"Calling in Context" (Susan Lynn Maros)

TITLE: Calling in Context: Social Location and Vocational Formation
AUTHOR: Susan Lynn Maros
PUBLISHER: Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2022, (240 pages).

Calling is a much-talked-about topic whenever there is a life transition. The Bible says it. People use it. We live it. From looking for a life partner to trying to find a job; choosing a college to commit to making investments; the word "calling" has been used, misused, and sometimes abused. Some say calling is for those contemplating entering into a ministry, while others apply it specifically to schools, jobs, and various project assignments. The truth is, any specific calling needs to be seen in its proper contexts simply because we are all unique. Our participation in the working out of this calling is also unique. With hindsight, author and professor Susan Maros admit that a lot of instruction about calling in our world has been restricted to "well-intentioned, White, evangelical, individualistic" views. Gradually, after hearing stories from friends and colleagues from different cultural backgrounds, she grows to apply the concept of calling to a wider world. In this book, Maros shows us step by step how our understanding of calling is influenced by our social and cultural contexts. Calling our existing maps problematic, she takes us through mental maps which often become the lens with which we interpret our world. She then takes a few notches up the ladder of deconstruction to question the way we use "biblical models" in our mental maps. This alone should make many of us sit up and reconsider our own mental maps and our own definitions of what it means to think biblically about calling. Specifically, she identifies five key characteristics in most theological thinking:

"Part-Time is Plenty" (G. Jeffrey MacDonald)

TITLE: Part-Time is Plenty: Thriving without Full-Time Clergy
AUTHOR: G. Jeffrey MacDonald
PUBLISHER: Louisville, LY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2020, (180 pages).

For many churches, pastors are hard to find. More specifically, finding the right fit between pastor and church is even more difficult, if not impossible. The need will always be there, but pastors will come and go. If one casually checks the websites of various churches, one would quickly realize how many churches need to hire clergy for their various ministries. The signs are not encouraging. With more seminaries shutting down or downsizing due to declining student enrollment, this impacts the pool of new qualified graduates available for churches. Financial challenges are plenty as well. Many churches with aging members experience sharp declines in revenue. With full-time clergy hard to find, financial resources being stretched, and the difficulty of fitting together different expectations, finding a pastor might very well be close to impossible. Churches' budgets are squeezed. Candidates' expectations continue to rise. Demands on sacrificial service are made on a decreasing pool of willing people. In a climate where the demands are so high and the supply so low, we need to do something about it. There needs to be a new model to ensure that churches are still able to function in an environment where full-time clergy are hard, if not impossible to find. What if we lower our search toward part-timers? What if we learn to see opportunities instead of problems? What if we modify the current ways of doing Church to fit the new reality? This would require a paradigm shift. For some, it might mean changing expectations of seismic proportions. Before that could happen, perhaps re-education is required. This book shows the way to prepare our hearts for a new reality. Realizing the potential of part-timers, author G. Jeffrey MacDonald was awarded a grant by BTS Center nonprofit to visit congregations with part-time clergy in ten states in the US. Fair to say, there are some churches where membership dropped when they switched to part-time clergy. Yet, there are also others whose membership stayed strong, even thrived. 

"Every Job a Parable" (John Van Sloten)

TITLE: Every Job a Parable: What Walmart Greeters, Nurses, and Astronauts Tell Us about God
AUTHOR: John Van Sloten
PUBLISHER: Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2017, (220 pages).

Is God really interested in our jobs? What if our jobs are powerful windows into God's work in our lives? What is the relationship between our faith and our jobs? What does it mean to work joyfully as for the Lord? Can ordinary routine jobs be as significant as those mover-and-shaker jobs? These are everyday questions that would pique the interest of anyone out there working in the marketplace.

Your work matters to God because you matter to God. Every job is a story of this relationship. Through our jobs, we exercise our vocation to demonstrate God's grace in our work and the daily things we do. Through each vocation, author and preacher John Van Sloten has discovered a unique narrative in each of them. He calls it a "kind of parable," a unique story in which God manifests Himself in our work through us. He hopes that this book will spark in each reader a "renewed vocational imagination"to trust that because God is with them in their workplace, they would reveal God's glory in everything they do. In a secular age, it would seem impossible to even talk about things of faith in the marketplace. Yet, there is a way. Opportunities abound for the discerning. He shares about how a Walmart employee named Shirley puts customers before herself, just like Christ who put others before Himself. The forensic psychologist in searching for healing recognizes the powerful role of the Holy Spirit to heal and to make people whole. For Sam Kolias, one of Canada's largest residential landlords, it is a reminder that we are all God's tenants on earth. Through the many vocations, we learn about the different ways in which our gifts and talents are put to good use, all reflecting God's creative work in us.

"The Gospel At Work" (Sebastian Traeger & Greg Gilbert)

TITLE: The Gospel at Work: How Working for King Jesus Gives Purpose and Meaning to Our Jobs
AUTHOR: Sebastian Traeger & Greg Gilbert
PUBLISHER: Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2013, (160 pages).

This is a surprisingly good and useful book on vocation, work, and ministry. Some books cover topics of faith and work with a greater emphasis on good works and ethics. Others cover the topic with theological depth that appeals more to scholars and less to laypersons. Still, there are those that promise a lot but disappoints at the end. This latest effort looks the same at first, but offers a unique take on what it means to let the gospel guide our work. The key idea is this. We have only one employer, and that is God. We have only one calling, and that is calling to God. In fact, it is not what we do but who we work for that makes all the difference. This one big idea drives the entire focus of the book.

When the authors make use of the phrase "King Jesus," it reminds me straightaway of another brilliant book called "The King Jesus Gospel." What Scott McKnight was able to do for evangelism and outreach everywhere, Sebastian Traeger and Greg Gilbert manage to do the same for workplace and faith ministry efforts everywhere. Traeger and Gilbert's years of experience in both the marketplace as well as in ministry settings have lent an additional layer of credibility to this latest book. Beginning with a focus on what our primary motivation for work is, Traeger and Gilbert help us fuse this with the greatest commandment to love God, love people, and serve all. In all things, the way to witness is to shine forth God's character in all things we do. This one tip trumps all other detailed methodologies or strategies that can be unwieldy and confusing.

What I really appreciate is the way the authors warn readers about the dual threats against the living out of King Jesus focus. They created a brilliant visual of an arrow, sandwiched by the pits of idleness and idolatry. Slacken in our faithfulness and we fall into the pit of idleness. Overly engrossed in fruitfulness risks plunging oneself deeper into idolatry. Thus, the guiding principle is to make sure we avoid idleness by sustaining our faithful living throughout, and to refrain from idolatry by being measured in our push for fruitful living. In helping us recognize the promises and perils of working in this fallen world, readers will find this a very intuitive guide to recognize when to push and when to pull back. Once we catch the main point, the rest of the motivations and methods in the book becomes more tightly knitted instead of scattered offerings. This is important because living for God is not about compartmentalizing our lives into neat pockets or drawers. It is about integration of work and purpose with faith in God as the guiding principle for all.

The scope of applications are far and wide. There are tips for Church and family, friends and colleagues, work inside as well as outside our regular places.  In choosing a job, readers will find it a helpful list of "must haves" versus "nice to haves." We will recognize that all those questions and struggles about finding the right job, making ends meet, or enjoying what we do, are but secondary concerns. What is primary is godliness in everything we do, faithfulness in whatever we do, and bringing glory to God in all that we are and are doing. There is a chapter on how we relate to bosses and our co-workers to see them not as obstacles to our promotion or job security, but to see them as people loved by God. Some helpful tips include:

1. Determination not to complain or grumble about our work
2. Happy submission to authority by remembering it is God we submit to
3. Humble acknowledgment of duties and authority knowing that Christ himself had done the same
4. Compete with integrity, that we do not focus on taking people down, but holding Christ up.

There is also a chapter on how to be a Christian boss that should appeal to people who runs their own business or entrepreneurial endeavors. The guiding principles include honouring God with our authority, using our power to bless others, awareness of the ease of power abuse, sacrificial service, imitating Jesus, be Gospel motivated and grace empowered. The chapter on sharing the gospel at work is a call not to be too afraid of sharing the gospel when the opportunity presents itself, and not to be too insensitive to push down the good news to those who are resistant. What is needed is to be ready at all times, to be sensitive to Spirit-led moments, and to build good relationships for the gospel to flourish. As expected, the authors assert once more that full-time work is not more important than regular work outside the Church or Christian borders. The key thing is to see how God, our Employer is deploying us. Some are deployed for Church work. Others are deployed for work in secular settings. The key thing is that we are all members of the same body and workers for the Same Boss.

I am excited to recommend this book highly as we kick off a brand new year 2014!

Do check out their website here for more resources.

Rating: 5 stars of 5.

conrade

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This book is provided to me courtesy of Zondervan and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.

"One Big Thing" (Phil Cooke)

TITLE: One Big Thing: Discovering What You Were Born to Do
AUTHOR: Phil Cooke
PUBLISHER: Nashville, TN: Thomas-Nelson, 2012, (186 pages).

This book begins with two big questions to drive home one big thing. The two questions are:

1. "What am I supposed to do with my life?"
2. "In a hyper-competitive, cluttered, and distracted world, how do I get noticed?"

Both of these questions intersect to drive home one big thing, to discover what exactly are we born to do. It is about focus. It is about being able to recognize what is important and what is not. It is to know oneself, and to be purposeful according to one's knowledge of self. Cooke shows us that without intentional living, we let culture define who we are and what we ought to do. Without a sense of destiny, we will miss the opportunity to make a choice, and instead let ourselves be vulnerable to the whims and fancies of chance occurrences. This is a culture of clutter, of distractions, and very limited attention span. One of the biggest downside of such activism is a sense of meaninglessness. That is why Cooke argues for the need to have a sense of direction, appropriate influence, and a healthy sense of personal identity. Once this is appropriated, one can begin the journey to living the person we really are. We learn to let priorities be driven by values, to learn to take responsibility for the choices we need to make for ourselves, to map out our own future, to see the difference between jobs and our vocations, and to learn to harness the power of modern communications, according to our own make up.

My Thoughts

The way the author writes is captivating. He poses good questions to hook the attention of readers, to enable them to internalize the question into a personal one. He suggests several ideas, in the hope that at least one will hit home. He reads the culture at large and reminds readers that all that glitters out there is not necessarily precious or worthwhile. What is more important is to recognize our true sense of self and worth, and having done that, to learn to live in a manner that blesses others. There are at least three ways to benefit from this book. First, it is a mirror to look and to reflect on our own lives. Far too many people are living according to the values of the world, chasing after material dreams simply because everyone is doing it. As a mirror, it makes us think more seriously about what is more important for us. Second, it is a guide to help us discover who we are and what we are called to be. This sense of being will determine what we can do best. In our world, it is easy to react according to what the world hits us with. We need to learn to sift through the mass of information, to determine what is central and fundamental, and what is peripheral, and having done that, to make a conscious choice for the necessary. Third, it is a book to help us live well, that we can benefit others. Yes, no one is an island. No one needs to live only for self. We need to discover the role we play as a community. For people who feel uncomfortable about self-improvement, lest one becomes too individualistic focused, I like to offer some encouragement. Improving oneself is not wrong. Learn to see self-improvement as a way to bring positive energy and good to the community you are in.

This is one book that makes readers feel good about themselves, and having done that, to make one sit up and do something with their lives. The practical steps are easy to understand. The challenge to step out of our comfort zone is more difficult to practise. If readers are able to overcome their resistance to change, and to live on purpose and overcome the obstacles to change, they will benefit most. This book is strong in calling one to take the first step. It is not so useful when the going gets tough, or when discouragement steps in when the results are not forthcoming. That is why this book may give us the kick start. For Christians, we need the Bible and the Holy Spirit to help us navigate the marathon.

Rating: 4 stars of 5.

conrade

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com <http://BookSneeze®.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255<http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html> : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

"Wisdom Meets Passion"

TITLE: Wisdom Meets Passion: When Generations Collide and Collaborate
AUTHOR: Dan Miller and Jared Angaza
PUBLISHER: Nashville, TN: Thomas-Nelson, 2012, (272 pages).

This book maintains that both wisdom and passion are needed for whatever work we do. It aims to help blend together accomplishing financial goals and creating meaningful work. Wisdom ties everything together, thus the title of the book. Using an intergenerational approach to describe the differences among two generations, the authors themselves each represent one end of the spectrum. Dan represents the "passion" end where stewardship, responsibility and hard work defines their tradition. Jared represents the go-getter generation, daring to breech traditional boundaries in order to fulfill his dream. The focus is not on questioning traditions or perspectives, but on accepting ourselves the way God has accepted and created us to be.

The book begins with a clarion call for readers to dream big. It is one thing to be faithful with what we have. It is yet another, to seek out better future through passion and dreaming. Knowing that there are many who grew up in a conservative tradition, the authors show sensitivity to the culture among the Baby Boomers, and the older generation, recognizing the inner need for some form of security. Gently, the authors point out seven areas in which one can improve and excel in. Areas such as financial, social, personal development, physical, spiritual, family, and career. They acknowledge the level of debt by many families which can easily stifle any desire to achieve one's dreams. That did not stop the authors from teaching ten steps to education, and becoming rich too! In the new generation, traditional barriers are no longer career or dream limiting. With Facebook, internet, and the social media, as long as one can dream, anything is possible. Throughout the book, the emphasis is consistent. Dream big. Attempt big. Live a great life and do not settle simply for a good life.

Chapter 5 offers a theological perspective on work excellence. Develop a passion that is contagious. Chapter 6 probes the identity and destiny. Learn to imagine, to dream, to anticipate, to set realistic goals, to plan, to act, and to realize one's dreams. This book is pure perk-me-up vocational challenge for us to go all out, to dare to dream, and to dare to make that dream a reality. Most importantly, one needs to be crystal clear that it is a path one desires to do. There is no shame in wanting to make more money, only shame if we fail to exercise our talents when God has given us talents.

I am reminded of Mark Twain's famous words.

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

This book is another way of showing us how and why. The generation gap is not meant to be a barrier to bridging wisdom of the old with the passion of the new. Instead, it is meant to show us the strengths and weaknesses of both eras, that the best way to move forward is to work together. I like the way the book is summarized through the following:

1. Find your story.
2. Face your fears.
3. Be resourceful without resources.
4. Keep it simple.
5. Build trust.
6. Giving is good business.

The last chapter on work is indeed one of the strongest parts of the book. It also shows us the common ground both traditional as well as the modern generation has in common. Both will reach old age one day. Perhaps, when that day comes, it may very well be too late to regret not fulfilling our dreams. Take this book as an apt reminder that we are called to be the best that we are created to be. No more. No less.

Rating: 4.5 stars of 5.

conrade

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This book is provided to me free by Thomas-Nelson and NetGalley without any obligation for a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.

"Discerning the Voice of God" (Priscilla Shirer)

TITLE: Discerning the Voice of God: How to Recognize When God is Speaking
AUTHOR: Priscilla Shirer
PUBLISHER: Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers (new edition), 2012, (224 pages)

The book is a revised version of the very popular book about listening to God, recognizing God's voice, and to be reminded on the ways of God in guiding us. It is written in a very conversational and personal style which makes it easy reading. It invites the reader to eavesdrop on a conversation, and in the process learn a tip or two about what to do and what not to do with regards to discerning the voice of God. It is important to note that this book is about growing, and not about getting all the answers we need about spiritual discernment. Using biblical references, and several quotes from some popular writers on spirituality, Shirer is able to tell stories about how the various methods are practiced. She poses some practical questions of faith and doubt that many believers typically as. Her understanding of the anxious heart is clearly expressed which is one reason why this book is popular. Some of her reminders seem like evergreen spiritual notes for all believers.

• Have we become hard of hearing?
• Are we too impatient to wait for God?
• Too busy for God?
• Forcing God to toe our schedules?
•  ...

Shirer teaches discernment through recognizing the different ways in which one can discern the voice of God. Readers can trust God to persevere in reaching out to them. They can trust God to be persistent. When there are challenges placed before them, it may be God communicating an important truth that can only be done that way. Shirer even brings in the key lesson of Job, in that what Job has benefitted is not the answers to the world's biggest question on suffering or the most pressing question about life. What Job himself has learned is a real experience of knowing God.  This is what this book is trying to bring about.