Roots and Routes: Calling, Ministry, and the Power of Place

Randy Litchfield's fresh look at the perennial question of vocation combines theological reflection on the development of personal spiritual identity with a thoughtful look at the significant dimension of place - how the realities of our contexts call for particular responses to vocation in specific times and places.

Roots and Routes helps pastors and leaders claim a rich vocational imagination for recognizing God's ongoing call to partnership in the specific, concrete locales of ministry.

The Carnegie Institute's rich ethnographic studies of graduate education in the professions reveal that guiding experiences of risk are at the heart of professional development - combining call with experiences in the actual realities of professional life. Hence the emphasis on field education and internships. But how can we help pastors and leaders see calling as a life-long process of discernment and response? With ministerial burnout (and confusion) at an all-time high, connecting the dots between the ongoing call of God and the specific locales of ministry is an interpretive life-skill necessary for pastors, leaders, and disciples of Jesus Christ.

Failed vocational imagination obstructs the effectiveness of individuals and the church as a whole in fulfilling their mission of partnership with God's creating, redeeming, and sustaining work in the world.

The primary audience for the book is seminary educators and students and pastors. It also has congregational leaders in mind.