97% of Christians Will be in the Marketplace... Get a Vision for It!

Have you ever considered that 97% of Christian's will work in the market place compared to the 3% that will be vocational Priests, Pastors or Missionaries. Why then do we typically preach a message that tells people, "If you are really responding to God's love you will be a Pastor or possibly even a missionary?"

Yet this is the message we so often hear. 

Even if this is not the spoken 'content' of a message, often this is the EMOTIONAL content of the message. Pastor's and Priests often highlight the glory of the person who become a Missionary in a foreign land or who become a Pastor of a church. Even though they say they value a godly man or woman responding to God by working a regular job you get the sense that they don't altogether believe it.

We have to get a vision for people who want to passionately respond to God's love in Christ to work what we call 'ordinary jobs!' We need to be so careful not to put our 'calling' from God onto another person. No one should live in apathy or complacency, but let everyone hear and receive their own focus and calling from God!

Wouldn't it be Awesome to see 1,000 joy filled and honest politicians arise? Wouldn't it be stunning for 1,000 passionate followers of Jesus become lawyers? How about uncompromising Christian becoming News Anchor persons? or honest copy-editors, or reporters? (When good men and women do nothing, evil flourishes) What about creative and artistic believers starting their own movie companies or becoming godly actors? ... refusing to take parts that didn't honor God? What about Christians whose faith was really alive becoming the IT person in your corporation? How about godly people aspiring to positions of government administration to deliver the nation from bureaucracy  and red tape? What about real school teachers who didn't fear loosing their jobs to speak the truth about where this nation came from?

We need God's vision for people to be passionate about their faith in Jesus in ALL different types of jobs... and to do them with joy, excellence and grace! That would be a witness!

So often the Pastors and Priests never talk to the unbelievers. Why? Because they are all in the marketplace. Pastors and Priests never go there. They don't have the time. If the non-Christian people, whom God loves fiercely, are going to know Him we must work our jobs in faith and joy knowing that this is WONDERFUL to God! We have to know how He DELIGHTS in us daily in what we consider mundane work!

And it isn't only for a witness to the unbelievers that we work with joy and diligence. It is also worship! If no one else is around, God is still there. And he enjoys faithful actions and work. He enjoys it. Let's focus on His delight and we will be caught up in His Wonder!

So let's worship in the Marketplace! Remember worship is song but it is also action! When you pay your bills on time that is worship, because it is faithfulness! Therefore let's be like Brother Lawerence in "The Practice of the Presence of God." This man of God was able to worship through his work of being a cook and a shoe mender! He said his intimacy with God was as strong and close during work as it was during times of private prayer!