Mobeni
A/c : 62061351442
Forex SWIFT No. FIRNZAJJ762

Friday 31 October - Calling : Part 2

DAILY BYTE

Yesterday we started looking at God’s call as a source of hope and life for our world. The surprising but very good news is that when God’s call is heard and obeyed, when women and men give their lives to what God asks of them, there is truly a whole new creation that unfolds. The call of God taking root within ordinary people has the power to make all things new.

Tragically, God’s call is not always heard or obeyed. The pages of history and scripture are littered with the stories of those who have tried to turn aside from God’s call.

We think of people like Moses, Gideon, Jonah and Jeremiah who tried to duck and dive from God’s call staking a claim over their lives. The reasons that they gave for their reluctance and resistance sound strangely familiar. For they are the reasons we also use – I’m not equipped, I’m not sufficiently resourced, I’m not worthy, I’m too young, I’m too old, I don’t have the time, I don’t want to go.

Sometimes the resistance is expressed not all at once, but bit by bit, gradually over time, as people allow themselves to drift from God’s call until they find themselves living not out of the fiery passion of divine purpose, but out of the cold ash heap of mediocrity and irrelevance.

But I ask you, why would we settle for anything less than our highest calling?
Why would we not want to put these miraculous lives to magnificent purpose?
Why would we not risk everything to let our one chance at life be put to great and glorious good by an infinitely gracious God?

Maybe, like Jeremiah, we are just too aware of our own inadequacy. When he heard that God had appointed him a prophet to the nations, Jeremiah offers this somewhat panicked response, “But I don’t know how to speak, for I’m just a boy.”

Interestingly, God doesn’t even argue the point for it seems that Jeremiah is telling the truth. All that God says is, “Don’t SAY you’re just a boy. Because true though that may be, it is utterly irrelevant. It is irrelevant because you’ll go where I send you. You’ll speak whatever I command. So do not be afraid, for I am with you.

And then God touches Jeremiah’s mouth and declares that God’s very words, filled with endless creative and life-giving power, are now in him.

And so it is with us. In response to God’s call we offer our reasoned explanations as to why this is a bad idea, as if God is unaware of who we are in the first place and doesn’t really know what God’s doing. And many of our reasons are indeed accurate. But for one thing: in the eyes of God they are utterly irrelevant.

Let me say it as plainly as I can. If you’re seized by the call of God, of course you’ll feel inadequate, ill-equipped, unworthy. Get over it. Dare to believe that God is not limited by your limitations, and so neither should you. And remember that God’s call always always always comes with God’s gracious promise, “I will be with you.”

This is reason for great hope indeed.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Lord, tomorrow is All Saints’ Day, a day when we remember the lives of the countless women and men over the ages who have faithfully served you and poured out their lives to the glory of your name. May their example inspire us to heed your call and commit ourselves to your eternal purposes, for the sake of hope and healing for our world. Amen.

SCRIPTURE READING

Jeremiah 1:4-8

Now the word of the LORD came to me saying,
"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
and before you were born I consecrated you;
I appointed you a prophet to the nations."
Then I said, "Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy."

But the LORD said to me,
"Do not say, 'I am only a boy';
for you shall go to all to whom I send you,
and you shall speak whatever I command you.
Do not be afraid of them,
for I am with you to deliver you,
says the LORD."

Thursday 30 October - Calling : Part 1

DAILY BYTE

In the beginning, the Bible tells us, God SPOKE everything into existence. All God had to do was say the word, and the heavens and the earth burst into being. How incredible, that the words that come from the mouth of God are filled with the most awesome creative and life-giving power.

God spoke the words, and it was so. And God looked upon everything that God had made and saw that it was very good.

But we are all painfully aware that God’s good creation, spoken into existence, has gone sadly awry. We live in a world that is all too familiar with the realities of war, poverty, global warming, violence, rape, abuse, AIDS and greed. Ours is a world in chains longing for liberation. Ours is a world crying out to be made new.

So I ask you, “Don’t you think it’s past time for God to speak once again? To utter words of recreating and redeeming power over this broken world?” God did so in the beginning, and look what happened. Surely God could do it again. Surely it’s not too hard for God to say, “Let there be peace in the Middle East, and throughout the world for that matter,” and for it to be so.

Surely it’s not too hard for God to say, “Let there be an end to poverty and hunger and the indignities of human deprivation,” and for it to be so.

For God to say, “Let there be the resolving of all conflicts, the healing of all hurts, the binding up of all brokenness,” and for it to be so.

If only the voice of God could sound once again over the chaos all around us, as it did in the beginning, bringing order and harmony and light and life. Wouldn’t that be something? Wouldn’t that be reason for hope and rejoicing?

The good news is that God is speaking, right now. God’s voice is sounding over the chaos of our fallen human condition, right now. Words that are filled with creative and life-giving power, that come from the very mouth of God, are being uttered right now, bringing great hope to our world.

But here’s the thing: they take shape in a most surprising and unexpected way. Sometimes barely more than a whisper, the words that can bring hope alive for our world come to us in the form of a call.

“Come, and follow me.”
“Go into all the world in my name.”
“Live the life of purpose and significance I have prepared for you.”
“Embrace the work I have ordained for you.”
“Fulfil the destiny I have dreamed for you.”
“Be the hope for this world that I have created you to be.”

That’s God’s plan. It’s a simple strategy – to call women and men to be a part of a great purpose of bringing hope to the world.

We see this plan unfolding from the very beginning. No sooner were human beings created than God was enlisting them to share in the care of creation. We see this plan unfolding as God calls Israel to be God’s people, a light unto the nations. We see it in the life and ministry of Jesus. No sooner had he begun his work of announcing the coming of the kingdom, than Jesus starts calling disciples to join him in this great mission of love to the world.

Do you see the pattern? Do you get God’s plan? To call people like you and me to be a part of what God is doing. In fact, to depend upon people like you and me to be a part of what God is doing. This is completely unexpected. Altogether surprising It’s not the plan that we would have made. But this is what God has chosen.

And when God’s call is heard and obeyed. When we place our very lives under the authority of God’s life-giving word, then quite wondrously and miraculously we become channels of hope and healing for a needy world.

PRAY AS YOU GO

Lord God you have a plan and purpose for my life that will bring hope to this world. Thank you. Help me to hear and obey whatever it is that you are calling me to do today. Amen.

SCRIPTURE READING

Mark 1:16-18

Jesus saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him.