Church @ Work – Preaching

How can preachers speak to the challenges of our daily work when they don’t have “real” jobs?

This is the second in a series of posts on how the church could be (but for the most part isn’t) helping each of us to grow in our understanding and Christian living in the workplace. The question posed here isn’t an entirely fair one of course, for several reasons – pastors clearly have very “real” jobs, many pastors have significant workplace experience, and many preachers are not pastors (present company included). But many of us feel a disconnect between the pulpit and the shop floor, between the Word as preached on Sunday morning, and the life as lived on Monday morning. Is this inevitable as my first question suggests?

There are several ways to address this question. I was trained and licensed 30 years ago or so in the Church of England as a Reader, a lay minister able to lead services and preach and be otherwise involved in pastoral ministry, but intentionally as someone whose Mondays looked like everybody else’s. The CofE recognized this need, and so implicitly acknowledged the gap. (It was also a way of dealing with significant shortages in parish priests, but that’s another story). Many of my closest friends have been pastors, and this has issue been a frequent topic of conversation. I’ve heard frustration from congregation members too, and appreciation for those preachers who are able to talk about their significant work experience from the pulpit.

But we can’t lay all the blame on the system of professional clergy that our churches have largely adopted, or on the seminaries, or on the pastors who either haven’t spent long in the workplace or have forgotten what it was like. We have a responsibility too – listening to God’s Word isn’t just about being spoon-fed, but also about grappling with the Word, asking God through His Spirit to show us how it applies to our situation. For example, even though I have been in the daily workplace for decades, my experience is radically different from that of an artist, or a construction worker, or a trucker. My challenges are just as far removed from them as are those of a pastor in his or her work. Preachers must learn the art of application of the Word and pass on that art, teach its principles, to congregants.

However, those of us who preach can raise levels of expectation. We can continually draw attention to God’s 24x7 plan and debunk any ideas about Christianity being a Sunday religion. We can draw on our practical experiences to demonstrate the applicability of Scripture to all of life, generalizing in ways that help us all to see how the Scripture sheds light on our unique situations. When Paul says to Timothy that “all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work” (1 Tim 3:16-17) he is not just talking about “holy work” or “church work” but all of work which, as Genesis 1 says about God’s own work is “very good” (Gen 1:31). If our preaching does not hit home on Monday, then it isn’t really very useful. This doesn’t mean we switch away from theological depth, or from intensive Biblical exegesis and exposition though. I would argue strongly that if our theology and our preaching do not interpret, shape, encourage and challenge in daily life situations, we’re wasting our time, no matter how academically interesting our studies!

So here’s a challenge to myself (and other preachers who read this): I need to add a success criterion to my preaching that every person in the church is in some way taught, rebuked, corrected or trained in relation to their daily work.