Jesus in the Workplace

It has been an incredible experience, thus far, interning at ChristLife. The focus here in every task and activity we do is to do it in the same manner as Jesus himself would do it. That requires strength and grace through the power of the Holy Spirit, which is why we start every day with mourning prayer and worship in our chapel. Yet, you do not have to be working in a Catholic ministry to have Jesus as the goal and center of your workplace. In any occupation and vocation Jesus can and should motivate everything thing we do, by showing us how He himself would do it, as Dallas Willard points out in his book The Divine Conspiracy:

"But let us become as specific as possible. Consider just your job, the work you do to make a living. This is one of the clearest ways possible of focusing upon apprenticeship to Jesus. To be a disciple of Jesus is, crucially, to be learning from Jesus how to do your job as Jesus himself would do it. New Testament language for this is to do it 'in the name' of Jesus.

Once you stop and think about it, you can see that not to find your job to be a primary place of discipleship is to automatically exclude a major part, if not most, of your walking hours from life with him. It is to assume to run one of the largest areas of your interest and concern on your own or under the direction and instruction of people other than Jesus. But this is right where most professing Christians are left today, with the prevailing view that discipleship is a special calling having to do chiefly with religious activities and 'full-time Christian service.'

But how, exactly, is one to make one's job a primary place of apprenticeship to Jesus?....

A gentle but firm noncooperation with things that everyone knows to be wrong, together with a sensitive, nonofficious, nonintrusive, nonobsequious service to others, should be our usual overt manner. This should be combined with inward attitudes of constant prayer for whatever activity our workplace requires and genuine love for everyone involved....

It is not true, I think, that we fulfil our obligations to those around us by only living the gospel. There are many ways of speaking inappropriately, of course - even harmfully - but it is always true that words fitly spoken are things of beauty and power that bring life and joy. And you cannot not assume that people understand what is going on when you only live in their midst as Jesus' person. They may just regard you as one more version of human oddity.

I once knew of a case in an academic setting where at noon one professor very visibly took his Bible and lunch and went out to a nearby chapel to study, pray, and to be alone. Another professor would call his assistant into his office, where they would have sex. No one in that environment thought either activity to be anything worth inquiring about. After all, people do all sorts of things. We are used to that. In some situations it is only words that can help toward understanding." (Divine Conspiracy)