Work as Mission

This afternoon, I napped for 3 hours, so I am having trouble sleeping; partly because of the nap, but also partly because of the craziness in my head right now. Tonight our pastor gave one of the most pointed sermons I have ever heard him give.

He began to work out a philosophy of work as mission. He used a lot of Scripture and personal experiences and beliefs to encourage us to begin to see our work and lives differently. He talked about the separation that has happened between clergy and laymen. He talked about the professionalization of full-time ministry. He talked about the Biblical basis for the church doing the work of ministry/mission and the pastors equipping the saints for that work of ministry. He talked about our false views of following Jesus as happening only on Sundays.

His main points centered on the fact that we do not see our work as our mission field. The paradigm that exists in Midland right now during this boom is GET IN, GET MINE, and GET OUT. This paradigm presupposes the wrong purpose as to why we work the job we do. This ‘get mine’ mentality centers on getting enough to live the lifestyle we want or to retire at a certain time with enough. He broke down the idea of retirement and called us to finish the race marked out with endurance, not to strive to get to relax.

A central piece of understanding is the Great Commission in Matthew 28:19-20. ‘Go therefore and make disciples…’ We read it in our English translations as a command or an imperative, but in fact it is not a command. The central verb in this sentence is the make disciples (evangelize or gospeling), not the go. It could be read ‘as you go’, ‘while you go’, ‘as you are going’, ‘as you are doing’, instead of ‘go’. He connected this with Colossians 3:23, which talks about doing all that we do to the glory of God.

So the point is that it does not matter what job or career we find ourselves in. It is not important whether we are happy or even satisfied with that job. What matters is that we see all that we do through the lenses of mission.

This is a hard sermon to hear no matter how ‘good’ or ‘bad’ one is currently doing at making disciples in our workplaces. Although difficult to hear, this kind of reminder refocuses us on what we are to be about.

He poked some fun at our ideas of missions as trips overseas witnessing to the poor African or Asian. He talked about how hard we might work to contextualize the gospel to these people and how committed we will be to devotions and prayer while being on mission. Yet, in our daily lives we hardly pause in the mornings to even reflect on the souls that we will intermingle with that day. We hardly consider how it is we might engage those at work. We hardly consider that we are on mission at every moment, or we are not.

He seemed to negate the need for ‘missions’ in the traditional understanding, yet I know this is not his heart. He understands the need for people to be going overseas to places that will never hear the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. However, it did bother me that he somewhat negated the full-time cross-cultural ministry that is necessary.

I understand where he is coming from. He pastors a church in Midland, Texas and is primarily concerned with the people that will exist here. Most people will not spend their lives in a foreign country or in a professional ministry position. Most people will be normal, average Joes who work in the oil industry out here. He understands this, so in order for him to have the most impact, he has to impact the average Joe and Jane. Most people will be content coming to Church on Sundays and seeing the paid staff of pastors doing the entire ministry. This is neither biblical nor healthy. He wants to see radical, daily commitment from the body to be the hands and feet of Jesus every day in the places we spend the majority of our time.

There will be no great reconciliation movement from more songs, sermons, summer camps, or revival services. We need people to so treasure Jesus Christ that each day is seen as a mission.

It was interesting listening to this sermon and catching eye contact with him throughout. He knows my life course for the time being. We have talked about how God might use my Petroleum background and passion for Jesus for the Kingdom. But I know in my heart of hearts that I have not been the missionary at Chevron that I so desire to be at the ends of the earth. I have engaged some and seen some fruit from being faithful, but not near to the extent that I could have.

This sermon really challenged me in two areas. The first is to be fully engaged with the people around me for the next 2.5 months at Chevron. The second is to continue to pursue how God might use Petroleum Engineering and Seminary as mission. I pray that we would be challenged to see work/life as mission.