Part two of two; reprinted from Workship. Here are some of my suggestions for what a post-pandemic world could look like, with Christian input. 1. A renewed appreciation of physical connections While the church has responded heroically in obeying bans on mass gatherings by moving services online, this should not become the new norm. I support Brian Zhand, who warns, “Don’t…
Part one of two; reprinted from Workship. As I visited Laurel the other day to drop off a pre-recording of our weekly church service, Handel’s Messiah was pumping from her house. Laurel is over 80 and needs voices and music to be a little louder for her to appreciate them fully. I gave her the DVD and asked how she…
Reprinted from Workship. Coronavirus (COVID-19) is having unprecedented impacts on our lives, with apparently worse to come. Setting aside the health effects, our working is being impacted in many ways: the context (working from home where possible), the amount of work (casuals losing shifts, work suspended for months, being made redundant) and the culture of work (from positive to crisis)…
Reprinted from Workship. Photo by Kara Martin. A couple of weeks ago on Facebook, Nathan Campbell from Living Church in Brisbane explained that he was going to be preaching on the topic of work the coming Sunday. He posed the following question: “This week I’m preaching on work, like the stuff we do to bring order and beauty to the…
Reprinted from the Salt & Light Australia Daily Devotional. I recently received an email from a young woman who said the following: “Your work was instrumental in helping me break through the barrier between my faith and work. I realized I was blocking God for fear he’d destroy my career goals, because I thought they were pride based. Now I…
Reprinted from the Salt & Light Australia Daily Devotional. I was doing research for an organisation I was part of, supporting Christians working in the mining industry. We had received a grant to examine the need for chaplains in the industry. I called Wayne, who was mine manager at a large coalmine in Australia’s Hunter Valley. He was a bit…
Part three of a series. Reprinted from Ethos. In this series we are looking at six categories of spiritual formation while working. This concluding post looks at the final three categories in detail: Incarnational Working, Spirit-Empowered Working and Social Justice Working. Incarnational Working Just as Jesus, who is God, humbled himself to be born and live as a human to enable us…
Part two of a series. Reprinted from Ethos. In this series we are looking at six categories of spiritual formation while working. This post looks at the first three categories in detail: Holy Working, Gospel Working and Prayerful Working. Holy Working Once I was writing about work and spirituality, and someone commented: “I don’t know why you are making it so complicated.…
Part one of a series. Reprinted from Ethos. In the late 1990s I was a mother of young children who had the opportunity of sitting in a class led by Robert Banks and Simon Holt about the theology of everyday life. It was one of the first units presented by a fledgling organisation, the Macquarie Christian Studies Institute (MCSI), led by Robert…
Reprinted from the Salt & Light Australia Daily Devotional. I was teaching a unit on Workplace Ministry at a theological college and I asked the class of 24 students how many had been visited in their workplace, by their pastor. Two hands went up. The first student told us how he was a barista in a café, and the pastor…
