When I start talking about theology of work and how it affects the church, people always look at me funny. I can't blame them. When I first heard "theology of work" I thought "That's the last straw - why do we have to have a theology of every single little thing? What's next, a theology of carrots? Why can't it just all be about Jesus?" I have no good answer to that question except that sometimes we get stuck in paradigms that we can't recognize until we assign them a label and a definition - and until we also label the truths that get us un-stuck. So here's a few words I wrote the other day just to remind myself how TOW really looks. Dedicated to my pastors past and present, Richard and Jeremiah - you guys showed me this before I had any idea there would be a "theology" for it, or a label! Very thankful that you're the pastors and I'm not. :) Nevertheless...
If I were a pastor,
this would be my message to my church...
Your work IS church work. When you are manufacturing
airplane parts, teaching math to small children, measuring the environmental
effects of carbon dioxide, caring for plants, or growing a small business, you
are participating in the work of God and in the work of the church. My role as
a pastor is primarily to support you in the roles and opportunities for good
works that God has given you, and to help you live these roles as someone who
is filled with the Holy Spirit and equipped for every creative task of the
Kingdom. (Yes, that includes the actual output of your job!) God’s calling to
do well where you are and to be light in your circumstances includes quality
work, and this pleases him. It also includes quality relationships with those
around you, and you are irreplaceable to the relationship circles he calls you
to, including your workplace.
Of course, part of this role of supporting you in your
vocations involves calling you to see your role in light of God’s story, which
is all about Him, in fact, not primarily about us... That’s why we get together
for worship and for church conferences and for any kind of opportunity that we
can find to rest and be strengthened and refreshed in both our understanding of
God’s story and how our stories fit into it, and in our relationships.
