Sunday, January 27, 2013

why "work" isn't a four letter word


Vocation

My daughter loves nature. Baking mud pies, catching lizards, climbing trees, gazing at stars, playing with her 3 dogs, one cat, one turtle, one parakeet, and the newest addition to the family, an orphaned baby hummingbird.

At six years old, she's exhibiting an insatiable appetite for learning about the animal kingdom. Perhaps she'll be a zoologist. Broadly, perhaps her love for nature will nurture her love for learning. Many of us know that such passions at an earlier age have the ability to drive us along a path that may not necessarily end where we expect but nevertheless leads us right into the very thing we were always meant to be.

Madam toastmaster, fellow members, and anyone who's been impassioned to do something or be someone, this is a quick study in vocation.

Today we typically use the word vocation to describe a specific type of trade school or occupational training program or simply a job.

Vocation however is much broader, grander, richer, fuller, and even holier.

The word vocation is derived from the Latin "vox" or voice; "vocatio" or summons; "vocare" or to call.

According to Webster's dictionary, vocation has three definitions.

1 a summons or strong inclination to a particular state or course of action; especially a divine call to the religious life
2 the work in which a person is employed or occupation
3 the special function of an individual or group

Let's condense those definitions for this morning's study. I propose that vocation essentially means three things:

Occupation. The call to action.
Compassion. The call to help.
Commission. The call of a Caller.

Lets begin our short study with a view of occupation.  In simplest terms, we are called to action. My daughter's curiosity of nature, in particular, animals, may lead her to a job at a zoo or as a veterinarian or on the Serengeti. Ask any child today what they want to be when they grow up and they answer quickly and confidently. We all hear or know of people who at a very young age knew they’d become a scientist or fireman or secretary or salesman.

My wife inherently knew she wanted to be a teacher. She’d arrange her toyroom as a classroom and instruct her siblings and cousins to follow along in the lesson of the day.

Confucius is known to have said, “Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.” His point is clear, when we identify our personal, self-evident interests, talents and passions, we can pursue vocation with purpose, discipline, conviction, enjoyment and action.

Sometimes we may not necessarily know the specifics of our vocation but we sense its essence; to help others.

In the broadest sense, the second definition of vocation is that we are called to serve others with compassion; often said as benefiting the common good.

Compassion isn’t just an empathetic, emotive response. It speaks to the heart of what we all, in some capacity, exercise: the organic declaration that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

During the Cold War, John Kennedy in a plea to the world’s civility said, “For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal.”

The easy examples of considerate and compassionate vocations are doctors, nurses, teachers and ministers. But the McDonald’s worker is showing compassion by helping to feed others. It probably doesn’t sound as noble as feeding the homeless woman but maybe that’s because we’ve not clearly examined vocation. The man that paves the potholes is saving your car from damage and your pocketbook from emptiness. The Edison engineer is helping to provide power to your home so that you can live comfortably and safely when its 110-degrees outside. The lumberman who mills trees ensures that we have roofs over our heads.

And when some of us don’t’ fulfill the call to compassion we are reminded by other compassionate people, legislators, judges and police officers.

The point is simple; we are called to show compassion to one another and to ensure that our deepest, basic human needs are fulfilled.

Finally, if what we’ve said is true; that is, that we are predisposed with certain character traits and talents and passions and expectations and desires and longings that call us to action.  And that these convictions are placed in each of us to serve an occupation that enables us to express compassion toward one another—then it may help us to briefly consider that these gifts are the result of a commission.

My final thought on vocation is that in order to have been called, there must be a Caller. A commission originates from a Commissioner.

Earlier I quoted the Declaration of Independence, that we “are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights”. If then, we hold these truths to be self-evident, that these basic building blocks of society and common good and occupation and compassion are established by a divine Creator; then we must consider the commission of vocation with some basic concession and appreciation of the Creator Himself.

This God personally demonstrated vocation when in the very opening act we are told He planted a garden within the Garden and invited man and woman to join with Him in working and cultivating and enjoying the fruits of their labors. In other words, labor was always designed to be a divine appointment where we could participate with God in the ordering, nurturing and caring of this present world.

It is in this basic framework of how the world should function that we glimpse the full purpose and prose and power of vocation. We are called by a Creator to action in order to help others and to ultimately serve a far grander role than just working for the weekend. I’m afraid that if we miss this component of vocation, we are simply spinning our wheels, accomplishing nothing, going nowhere, often resenting work.

Ultimately, we are called so that we might imitate the Divine in bringing heaven to earth, just as the Lord’s Prayer states, “your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”.

Saint Paul the Apostle reminded us that all work is sacred, “Whatever you do, work at it wholeheartedly as though you were doing it for the Lord and not merely for people,” he wrote in his letter to an early church in Colossia.

In closing, may we continue to study vocation as a means by which we achieve the very things we were always meant to and to help the world in ways we were ultimately designed to by the Great Commissioner Himself.

Saturday, January 26, 2013

insanity is politics as usual


Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results cautioned Albert Einstein.

I'd like to propose to you this morning, in my very short window, that politics as usual is insanity.

During this election season, we'll hear promises from the right and from the left and from everyone in between. We'll hear that government is bad and that government is good. We'll hear that taxes are too high and that taxes are too low. We'll hear that he's right and he's moderate and he's wrong. That his proposal or program or policy or philosophy is spot on or far off. We'll hear that a vote for him will change the course of America, and the world, forever.

This morning I propose that all of these political commentaries are only a glimpse of a grander narrative.

Throughout human history we've seen nations rise and fall; some by foreign force, some by civil war. Kings and queens have ascended and descended the throne. Dictators have captured power and squandered it away. Some nations conquered by war, as when Alexander the Great ruled Greece and established one the largest empires the world has known. Some men were defeated from within, as when Brutus and Roman senators betrayed and assassinated Julius Caesar, one of Rome's most famous and powerful emperors. The royal thrones of England and France and Spain no longer lead missions to colonize the world. Some regimes were expelled by a revolution of its populous, seen in Egypt just last year.

The best and the worst of them have come and gone.

The Republic of Rome, Nazi Germany, the British Monarchy. Napoleon, Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, Saddam Hussein.

What was the common denominator of these political regimes, these world powers, these leading figures? They were fleeting human institutions. The Psalmist wrote of this stark reality, "Don't put your confidence in powerful people; there is no help for you there. When they breathe their last, they return to the earth, and all their plans die with them."

You see, the grandest plans, the most ambitious policies, the most powerful men, they are small solutions to a grander problem. All the kings men and all the kings horses can't put Humpty Dumpty together again. There is something terribly wrong with humanity.

A quick recap of human history shows that despite man's best political plans, poverty and corruption and greed and murder and pain still exist. Dictators and presidents and Caesars and mayors have lived and governed and died yet wars are still waged even after the war to end all wars. Malaria still kills hundreds of thousands of people per year. I don't have time to list our own national, state and local concerns. In the final analysis, man can not broker world peace or heal the world's diseases or end local crime sprees.

So what then, am I suggesting we throw up our hands and throw in the towel? Do we live in apathy, lower our expectations and abandon all hope?

I respond with a resounding NO. I don't suggest we become disconnected and walk away from our duties as citizens of a great democracy.  Afterall, the famous quote is true, "The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing". As people of the greatest country ever established, we each have a role and a responsibility to do good.

However, what I wish to remind myself and others of is that today's political discourse must be taken with a grain of salt. The expectation that politics alone is the key to economic recovery or social justice or world peace must be reconsidered in light of its historical reputation. Political remedies are fleeting, here today and gone tomorrow.  Politics must be appreciated in its proper context within the grander narrative of human history.

Fortunately, in contrast, there were ancient writers who foretold of a promised kingdom to come, one that would never end nor be destroyed. One that we could hope on.

Indeed, that kingdom began its invasion nearly two thousand years ago at the most significant event in human history. We mark our calendar by it. Today is September 24, 2012 anno domini, Latin for "in the year of our Lord." Yes, I believe the contrast to man's noble, yet feeble, political efforts to bring justice and peace to the world lies in the story of the one called Christ.

As a young Jewish rabbi, Jesus was asked what he thought of all this political rhetoric. He replied, "Give unto Caesar what is Caesar's" and later He said to the Roman governor who was to sentence Him to death, "You would have no power at all unless it were given to you from above." You see, Jesus understood the contrast between man's institutions and the one He was inaugurating; His was a kingdom that was from above. We all know his prayer, "Our Father, may your Kingdom come, on earth, as it is in Heaven."

In summary, the carol rings true, His kingdom is the good news that will bring peace on earth and goodwill to men.

I conclude that the contrast between that heavenly kingdom and man's politics highlights the difference between eternity and insanity.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

relationship restored

And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him. For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!” :2 Corinthians 5.18-20

life-giving perfume

But thank God! He has made us his captives and continues to lead us along in Christ’s triumphal procession. Now he uses us to spread the knowledge of Christ everywhere, like a sweet perfume. Our lives are a Christ-like fragrance rising up to God. But this fragrance is perceived differently by those who are being saved and by those who are perishing. To those who are perishing, we are a dreadful smell of death and doom. But to those who are being saved, we are a life-giving perfume. And who is adequate for such a task as this? :2 Corinthians 2.14-16

to change one's mind or purpose

"Repent" is a word used often in the church. It carries alot of baggage. So what does it really mean: http://strongsnumbers.com/greek/3340.htm. Simply, it means to turn toward God. Wherever you are, whatever your circumstances, He desires you to change your mind and your purpose.

My early blogs will be short. ;)

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

N.T. Wright

N.T. Wright moves mountains. I'll post more about my recent readings of some of his new books. For now, read anything he's written in the last few years.

Sunday, July 25, 2010

the Word is God

And remember, the Lord’s patience gives people time to be saved. :2 Peter 3.15

My heart has heard you say, “Come and talk with me.” And my heart responds, “Lord, I am coming.” :Psalm 27.8

See how very much our Father loves us, for he calls us his children, and that is what we are." :1 John 3.1

But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. :1 John 4.8