Yesterday, as a part of our regular church service we had the pleasure commissioning our University graduates into their lives beyond school. We read a short litany, Pastor Kelly blessed them and members of the congregation came up to lay hands on the students as we prayed over them.
I was inspired to do this after reading several things that Ken Baker had to say in the book we studied at the end of the semester, What Do I Do With My Life?
He makes a couple of important points. First: “For most adult Christians in North America the workplace is the primary arena for practicing discipleship.” p.7.
Second: “In my church we conduct ‘ordination’ services for elders, deacons, ministry associates, and ministers of the Word. We ‘install’ these persons into their respective ‘offices.’ We call them officebearers. In our ordination forms we ask them if they feel ‘called’ by God in the call of the congregation. We also ‘commission’ other church workers, including Sunday school teachers and people who represent us on a mission trip, and talk about the valuable ‘ministry’ they perform. These same persons may devote twenty, forty, or more hours every week to their work as business owners, construction workers, managers, plumbers, homemakers, or Hospice volunteers. Ordinarily, though, we do not ask them whether they feel called to such work. We do not set them apart, commission them, or honor the office they hold in the workplace during the week. We don’t offer special prayers or thank the Lord for their ministry in the workplace.” p.11&12
I thought this was an excellent point and wanted to do something that would try to honor those things. I believe it is important to recognize, as he points us to, that our workplace is often our primary arena for discipleship and we need to take that more seriously than we often do. It doesn’t mean we have to be actively proselytizing our co-workers, but it does mean that we witness to God and honor God in the good work we should be doing.
Overall it was a wonderful event and I would love to do this again someday.
