Tag: strategic

Categories
Christian Living

Initiating Strategic Conversations for the Sake of the Gospel

I received the following question a while back related to the idea of us “changing our conversations”:

I find the challenge of “changing the topic” very interesting. I would like to know what you would consider the “changed topic.” From the casual Wal-Mart conversation to the person you car-pool with to a fellow passenger on a plane, what do you see as ultimate destination of our conversations? I have ideas of the progression from “God is good,” to “God is in control,” to “Jesus is my savior,” to “Jesus is the only way.” If you have some time, how about making a list of the things you wish all of us would spend our day talking to others about.

What a great question! How would you answer it?

A picture of two cups of coffee symbolizing our need to have strategic conversations with others
A cup of coffee with someone is a great place for conversations. But will you have a strategic direction for the conversation?

My response was:
Hmmmm, I’ve been thinking about a list of things I wish people would talk to others about. I’m still not sure about the list, but here are some things that I would encourage people to do:

1. Each Sunday think about the thing that impacted you the most during Bible Study and Worship, and then try to bring that up in conversation with someone during the week. (This could also be done with your daily devotional time, too. What was most impactful? How can I share this with someone today?) For example, maybe the message is on an attitude of joy vs. an attitude of complaint. Then think about what people complain to you about and be prepared on how you will respond to turn the conversation. We know that we all constantly complain about the weather – “it is too hot, too cold, too dry, or too wet.” So we know this will come up. So the next time when someone is complaining to you about the weather being too hot – you might say: “I know! I am the world’s worst about complaining about the weather – about it being too rainy or to dry or too cold. But I heard something this weekend at church that made me think about that: It was the statement that ‘Rain can ruin your weekend or rain can save your life, depending on who you are and what your thirst is like.’ And it got me to thinking about how the weather might be something for me to complain about, but someone else is probably praising God for the same weather. So I’m trying to make a commitment to focus more on the positive. How hard do you think that will be for me?” That gives information on your beliefs, and invites them further into the conversation.

2. Look for opportunities to discuss the relationships you have at church, and to invite people into a relationship with you. For example, at work when someone says, “This weekend was great! I was able to sleep in on Saturday, and on Sunday I went fishing bright and early. We caught a mess of fish.” You could then say something along the lines of: “That sounds great, I love fishing. In fact, one of the guys in my Bible study group was talking to me about us getting together to go to the lake one of these upcoming Saturdays. Would you be interested in going with us?” This points out that you are in a Bible study group, and that you are open to new relationships.

3. Be strategic about talking to other Christians about godly things in the presence of non-Christians. Again, not in weird stuff like a discussion about the “soteriology themes in Revelation as they connect to Ezekiel and the 70 Weeks in Daniel” (what?!), but just about how your relationship with your wife has improved as you have grown in your relationship with God. Doing so allows a non-Christian to hear your conversation and allows a small seed to be planted about how something like that could help out his relationship with his wife.

What else should be included in my answer as to how to practically change our conversations toward God?

.

Categories
Serving Others

Your Job Is Your Mission Field

“Your Job Is Your Mission Field”
      by brian rushing

No matter who you are, where you live, or the type of work you do, God has a mission for you.

Mission From God

The “Blues Brothers” were on a mission from God, and so are you!

And you don’t have to be ordained, licensed, or commissioned during a church service in order to complete your mission. In fact, where you work – in the secular job you have – you have a mission to complete.

John Piper reminds us:

“Please don’t hear in the phrase “secular vocation” any unspiritual or inferior comparison to “church vocation” or “mission vocation” or “spiritual vocation.” I simply mean the vocations that are not structurally connected to the church. There is such a thing as being in the world but not of the world…. Jesus’ intention is that his disciples remain in the world (which is what I mean by “secular jobs”), but that they not be “of the world” (which is why I say we are in a war).”


 So being in a secular job is a strategic place of battle for God’s kingdom work, and you have been placed there to do that work – as the workplace pastor for those around you. You are to care for them, pray for them, give them spiritual counsel, shepherd them toward the Lord – using your speech, your attitude, and your actions to point them toward God.

Martin Luther said it this way:

It is pure invention that pope, bishops, priests and monks are the only ones to be called the “spiritual estate”; while princes, lords, artisans and farmers the “temporal estate.” That is indeed a fine bit of lying and hypocrisy…. All Christians are truly of the “spiritual estate,” and there is among them no difference at all but that of office…. To make it still clearer. If a little group of pious Christian laymen were taken captive and set down in a wilderness, and had among them no priest consecrated by a bishop, and if there in the wilderness they were to agree in choosing one of themselves, married or unmarried, and were to charge him with the office of baptizing, saying mass, absolving and preaching, such a man would be as truly a priest as though all bishops and popes had consecrated him…. There is really no difference between laymen and priests, princes and bishops, “spirituals” and “temporals,” as they call them, except that of office and work…. A cobbler, a smith, a farmer, each has the work and office of his trade, and yet they are all alike consecrated priests and bishops, and everyone by means of his own work or office must benefit and serve every other, that in this way many kinds of work may be done for the bodily and spiritual welfare of the community, even as all the members of the body serve one another.”


So even back in the 1500s, this man of God realized that where you work wasn’t important. It was how and why you work. You are called to work for the Lord as a workplace pastor to those around you to “benefit and serve” them in order to help them better know Jesus Christ.

“The Bible makes it plain that God’s will is for his people to be scattered like salt and light among the whole range of secular vocations. Clusters of Christians living only with Christians and working only with Christians would not accomplish God’s whole purpose in the world. That does not mean Christian orders or ministries or mission outposts are wrong. It means they are exceptional. The vast majority of Christians are meant to live in the world and work among unbelievers. This is their “office,” their “calling,” as Luther would say.”

My prayer is that as you go out into your workplace today, you won’t think of your work as secular, but as strategic. That you would consider where God has placed you and how He wants to use you to make a difference in the lives of those you will encounter today as their workplace pastor.


        (Quotes in today’s post are from Don’t Waste Your Life by John Piper)