day 62: Year-end Examination

At the end of the year we are usually scrambling to get everything on our to do lists out of the way and cleaned and tidied up for a fresh start in the New Year. I also notice that at the end of the year there is a mad dash to use up all of the health reserve money that has been saved up tax-free throughout the year. I always thought that it must be interesting for doctors who get this year-end set of appointments for examinations, whether people need them or not. The end of the year is when most of us do the self-examinations of ourselves. We reflect back over the past year and evaluate how we did in life, work, spiritually, financially, etc. and we then set our goals for the New Year, some being called our "New Year's Resolutions". This self-examination is good. Paul calls for us to do this continually in I Corinthians 11:28. David Wilkerson, the author of The Cross and the Switchblade and now pastor of the Times Square Church in New York City says, "Paul further urges us, 'Let a man examine himself…'. The Greek word for examine here means 'scrutinize, test.' The apostle is saying, 'Test yourself—see if you’re walking according to God’s Word.' We’re to constantly ask ourselves, 'Am I changing? Am I becoming more loving and tenderhearted? Am I treating my family and friends with godly respect? Is my conversation becoming more righteous?” These are great questions of self-examination as we head into our new year of work life. As we set our goals for the person we want to be at work and to be a person who works to their purpose, we can be assured that our constant self-examination and adjustments and corrections are the way that God wants us to live and pursue His righteousness. So, set those goals this year with confidence and great expectations that this New Year will be a year of positive change for each of us.


Reference; I Corinthians 11:28 (New Living Testament)

day 61: What Do You Love?

I sometimes amuse myself by thinking about the words we use at work that we don't really mean or words we use but would never really talk about what they mean, not at work we wouldn't that is. The greatest example of this is the word "love". We all the time will say, "I love doing...", or "I would love to take that project on", or "I'd love to get together and go over that with you", or we ask in an interview, "what do you really love to do?". But if we ever stopped to define what those loves mean or really talk about what love is and what we truly love or not, we would likely pull up short and think better about talking about this at work. Love is not a usual work topic. This is the usual time of the year when many of us take inventory of the past year and begin to set goals and objectives for the coming year. This can coincide with business planning so it seems natural to set our own professional goals and might as well set our own personal goals while we are at it. Most of us start those lists with what we want to get done throughout the year and those goals may cross the areas of physical, spiritual, relational, financial and vocation. There are always many things that we want to accomplish and achieve within the next 12 months. Not often though do we sit down and take the time to catalogue what it is that we love and how we are aligning our time, efforts, and resources against that list. Maybe this year would be a good year to think differently (thank you for that tag line Apple). If we were to start with what it is that we truly love and then build our personal and professional goals from there, then the list might be different this year and it might even be eye-opening or life-changing. We are told in I John 2:15 that we are to "stop loving the evil world and all that it offers you, for when you love the world, you show you do not have the love of the Father in you". What does this mean for us as believers who are trying to bring purpose to our work and lives? What this means is that we are to take a hard look at ourselves and determine what it is that we are truly putting our love towards and if it is towards worldly ways that undermine who it is that we can ultimately be for Christ, that we need to re-prioritize and do so quickly. This is relevant in our work and the examples we are in the workplace. If we are chasing that next promotion and raise and doing so at all costs to ourselves, our families and our co-workers, it is a pretty good bet that money and power would be high up, if not on the top of, our "I love..." list. These are hard things to reconcile but God calls us to be constantly checking ourselves and making adjustments. To be the person He wants us to be at work would not to be known as the person who is blindly chasing money, power, or even the next job. The right life example would be one where others could see that there is a larger context and purpose that we chase and fix our eyes upon and how we work is influenced by that choice. As we look to a new year, now would be the best of times to take a love inventory before we set our next year's goals and objectives.

Reference: I John 2:15 (New Living Testament)

day 60: Sunday Is Really The First Workday

I am sorry to say this to you because we all look so forward to the weekend. Wasn't it the band Loverboy who sang, "Everybodys working for the weekend!". Yes, the weekends are a time of rest and we should all take advantage of our sabbath time and our down time. With today's technology and being constantly online it has gotten harder and harder to find that "away from it all" downtime. All that said, I will put forward that Sunday, and in particular our church time on Sunday is an important first step of the work week and we should consider it really the first workday of the week in our preparation to have the kind of week we truly desire. I say that from the context that we are reading this and trying to live out God's purpose in our work lives and as such we are in constant preparation for what the day, the week, the month, the year, the lifetime has in store for us. So, let's go back to why Sunday is so important to get going in the right way for our workweek. Those who are called into the ministry have been called to ready and equip all the rest of us who carry the Word and the purpose of God into our work week and to our offices. Ephesians 4:11-12 says: "He is the one who gave these gifts to the church; the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God's people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ." What a great assurance. God gave the pastors at our church the gifts needed to equip us in the work that God has asked us to do for His purpose. And with that assurance, why would we ever miss an opportunity on Sunday to not be in church to gain the wisdom, lessons and equipment we need to make it through our work week. Many leaders hold their weekly staff meeting on Monday mornings to do just that for their teams; to be sure everyone is ready, prepared and aligned to take on the week. God does that for us with His staff meetings every Sunday in His church and he gives each of us an early jump on the week. So, next time we are thinking of blowing off Sunday church, we might think whether or not we would lightly blow off God's Staff Meeting that He has prepared for us. Think of Sunday as the first positive move into the workweek and know that you are being better equipped and prepared to meet whatever it is that you will face in the coming week.

Reference: Ephesians 4:11-12 (New Living Testament)

day 59: Kingdom in the Ordinary

You have heard me before speak of those who lament that they don't know if they are living their life to the fullest and doing a higher calling because they are not in the ministry but instead are in the marketplace. We already know that God did His work through ordinary people of the Bible and many of them were ordinary workers at some points in their lives. We also know that each of us are to search independently to find God's will in our own lives and then learn to adjust and obey what it is that He wants us to be doing. As we draw closer in our relationship to Jesus we will find what the will of God is for our lives. In the book Experiencing God, Blackaby says, "God reveals His ways to us because they are the only means to accomplish His purpose". I find that quote to be very inspiring because as I search for God's will knowing that the marketplace and business is what I am about and what I do, knowing that God will reveal His purposes to me and that He needs me to be doing what I do because in me (and all of us) this revelation of His ways is the only means to accomplish His purposes is both inspiring and comforting. That means that as we each seek our own purpose in our lives and work, that God is wanting to use His purposes to unveil our purpose, thereby making it one. So, as we think of our work and what we do day-to-day for all of those hours we can hold fast in the promise that the purpose of God can be manifested through our work. This leaves us with that important lesson that if we are to accomplish our purposes that what we do is less important than how we do it. God gave his disciples ways to do their work and He taught them, as we teach those who work for us, how to get the job done. We can learn many lessons from these teachings with the an important one being that when Jesus spoke to His disciples and asked them to do the things He wanted them to do, more often than not they questioned and sometimes scoffed at how Jesus wanted the job done. No better example of this than when Jesus commanded the disciples to feed the multitudes. The disciples wanted to nix the effort but Jesus instead was specific on what they were to do, and when they did it, a miracle occurred. Could it be that God is asking you to go about your work differently than you have in the past and He wants you to be an example in your workplace of how someone can work differently when they work with God as the determiner of your purpose? Might it be that how you have gone about your work has not been the best demonstration of how God can be in someones life as they go about their ordinary day-to-day work? Remember, He wants to use each of us to reveal His purposes. All we have to do is be willing and obedient to let that happen. Can today be the day that we put aside the rest of the things that get in the way and we start anew?


Reference: Proverbs 19:21 (New Living Testament)

day 58: Renewal

Each day we rise to face another day of issues, objectives and challenges at work. We do our best day-in and day-out to be strong and committed while we face the obstacles that so naturally are there within our workplace and with the people whom we work. When we do good and try and provide a ministry to others we are expending what needs to be renewed. Even Jesus felt that there was something that was expended when His robe was touched by the woman seeking healing. In Luke 8:46 He says, "No, someone deliberately touched me, for I felt healing power go out from me". None of us can even begin to think that we are ministering as Jesus did but if even He felt a depletion then we as humans would have even more of a depletion than He when we attempt far less. I don't think it is unusual for any of us to just feel beaten down and wiped out at the end of the week. It is in those times when we are the weakest and what felt like strength and vigor and full faith on Monday can feel like a whimper of faith and lack of strength come Friday. So, it is important that we find ways to renew and refill ourselves throughout the week. If you are having troubles living the life you want to live at work and you find that it becomes harder and harder as the week goes on, then it is time to refresh yourself by adding in Bible reading, prayer time and potentially joining with others in a small group within the week. The point is that we need to renew ourselves and realize that we just can't go it alone and expect to be strong and faithful if we are depending on our own strength. Our God loves the worker and He time and again has done miraculous things with those who toiled and worked the fields. He will give you strength and renewal and make you fresh and new every morning if you only seek Him to do so.

day 57: The Facts Please

Don't you just hate when the person at work takes snippets of information, doesn't have the whole story and then either tries to give advice, tell you what to do, or worse yet takes what he/she knows (which is not all the story) and goes and stirs something up by telling others? It happens all the time at work. We get an email that doesn't tell everything that happened and we take the information we have and run with it. The same with conversations we have with others. We can take what we have heard and then because we are in a hurry, overwhelmed, up against a deadline, or just don't care enough, we don't dig in deeper and then we end up representing something not quite right and it ends up becoming a bigger issue than it needed to be. Part of working with purpose is being a person who stands for and represents the truth. Everyone can respect the truth. They may not like the truth, but truth cannot be argued against and those who tell and represent the truth will be respected. But to get to the truth, it can take work and patience. It can take having to listen longer, ask more questions, understand the context of the situation and ensure that all sides of the story have been revealed. We are to be truth seekers and truth advocates. When we don't get the facts we run the risk of falling into the ranks of the foolish. Proverbs 18:13 says, "What a shame, what folly, to give advice before listening to the facts." We can start right now, today, with building our advice on the facts and doing whatever it takes to get to the root of the situation or issue by relying on the facts and the facts only. The facts are the evidence of the truth and when both have been stood up for, we can expect that we have done the right thing to stand on the higher ground. So, know that we have to work a little harder and dig a little deeper. It is part of the responsibility given as God's workers.

Reference: Proverbs 18:13 (New Living Testament)

day 56: Work Words, part 2 - Replacement Words

Yesterday we learned the simple truth that God does not want us using foul or abusive language in life or at work. A simple lesson for sure but not an easy one to follow and practice. It just seems like adding that certain word for emphasis or explanation helps make the point. But, when we take this path we are making both emotional and intellectual choices that have consequences. I think in most cases we are also taking the lazy path intellectually when we allow ourselves to use this language. The other day I overheard a conversation with two people where the description of one person by the other, to his face (which was representative of an anatomical part), expressed the point clearly but also created a heightened animosity and anger in the person who was being talked at and could have easily, if not for the control of the receiving person, come to blows. As I reflected on that conversation, the person delivering the message may have felt more powerful but in reality, this very intellectual person had lowered himself to a base level and chosen the laziest of words to express his point of view and left the conversation in a worse place than it was before, all because of the words chosen. If we are not to use foul or abusive language, what words are we then to choose to replace these words? Ephesians 4:29 concludes with; "Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them". We are to take the higher ground. We are to work harder intellectually and emotionally to find the place and the words that can still bring across the point but leave the other person or parties in a better emotional state. As I think back on the confrontation I witnessed, there was another way to have made the point. It would have taken the person who was expressing the point of view to have found another emotional footing to stand on, and then to have intellectually have thought through how it would be that he could build up the other person and still ensure that the lesson was given. It could have been done and knowing the situation, good could have come from what was initially bad and unfortunately after this conversation got worse. God wants us to use the faith that we have in Him, the power that He has put inside of us, and the love that He modeled, to be different than the rest of the world. That can start today, at work, with you and the words that you choose. Today would be a good day to start thinking and using the replacement words that He can give you. You and all others around you will be better for it.

Reference: Ephesians 4:29 (New Living Testament)

day 55: Work Words, part 1 - No Nos

This is pretty straightforward. Let's choose more carefully the words we use at work. We all know the statement, "he curses like a sailor". How does one become a sailor? A sailor becomes a sailor because he/she applies for a sailor job or joins the Navy to take the job of a sailor. So, the cursing of the sailor is referencing the cursing that occurs on the job. Yes, work for some reason is an easy place for the words of a sailor to become common language. I have been there and I have gone through stages in my career where I might as well have quit my job and joined the Navy. If we are trying to infuse our purpose into our work and we are trying to be the examples of how one is to supposed to live in a larger context then the words we choose to use at work need to be consistent with the life we are wanting to live. Paul makes it clear in Ephesians 4:29; "Don't use foul or abusive language." Clear enough? There is lots to learn and study on self-control and the taming of our tongues and how for some this takes God really helping out. But wherever you are and however hard or easy it is for you to control your language, it is an important lesson to remember. We are to live our lives in the example of the One who gave us His example to follow. And when the moment comes where the expletive is the most cultural, hippest and for some reason the most powerful word we can think of, then we need to think again and bite that tongue before we let the words roll out. Once out they can't be rolled back in. Today, say a prayer before heading to work that God will give you different words today to replace those that come most easily. Ask Him to give you new work words and to send the words of the sailors out to sea.
Tomorrow, words to use as replacements.

Reference: Ephesians 4:29 (New Living Testament)

day 54: True Understanding

Certain people at work are the ones that everyone go to for advice, counsel and wisdom. Often when asked about why they go to the person they have chosen you will hear things like, "they just seem to understand me". Understanding others and situations is a true skill. Some can do it and most can't. The difference between the two is often the difference between whether or not one can stop, listen and then intake the information and put it in context to the other person's situation. That seems easy, right? We should all be able to do that. If it was so easy then we wouldn't look left and right at work and think about all of those people who have their own agendas and are constantly only looking out for themselves and who only care about their own opinions and point of view. Those that have true understandeing of others can put themselves in the shoes of others and walk that mile plus in their shoes. If you want to be someone who can understand others and be someone that others seek out for advice and counsel and someone who others think of as a real team player, then I suggest we all can start with the advice in Proverbs 18:2; "Fools have no interest in understanding, they only want to air their own opinions". True understanding starts with the subordination of our own opinions and allowing ourselves to be placed in a state of empathy and caring about others that allows us to internally squelch our need to be the one with our own opinions before they are shaped by the condition of others. We as a believers have the ultimate example of One who came to earth and walked in our shoes so that He could share in the experience of man. To be one who truly understands we need to put ourselves in the place of others. We get there through listening, slowing down and walking with others in their shoes, and by constantly checking our own egos and opinions. Work needs more people like this. Perhaps, you are to be one for your office.


Reference: Proverbs 18:2 (New Living Testament).

day 53: Marketplace Assurances?

We live and work in a time of great marketplace uncertainty with no assurances of anything as it relates to business. Industries and jobs that were once powerful and seemed indestructible can now topple overnight. Security of a job is a lingering memory from days of old. We wonder from day to day when the next shoe will drop and what will be the impact on our jobs and companies. We want to think that we can find a sound footing but everything that was once solid is now not and we find ourselves slipping. It is not a time of assurance so we have to look beyond the corner office to find the peace and understanding that we actually need to do our jobs well and with confidence. The Prophet Habakkuk details a time and set of circumstances that feel very much like today and he also tells us where to look for the solutions to what is most troubling. Habakkuk 3:17-19 says: "Even though the fig trees have no blossoms, and there are no grapes on the vine; even though the olive crop fails, and the fields lie empty and barren; even though the flocks die in the fields, and the cattle barns are empty, yet I will rejoice in the Lord! I will be joyful in the God of my salvation. The Sovereign Lord is my strength! He will make me as surefooted as a deer and bring me safely over the mountains." Business is never easy to predict even in the best of times. In the roughest of times, we can only look to the words we are given and allow our faith to carry us through the days. But if we can, then we can know that there is joy to be had and that this too shall pass and we will find that sure footing that we each once had.

Reference: Habakkuk 3:17-19 (New Living Testament)

day 52: God's Workers

So many times we feel like in order to do God’s work we have to be called to leave our jobs and go into ministry. And because we thnk this, we can feel unfulfilled in our work. I was reading a section of Blackaby’s Experiencing God and he points out that if you catalog some of the great people of the Bible, you will see that they were workers and through their work God used them to do great things in His name and glory.

Take a look:

-Abraham (Genesis 24:35
-Isaac (Genesis 26:12-14)
-Jacob (Genesis 30:43)
-Joseph (Genesis 41:37-57)
-Moses (Exodus 3:1-6)
-Elisha (1 Kings 19:19-21)
-Amos (Amos 7:14)
-Jesus the Carpenter
-The Apostles (Mark 1:16-20, Mark 2:14)
-Joseph of Arithmea (Mark 15:42-43; John 19:38)
-Lydia (Acts 16:14-15)
-Aquila and Priscilla (Acts 18:1-2)

If you doubt at all if God can use you in your work to do great things for Him, then doubt no more. You have been trained to understand people, economics, what products and services people want and desire, leadership, and teamwork. What a great piece of clay you are for His molding. As you go to work today, remember you may be the next worker that God taps to do something marvelous.

day 51: Don't Let it Linger

I woke up this morning and did a quick inventory of how I felt and what my emotions were going to be into this day. Fortunately, this was a day where my head and emotions were clear and I was optimistic about the day. Ah, wouldn't it be great if each and every day felt that way. Wishful thinking, yes. One of the best ways to control how you feel in the morning, and how you will feel on your way to work in the morning, is to be sure that all of the unfinished business that might drag you down has been taken care of the night before. What really makes the day the worst is when you go into the office knowing that you are harboring feelings of anger about something that happened prior and you just aren't over it yet. You might even be talking to yourself on your way to work, preparing for the fight that is going to occur. The Bible tells us to not start our day that way and to ensure you don't by taking care of things the day before. Ephesians 4:26 says, " And don't sin by letting anger gain control over you. Don't let the sun go down while you are still angry...". I always heard this verse in the context of marriage and it certainly is true there, but it holds true for work as well. If you allow yourself to carry anger home and into the night, not only will you have subjected your family to something that they never asked for or deserved, but you will have that same anger sitting with you in the morning and it will shape the rest of your day. We all know people who come to work who are ready to battle. We don't want to be or live that example. So, today, see if you can clean out that anger locker before you go home and leave it all at the office, even if that means getting around to those today who you feel have wronged you and cleaning up the situation. It will be worthwhile and tonight and tomorrow will be better for it.

Reference: Ephesians 4:26 (New Living Testament)

day 50: Reputation Trumps

We work so hard. We work hard for so many things. We do our very best day in and day out with the rewards tied to a day in the future when we can sit back and rest and reflect on a job well done. During that journey we set different goals for ourselves and we strive to meet and exceed those objectives. One that invariably becomes a measurement of how we are doing, and our ability to enjoy the latter years of our lives when we are not working, is our financial goals. There is nothing wrong with having financial targets and in fact any good financial planner will tell you that having goals and plans are essential to getting to where you want to be in the future. However, what can lead us astray is when we put that financial target above all else and we find ourselves in a situation where that measure literally takes over on us. I know too many people who because of this have gotten turned around and messed up with their priorities and let their perspective get our of whack. This turned into some bad decision-making and for some life long consequences of their actions as they blindly chased their financial dreams. The Proverbs tell us how to keep that in balance. Proverbs 22:1 says; "Choose a good reputation over great riches, for being held in high esteem is better than having silver and gold". That says it loudly and clearly. Whenever we are in a situation where we put our reputations at risk while questing for silver or gold, we are sailing in dangerous waters. As you think about today, remember that our reputations proceed us and at the end of the day, it will be our reputations that will outlive us. Let us be careful about our priorities and the outputs of why we work.

Reference: Proverbs 22:1 (New Living Testament)

day 49: Perspective of Troubles

Work is full of troubles that can get us down. We look at these challenges as really big ones because we have to deal with them for so many hours a day, so many days a week, and with financial security, career reputations and emotional impact all weighing in the balance. We see these troubles as serious weights around our necks and no matter how we want to lighten them up, they are real and must be managed and dealt with. So, if they are there and sometimes only time can work them through, then the best thing we can do it turn them over to God and ask Him to help us put them in perspective. My church, during this holiday season, has been offering a daily morning worship and devotional time to ready people for Christmas in a much more intentional way than just what can be offered on Sundays. I attended the session this morning and walked away with a new appreciation of the perspective we should be putting against all of our troubles. Imagine the troubles that Mary, the Mother of God, must have felt in the months leading up to the birth of Christ. An unmarried woman, carrying a child that was not that of her fiancee, managing the stigma socially but also the pressures and stresses of what was happening to her. Yes, even with these troubles, beyond anything imaginable, Mary in Luke 1:46-49 proclaims the greatness of the Lord and puts all of her troubles aside to recognize the marvelous and miraculous thing that was about to happen. If today or tomorrow, we think we have it rough, it would be the right time to put things in the perspective of Mary and look to see if there is not something wonderful that God wants to do with you that will emanate from the overcoming of your challenges and troubles.

Reference: Luke 1:46-49 (New Living Testament)

day 48: Wholly Holy

Webster's second definition of holy is: "dedicated or devoted to the service of God, the church, or religion; a holy man." The question at hand is can we be wholly holy by being holy at work? Of course the answer is yes, although not easy. The workplace is not a place (unless you are so fortunate to work somewhere where the open sharing of your faith is accepted and welcomed) where you usually feel comfortable expressing your faith, bowing your head to pray over your lunch, reading your Bible on break, or saying a prayer with someone else. Most workplaces aren't opposed to any of that, but it is not encouraged because most companies think there should be separation from work and religion. The legal issues alone that come from discrimination from one religious group to another causes companies to shy away from the topic all together. But we can't just shut off our relationship with God and ask Him to sit home or go spend time with someone else while we go to the office. Instead we have to have find a way to remain in fellowship, prayerful and holy while the work day moves along. We are given a simple call in I Thessalonians on how to remain holy by subtracting and denying another part of our life. We are told in Chapter 4, verse 7: "God has called us to be holy, not to live impure lives". Simply said, if we can remove the impurities of our lives, at work too, and strive to live a life of purity, then we are tracking towards living a holy life. So, what we can all do is commit ourselves in the mornings when we head to the office to a day without impurity, a day where we will do our best to do right. If we can start there and string together 8-10 hours, day after day, then we are building a foundation of purity and a foundation of holiness. And before long, we will find that one can be wholly holy at work and thus living our lives more fully overall.

Reference: I Thessalonians 4:7

day 47: Heart Of The Matter

Core to the way we live and work is our ability to assess other people and ferret out who is who and what is what when it comes to people. At work we end up doing it continuously with interviewing, bringing on new members of our teams, getting a new boss or transfer subordinate, meeting a new external partner, or evaluating a new vendor, etc. Being able to make good people assessments and decisions is part and parcel to success in the workplace. I would argue that most times, it is this ability that separates the great from the good. So, we get trained and we come to our own assessment process whether it is formal or informal. At the end of the day we more often than not will choose to like those people who are most like our selves. That can be good and that can be bad. I have spent most of my career with a focus on becoming great at spotting, attracting and promoting talent. The number of people I have personally interviewed is in the thousands for sure. And even then, after all of these years, it is still an art for me, not a science. So, still today I look for the better ways to be able to assess people and talent. God gives us a word on what is really important about people. Of course, we are not God and so we are not capable nor are we to think that we can judge other people, but the example that God gives us in the book of Samuel does say something to us about what is really important about people. We are told in I Samuel 17:7: "But the Lord said to Samuel, ‘Don't judge by his appearance or height, for I have rejected him. The Lord doesn't see things the way you see them. People judge by outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart." Think for a moment how differently we would assess and evaluate people who are looking to join the company or the team if we were capable of looking beyond the outer appearance and instead be able to delve into what is in someone’s heart like the Lord can do. We know that we can’t see into someone’s heart, but we can surely, through the way we assess and question, get past the superficial things and get to the core of who someone is and who they want to be. We can spend our time and energy with someone around their values, principles and dreams. It has been my experience that we want to work with, hang with, and go to battle with, those who are aligned with our own values, principles and dreams. In fact, we can be very, very different in our personalities, our experiences and our approaches, but if we are aligned at the core with each other, that it all works out to the best. Might today or this week be a time when you are going to be assessing someone else on behalf of the company or for some other reason outside of work? Would this be a good time to change your approach and spend more time trying to get to the heart of the conversation, to the heart of the person, to what is really, really important?

Reference: 1 Samuel 16:7, (New Living Testament)

day 46: It Should Have Been Me!

You were passed over for the big promotion. You didn’t get to go on the business trip. The project was given to someone else. The sales territory was split up and you lost out on the best accounts. The boss just pays way more attention to others than to you. You have been in the same position much longer than everyone else. You are sure that you make less money than everyone else at your level. How many of these are real and how many are just “work ghosts” that keep showing up and tormenting you? What are these all about? At the root, it is easy to be jealous and envious at work. The whole system is set up to pit one person against another where someone wins and someone is left out, passed by or just the loser. We are not to be envious or jealous. Both of these are emotions that can get in between our relationship with God. We are to do whatever we need to do to not allow ourselves to slip into these states or mind. The Proverbs tell us how bad this can be as jealousy is described as “cancer in the bones”. I have never known anyone who has had bone cancer but I am told that it is one of the most painful of all cancers with every move putting pressure and strain on one’s bones. It is not a pretty picture. In the same verse, we are also told that a removal of those things in our heart that does not promote peace and allows for our hearts to be peaceful, that we can expect a healthy body in return. As we look at the things at work that we find ourselves feeling jealous or envious about, we need to do what we can to remove these instigators and replace them with those thoughts and things that can promote a peaceful heart. Today, call on God to show you the things in work that are getting under your skin and ask Him for His help to put these aside as the unimportant things in life.

Reference: Proverbs 14:30 (New Living Testament)

day 45: Godly At Work?

I hear it all the time, “it’s so hard to be ‘Godly” at work”. When I hear it from others, I reflect upon my own work life and cringe at the memories of how I handled myself on many occasions and the poor example that I many times set. I also lament that my example might have hurt the cause of someone else who was trying harder than me to be more Godly and then they would see me and feel let down. When we are so emotionally and physically intertwined with other people for the hours we are when we are working we can easily slip into the ways and the words of others. I always marveled when someone senior would come into the company and before long, the words that person used became the words of their subordinates and before long their peers. I once worked with a person whose favorite phrase was, “I don’t disagree” and before long everyone said the same thing. There was nothing outwardly wrong about that phrase (other than it sneaked in a passive aggressiveness into the culture and before long no one ever disagreed outright) but it was a great example of how we become chameleons at work and can find ourselves sharing the words and behaviors that wouldn’t normally be ours. I also know that those words and behaviors from work then creep into home. So, what are we to do? What if we try and try but still can’t seem to keep ourselves above the temptations and the fray? What we have to do is quit trying to go it alone and instead ask God to do His work on us as we go to work. If we allow ourselves to receive the power that God has covered us with then we can find enough of that power to keep ourselves Godly when we are working. In 2 Peter 1:3, we are told just this: "By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life...". Today, think through how you can let God give you that power so that today, day by day, you can find yourself living a Godly life…at work!

Reference: 2 Peter 1:3 (New Living Testament)

day 44: But, It's Only Work...

Since it is only work and not some form of formal ministry or “calling” we tend to think that God doesn’t want us to bother Him with the tedious details of our work lives. It just can’t be that important and why would we have to bring our work issues to God? Isn’t He more interested in soul-saving or issues that affect those in pain, need, or suffering? So, we try to humanly muscle through our 40 hours a week and then we wonder why God isn’t rewarding and fulfilling us in our work. If we expect God to intervene without us bringing our work challenges to Him, then we need to readjust our expectations and expect human results. We have to include God in our work lives as He wants us to do so. We are given this word in Psalms 32:2:"The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives." What a tremendous promise to know that God delights in every detail of our lives, including the details of the work we do. So, today you can drive to the office knowing that God wants to be there with you as you balance the books, make that sale, mill that part, fix that machine, prepare that presentation and make that decision, whether it be big or small. Don’t take this wrong, God doesn’t care about the result, He cares about us. He wants to be our best friend and like a best friend is there to hear our worries, our fears, our achievements and our dreams, God wants to be right there with us at work in real time. If you allow Him into the details of your life today, He will be delighted and you can know that He is there with you in any situation you face.

Reference: Psalms 32:2 (New Living Testament)

day 43: Lifted Up

In the Psalms, David is such an inspiration. He seems to almost always have the right word for the right time. David was a worker before he was a king. He worked in the fields as a shepherd and learned a skill the hard way, through experience. When we are mired down in the muck and mire of work and we feel like we are caught in a pit, that pit can easily feel like a pit of despair. At work it can be the smallest of things that put us in this mood and feeling. Why such a little thing like an errant word in an email, or a phone call not returned, or not being invited to a meeting can create a feeling of loss or hurt? These are the little things that, for some reason take on a life of their own and can quickly turn into an all consuming issue. When this happens we can quickly lose our perspective and instead of looking at our problems from the top of the mountain top of confidence, we look up and out of our pit of despair and the issues just get worse and worse by the minute. So what are we to do? While many things at work can be managed and handled through our own skills and experiences, there are many things that we need to turn over to God and let Him work it through for us. Psalms 40:2 gives us a clear example of what God can do for us. David says. "He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along." This is the God who comes to work with us day in and day out. He doesn't need to swipe an access card to come to hang with us at work. All he needs is the invitation from us to join us in the pit and meet us in the mud and mire. If we are willing to invite Him to take over and help us through the challenges we face we will find ourselves finding the solid footing that we once had. Can you take God to work with you so that He can lift you up?

Reference: Psalm 40:2 (New Living Testament)

day 42: Quiet Confidence

Is there someone you know who exudes a quiet confidence? They don’t have to say it, but you just know that they are confident in who they are, what they stand for, and the positions that they take. We all know these types of people. They are the quiet lions of the work world. You sense and know their presence when they are in the room. The people who I know who are that strong are role models who others look toward when everyone else is scrambling and shaking. How is it that they are such a solid rock? One way to find that inner confidence is to follow the words of Isaiah 30:15 as he provides how to build one’s inner and spiritual strength: “The Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says, ‘Only in returning to me and waiting for me will you be saved. In quietness and confidence is your strength”. God says that in our most difficult of times we are to return to Him and then in our faith we are to remain quiet and confident. The evangelist, David Wilkerson, writes on this scripture. He translates the word “quiet” in Greek to mean, “Repose”. Repose means to be calm and under control. The message here is that we can’t create our own confidence and quietness, but what we can do is strengthen our faith and then let our faith play out as we become more confident and as we wait on Him in quietness, we will find the right spirit and words. In our work lives we are being watched for how we handle those tense and stressful situations. Others expect us to hold ourselves strongly and calmly and to not let ourselves to become caught up in the war of words or taking on an attitude. Today is a great day to ensure that we are right with God spiritually as we face the challenges at work. If we can begin to give over to Him those things we cannot handle ourselves and wait on Him, then we will find that internal quiet and confidence that can become a life signature.

Reference: Isaiah 30:15 (New Living Testament)