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Another great person of the Old Testament who struggled with his vocation is the prophet
Jeremiah. God said to him, before I formed you in the womb I knew you;
Before you came to birth I consecrated you;
I appointed you as prophet to the nations.” (Jer 1:5) But Jeremiah did not respond with faith,
at first he responded with lack of faith like Moses. He said, “Lord Yahweh, I do not know how to
speak, I am only a child.” (Jer 1:6) But after an interior struggle Jeremiah answered God’s call.
When God called Moses he objected many times to God’s call. God said to Moses, “I am sending
you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt” (Ex 3:11) and Moses replied,
“Who am I to go to Pharaoh…?” Then in the Book of Exodus there is a long conversation
between God and Moses and several times God has to reassure Moses that he will be with him to
help him but each time Moses finds some new excuse for not answering God’s call. The next
excuse Moses gave God was, “but suppose they [the Hebrews] will not believe me or listen to my
words, and say to me, ‘Yahweh has not appeared to you’?” (Ex 4:1). Again God reassured him
but Moses found another excuse, “Please my Lord, I have never been eloquent…for I am slow
and hesitant of speech.” (Ex 4:10). Again God reassured Moses but once again Moses made an
excuse, “Please, my Lord, send anyone you decide to send!” (Ex 4:13) It was quite a struggle for
God to get Moses to answer his call. Moses knew that it would be difficult to lead the Israelites
out of Egypt and he hesitated many times when called by God but eventually he answered the
call. He surrendered himself and his way of thinking to God who knows what is best.
New Testament
The rich young man turned his back on Jesus’ call. The young man had kept all the
commandments since his youth and we read that Jesus looked steadily at him and loved him.
Jesus asked him to do one more thing, to sell what he had and follow Jesus. But the young man’s
face fell at these words of Jesus and he went away sad. He went away sad because he wanted to
follow Jesus and he wanted to keep his possessions.