Career Changes

Find someone in the congregation who has made difficult career changes based on what God has asked them to do. Other than those who are in full-time ministry, consider shifting the parameters of who you might ask to share to a different lens. Has someone in the congregation chosen to work in their field in a community that isn’t always ideal (a more disadvantaged situation, a harder town or community) rather than where it would be easy to flourish, make more money, or become well-known? These people are fulfilling their calling to follow Christ as his disciples in the place of their employment and choosing to do the harder thing. Point out how valuable it is to have Christians in the workplaces in our community, that we need multitudes of believers influencing a community as they do the jobs they have been trained to do. Another type of person who would illustrate a response Jesus’s call to follow him would be someone purposefully not working in their field in order to serve another, such as someone caring for aging parents who require full-time care, a parent who has left their job to care for a child at home, or someone who has relocated to serve an ill or aging family member. All these scenarios illustrate giving up oneself for another—either temporarily or for the long haul—and require someone to daily surrender their own needs on behalf of another.