a missionary with a corporate sponsor

Work as Worship

This past Sunday at Legacy Church, I told the story of a running partner who told me how she had sent an email to her office inviting the women in it to a small group she led at her church. Her plan backfired when one of her peers scolded her for using company resources for religious use. She admitted that was a mistake, but invited her to the group anyway. She went on to tell me how the girl had come to the group, grown in her curiosity about God, and that she attended regularly now.

As we continued to run she told me more stories about how she leveraged her consulting and traveling as a platform for sharing her faith. (She no longer used company email for invitations to her faith activities.) I complemented her for seeing all of her life as a mission field and her network of relationships as her responsibility in serving others in the name of Jesus.

She smiled and said, "I guess I'm a missionary with a corporate sponsor."

I agreed, and that phrase has stuck in my head since. It describes for me a perspective every working follower of Jesus should have about work.  

Too many Christians separate their sacred Sundays from their secular Monday-Fridays, and by doing so offer to their co-workers a skewed view of faith. To live that way is to say, "My faith is my hobby on the weekend. What's yours?"

Last week some of our staff attended the Right Now conference in Dallas. J R Vassar of The Apostles Church in NYC, emphasized the conference's core value, "Work is Worship."At Legacy Church we describe a similar core value, "Worship is a lifestyle." Vassar called us to see ourselves as missionaries to our "neighborhoods, networks, and to the nations."

The world is in need of the message and the hands and feet of Jesus lived out in his followers. What if you saw your work as worship, or, yourself as "a missionary with a corporate sponsor?" If you did, I bet the world you touch would know the difference.

faithrunner schedule this week:

faith: Join Legacy Church, many others, and me for One Meal One Day this Wednesday. Skip a meal to feed a child through Compassion International.

runner: NTTR's annual club-sponsored run, the Rockledge Rumble, is this Saturday at Lake Grapevine. I am honored to serve as the race chaplain. The run is sold out, but if you happen to be on the North Shore Trail at Lake Grapevine cheer the trailrunners as they run in honor of our US Veterans. Veterans Day is this Friday. Thank those who have served so we are free to practice our faith.