At the Catalyst blog Tullian Tchividjian, pastor at Coral Ridge Presbyterian church, explores the concept of a Christian vocation in a post entitled ‘Our Calling, Our Spheres’:
Martin Luther was once approached by a working man who wanted to know how he could serve the Lord. Luther asked him, “What is your work now?” The man replied, “I’m a shoemaker.”
Much to the cobbler’s surprise, Luther replied, “Then make a good shoe and sell it at a fair price.”
He didn’t tell the man to make “Christian shoes.” He didn’t tell him to leave his shoes and become a monk.
As Christians, we can serve God in a variety of vocations. And we don’t need to justify that work, whatever it is, in terms of its “spiritual” value or evangelistic usefulness. We simply exercise whatever our calling is with new God-glorifying motives, goals, and standards.
Outwardly there may be no discernible difference between a non-Christian’s work and that of a Christian. A transformational approach to culture doesn’t mean every human activity practiced by a Christian (designing computers, repairing cars, selling insurance, or driving a bus) must be obviously and externally different from the same activities practiced by non-Christians.
Read the whole post here.
On his own blog, On Earth As It Is In Heaven, Tchividjian provides another summary of his recent Twitter posts on the Gospel.
Some samples:
- God’s love for me and approval of me does not get bigger when I obey or smaller when I disobey. This makes me want to obey him more, not less!
- When you trust in Jesus, your identity and worth is no longer based on what you can accomplish but on what Jesus accomplished for you.
- If you’re overly concerned with what others think then your living in the prison of human approval. Only the gospel can set you free!
- We only start “doing better” as we increasingly focus on what Jesus has already done, not on what we must do.
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