Reclaiming a Holistic Approach to Christian Calling and Vocation
The institution of work affects everyone. No matter the job, we must engage in it to make a living. Yet it is more than a job. It is a vocation. It is a calling from God wherein He has created and equipped us to minister to the lost and to effect cultural change. Many Christians who have secular jobs fail to view their work as from God; or else make a distinction between those vocations that are sacred and those that are secular, believing the latter to be less significant than the former. However, a holistic approach to Christian calling and vocation avoids such thinking. It recognizes that all vocations, sacred and secular, are from God and of equal importance to the Kingdom.
History & Background
The development of Western civilization helps to shed light on this current phenomenon. In ancient Greece, when Alexander the Great conquered the then-known world, so did Hellenistic culture and thought. Characteristic of this shift in power was the tendency to view the world in separate categories rather than an organic whole. As a result, through the centuries, the tendency to classify some vocations as sacred and others as secular slowly crept into the church. Authors Doug Sherman and William Hendricks agree, “This whole idea of secular versus religious is a Greek idea. These Greek ideas, clothed in biblical language, have for the most part, been passed down unchallenged to succeeding generations of Christians” [1]. Although categories are helpful in some situations, a distinction between sacred vocations and secular vocations has proven harmful to the mission of the church. This is further heightened by the etymology of the term “secular”.
Concurrent to this historical development was also an etymological development. “Secular” does not mean sinful or worldly, as assumed by many in the present age. Literally, it means “age” or “generation” (derived from the Latin saecularis/saeculum). Thus in the medieval church, a secular vocation was merely one that occurred outside of the monastery [2]. Hence most medieval Christians worked in secular vocations (e.g., butlers, clerks, cooks, cottars, knights, miners, porters, shoemakers, and watchmen). Yet through the centuries, the term evolved from referring to that which occurs outside of the monastery to that which occurs outside of the church. As a result, the dichotomy between the church and the world, a valid and biblical one, began to be applied to the term “secular.”
Misconception compounded upon misconception until the present day, where many persons assume that secular vocations are less noble than sacred ones, since that which is secular is worldly and sinful. Others, while not viewing sacred vocations as more important than secular ones, nonetheless make a distinction between the two. Such thinking, conscious or not, harms the body of Christ, and promotes an improper understanding of Christian vocation.
The Church: Redefining “Ministry”
Some persons have made the mistake, upon receiving the call of God on their life, of assuming that they must give it to the church by pursuing vocational ministry. Dreams of business administration, crop and animal husbandry, law, management, the medical profession, pedagogy, politics, or some other vocation must be forfeited. By so doing, however, this person has evinced an improper understanding of the ministry. The Christian’s vocation, whether in the church or not, is a ministry. “I do not believe the Bible makes a distinction between those whose livelihood is paid by the church and those who are supported by other means,” writes Dr. Ken Riggs in an article entitle, “Redefining the Ministry” [3].
An understanding of ministry that confines it to the work of the church is too narrow. It is more appropriately defined as the work and service of any Christian in any life circumstance. Dr. Riggs continues:
I am convinced there are many good believers who know they are saved, have a growing relationship with [God] but have never come to grips with the fact that what they do as a means of making an income is also their ministry. In too many cases, it’s because they have assumed the “ministry” meant you were a preacher or a missionary. They should not be blamed for that, however. They have learned that! [4]
A Proper Theology of Christian Calling and Vocation
Before ascending to heaven, Jesus stated to the eleven disciples, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations” (Mt. 28:19, NASB). In whatever capacity God has called us, we Christians should work to make disciples of all people, a task that takes place through the church, in the home, and at work. Like the Gerasene demoniac in Mark’s Gospel, many Christians, upon receiving God’s call on their life, are not called to accompany Christ and the apostles, but to “go home to [their] people” (Mk. 5:19). Though one, the body of Christ is composed of many. Though these component parts work separately in their circumstances according to their calling, they work in tandem to accomplish the church’s mission. Further, no part is more significant than another part (see 1 Cor. 12). Pastor Eugene Peterson writes, “[I]f Christian ministry is reduced to the work of pastors and the people who help them…there is not much integrity in praying, ‘Thy Kingdom Come’” [5].
Christian vocation therefore has eschatological and soteriological aspects to it [6]. Just as the Father sent Christ into the world, so He has sent us into the world, not that we are of the world, for we have been sanctified in the truth, but that the world might know Him through us (see Jn. 17:13-21). Just as Christ knelt down to wash the disciples’ feet (see Jn. 13:5-20), illustrating His incarnation and love for humankind (see Phil. 2:7), so should Christians in secular vocations kneel down and empty themselves in love to their fellow man.
Whether an author like John Milton, a composer like Bach, an entrepreneur like James Cash Penny, a lawyer like Thomas Helwys, a philosopher like Boethius, a professor like C.S. Lewis, a professional athlete like David Robinson, a restaurateur like Samuel Truett Cathy, a statesman like William Wilberforce, or a theologian like Thomas Aquinas, the Christian who is engaged in a secular vocation is involved in the ministry, and is helping to redeem the lost and to bring about “Thy Kingdom” (see Mt. 6:10) [7]. The apostle Paul writes, “Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus…[D]o your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men…It is the Lord Christ whom you serve” (Col. 3:17, 23-24, NASB).
Conclusion
The call of God upon a person is unique; it is tailored to that person’s God-given abilities and strengths. For what more is one’s vocation than a calling? (The English “vocation” is derived from the Latin vocare, simply meaning “to call.”) God’s bidding is accomplished inside of the monastery and outside of the monastery. It is accomplished inside of the church and outside of the church. Pastors ought to encourage their flock to pursue secular vocations if in fact God has led them to do so. Laymen ought to recognize that their work is more than a job, but a vocation. A holistic approach to Christian calling and vocation recognizes this. Sacred or secular, Christian vocation is a ministry from God unto the saved and the perishing.
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[1] Doug Sherman and William Hendricks, Your Work Matters To God (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1987), p. 60.
[2] Much of what follows in this paragraph is adapted from a lecture by F. Leroy Forlines in his “Systematic Theology” class.
[3] Ken Riggs, “Redefining the Ministry,” Contact (Jan. 1999), 9.
[4] Riggs, 10.
[5] Eugene Peterson, The Wisdom of Each Other: A Conversation Between Spiritual Friends (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998), 77.
[6] After explaining that a proper view of vocation is theological, Darrell Cosden offers a definition of work, “Human work is a transformative activity essentially consisting of dynamically interrelated, instrumental, relational, and ontological dimensions: whereby, along with work being an end in itself, the worker’s and others’ needs are providentially met; believers’ sanctification is occasioned; and workers express, explore and develop their humanness while building up their natural, social and cultural environments thereby contributing protectively and productively to the order of this world and the one to come” (Darrell Cosden, A Theology of Work: Work and the New Creation (Waynesboro: Paternoster Press, 2004), 178-79).
[7] For more insight on a proper theology of work and how it is eschatological and soteriological, see Darrell Cosden, The Heavenly Good of Earthly Work (Peabody: Hendrickson Publishers, 2006); David Johnson Rowe, Faith at Work: A Celebration of All We Do (Macon: Smyth & Helwys Publishing, Inc., 1994); Miroslav Volf, Work in the Spirit: Toward a Theology of Work (New York: Oxford University Press, 1991); and the Yale Center for Faith and Culture, http://www.yale.edu/faith/index.htm.
April 15, 2011
Very well written article! [originally submitted on 16 November 2010]