Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: Working in ExileDevotional: 1 of 5The high priest carries the blood of animals into the Most Holy Place as a sin offering, but the bodies are burned outside the camp. And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore. (Hebrews 13:11-13)Chances are that your workplace feels increasingly “post-Christian.” The HR department is now encouraging employees to customize their gender pronouns; talk of religion is quietly discouraged; and your employer is making headlines for their support of pro-choice causes.In the face of these trends, it’s natural to wonder whether you should quit your job and find a new role in a ministry or a business led by a fellow Christian—a workplace that is “better aligned with your values.” God may be calling you to do that, but I seriously doubt it for two reasons.First, Jesus himself worked in dark places. As we saw in today’s passage, he “suffered outside the city gate.” Most literally, this phrase refers to the fact that Jesus was crucified beyond Jerusalem’s city walls (see John 19:17-20). But theologians agree that there’s another meaning to these words. You see, while it was perfectly within God’s power to give Jesus a vocation inside the city gate—in the Temple, “the Most Holy Place”—he chose for Jesus to spend the majority of his life working “outside the city gate” as a carpenter where he undoubtedly suffered more blood, sweat, tears, and temptation than the average priest. Commenting on this passage, one group of theologians say that “to follow Christ fully is to follow him to the places where his saving help is desperately needed, but not necessarily welcomed.”Jesus’s example is the first reason to stay in your increasingly “post-Christian” workplace. Here’s the second: Jesus calls his followers into dark places. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus cried out to his Father on behalf of his disciples saying, “My prayer is not that you take them out of the world…As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world” (John 17:15-18). Here, Jesus is reiterating what he said in the Sermon on the Mount when he called you to “let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:16). Nobody sees light shining in an already bright room. Light can only shine in dark places. Which is why Jesus calls us to work and live amongst the lost.All of that brings me to the first principle for working in exile:Principle #1: A Christian’s default position should be to rush into dark workplaces, not retreat from them.But if we stay, we are going to need help in maintaining a distinctive Christianity while we work. It is to that challenge we will turn to next week.

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: Easter VocationsDevotional: 4 of 4He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God….Then they gathered around him and asked him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” (Acts 1:3, 6-8)Everything God does is intentional, and the timing of Jesus’s resurrection is no exception.As pastor Skye Jethani explains in his book Futureville, the reason why Jesus rose from the dead on a Sunday has its origins in the creation account of Genesis 1. Historically, Christians have identified “Sunday as the first day of God’s creative work.” And just “like the creation account in Genesis, which began but did not end on Sunday, God’s re-creation began on Easter Sunday with Jesus’ resurrection but continues to unfold.”You see, just as the first Sunday was just the beginning of the first creation, Easter Sunday was just the beginning of the final one. And just as God called the First Adam and his bride Eve to help him cultivate the first creation, Jesus the Last Adam has called his bride, the Church, to help him cultivate the final one.That’s the vocation Jesus gave us, his followers, in today’s passage: to be “witnesses” to that new creation! At first blush, that word “witnesses” simply appears to be a call to “share the gospel.” But pastor Tim Keller explains that the Greek word here means “more than simply winning people to Christ…the church is to be an agent of the kingdom. It is not only to model the healing of God’s rule but it is to spread it….ordering lives and relationships and institutions and communities according to God’s authority to bring in the blessedness of the kingdom.”What does that look like practically? It looks like weeding out things like disorder, injustice, and disease that have no place in the eternal kingdom of God.It looks like creating beautiful art, places of belonging, and cultural excellence that offer glimpses of what does belong in God’s kingdom.It looks like serving as faithful representatives of our Risen King, modeling his character of love, peace, and joy to those we work with.And yes, it looks like making disciples as you go about your life and work.If Jesus’s “Easter vocation” is King of Kings, our Easter vocation is to be witnesses to his kingship and rightful lordship over every square inch of creation—including your place of work. Embrace your role as a witness for the king and work to make “thy kingdom come” in your place of work “as it is in heaven” today!

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: Easter VocationsDevotional: 2 of 4“I’m going out to fish,” Simon Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus. He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?” “No,” they answered. He said, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish. (John 21:3-6)Today’s passage shows us “the third time Jesus appeared to his disciples after he was raised from the dead” that first Easter Sunday (see John 21:14). Commenting on this scene, St. Augustine once wrote admiringly that after Jesus had “risen from the grave, after seeing the marks of His wounds, after receiving, by means of His breathing, the Holy Ghost, all at once [these disciples] become what they were before, fishers, not of men, but of fishes.”But not everyone shares Augustine’s glowing view of the disciples. I’ve heard many pastors preach this text and call the disciples “backsliding” Christians because they went back to their vocations as fishermen instead of “following Jesus fully” as “full-time missionaries.” Let me share three reasons why that’s a poor interpretation of this text.First, Jesus never said that fishing for men and fishing for food were mutually exclusive. In Matthew 4:19, he said, “follow me…and I will send you out to fish for people.” He didn’t say, “I will send you out to fish for people and you will never fish for food or income again.”Second, Jesus could have reprimanded his disciples for fishing, but he didn’t. And it’s not like it was beyond the resurrected Christ to reprimand his followers (see Luke 24:13-25).Finally, Jesus blessed the work of his disciples’ hands with a miraculous catch of fish! Why would he have done that if he was not pleased with their decision to go back to their work of fishing? In this scene, we see a theme that is reiterated throughout the gospels—namely, that Jesus frequently smiles upon the choices his followers make to go back to the vocations they had prior to following him. We see it here with these bi-vocational fishermen/disciples in John 21. We see it with the Roman centurion in Matthew 8, who Jesus could have easily called away from his vocation, but didn’t. And we see it with Zaccheus in Luke 19 who, upon choosing to follow Jesus, appears to have gone back to his vocation as a tax collector with Jesus’s blessing.Following Jesus means that all of us will now “fish for people.” But it doesn’t mean that all of us will lay down our trades. Deep in your soul, you, like Jesus’s fishermen friends, know that God put you on this earth to fish, write, build homes, start businesses, or create spreadsheets. Meeting the resurrected Christ doesn’t necessitate you abandoning that work. You can bring Jesus great pleasure by staying exactly where you are fishing for people and food for the glory of God and the good of others.

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: Easter VocationsDevotional: 2 of 4Joseph of Arimathea…was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took [Jesus’] body away. He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds. Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen….At the place where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb…they laid Jesus there. (John 19:38-42)Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea had a lot in common. Both were members of the Sanhedrin—the religious governing body that had just played a role in crucifying Jesus (see Mark 14:53-65). Both men, most scholars agree, were likely very wealthy. And both men were secret followers of Jesus…up until Good Friday, that is.Something about Jesus’s death compelled these two men to go public with their faith, specifically by giving Jesus a proper burial. As pastor Daniel Darling explains in his book, The Characters of Easter, “Typically a criminal would be dumped into an empty grave or pauper’s field, buried ignominiously under a pile of rocks.” But Nicodemus and Joseph refused to allow Jesus to suffer that fate. While their fellow members of the Sanhedrin may have killed Jesus like a criminal, these men were intent on burying Jesus like a king.And they made at least three enormous sacrifices to do so.First, money. Joseph gave up his costly tomb (see Matthew 27:60) and Nicodemus offered “seventy-five pounds” of “myrrh and aloes” for embalming, which one scholar says would have cost “an extraordinary amount.”Second, these men sacrificed their priorities. As Ken Costa points out in his book, Joseph of Arimathea, Joseph and Nicodemus “fully knew the embalming” of Jesus “would make them ritually impure at the start of the Passover feast.” This was an unthinkable act for religious professionals used to adhering to the letter of the law! And yet they prioritized honoring Christ above honoring the traditions of their professions.Finally, by burying Jesus, Joseph and Nicodemus would have seriously risked their reputations. Their peers had just murdered Jesus! And here they were honoring him. At a minimum, this act would have cost them their stature. But it could have cost them their jobs—maybe even their lives.The faith of Joseph and Nicodemus cost them a lot. How much is your Christianity costing you? If your honest answer is “not much,” I pray that the example of these two men would inspire you to be even bolder for Christ in your workplace today. That could take a lot of different shapes. Here’s just one I would challenge you with this morning: Acknowledge your faith in Christ to one co-worker who may not know you’re a Christian. In doing so, you’ll be paying a small tribute to Joseph and Nicodemus. But more importantly, you’ll be offering up a small display of worship to the One who gave up everything for you and me!

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: Easter VocationsDevotional: 1 of 4Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane…and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” (Matthew 26:36-38)Peter and “the two sons of Zebedee” (James and John) had a broad vocation to follow Jesus. But on the night before their rabbi’s crucifixion, they were given a more specific job: Simply to stay awake while Jesus went away to pray.As they were all walking into the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus “began to be sorrowful and troubled.” He was “overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.”What’s going on here? In his phenomenal sermon The Dark Garden, Tim Keller explained Jesus’s sorrow this way: “Jesus…got all of his power…and his love from his relationship with the Father, and therefore...as he was walking to [Gethsemane], he would have started praying….In his heart, he would have turned to the Father, the way he constantly does…and that’s when it hit him. Because when he turned in his soul toward the Father, there was nothing there.”Jesus was experiencing a first sip from the “cup” of God’s wrath due to humankind’s sin (see Matthew 26:39). He was catching a preview of what he would drink in full the next day: Total separation from his Heavenly Father.Meanwhile, back at the camp, Jesus’s disciples were (literally) falling down on the job. Three times Jesus asked them to do the easiest job in the world while he went off to consider whether or not he would do the hardest—dying for these men who couldn’t even stay awake.As Keller explains, “Peter, James, and John are the representatives of the human race…Every time [Jesus found them sleeping] it’s like the Father is saying, ‘That’s the human race for you. Swallow hell for them. Take into yourself this spiritual atomic bomb and let it explode for them.’”And Jesus did! What does that mean for you, believer? At least two things.First, it means that God loves you on your absolute worst day at work. The day that represents your biggest regret. The season of unproductiveness. The time you had a golden opportunity to share the gospel with a co-worker but didn’t. God knows all about it. And because Jesus chose to die for his disciples on their worst day at the office, you can be confident that he loves you on yours.Second, I hope this scene at Gethsemane reminds you that you are free to risk greatly. Start that business, speak up for the injustice you’ve seen in your office, share your faith boldly. Why? Because even in failure, nothing “will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).Because Jesus spent three days separated from the love of God, you never will, believer. Don’t take that for granted. May the assuredness of God’s love lead you to be bold for Christ’s sake today!

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: The Work Beneath Your WorkDevotional: 4 of 4 “And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6:28-33)I began this series by asking you two questions:What is the work beneath your work? How does the gospel free you from that work? We’ve already explored two of the most common answers to that first question: performance and avoidance. Today, we look at one final work beneath our work: fear.This may be the most universal of all that we’ve explored. Entrepreneurs overwork themselves for fear that if they “don’t put in the work,” they won’t be able to provide for their families and their teams. Employees overwork for fear of losing their income and health insurance.Now, some of this fear is healthy. 1 Timothy 5:8 says that “Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”But fear is terribly unhealthy and sinful if it controls you. If it plagues your thoughts. If it leads you to overwork or not faithfully “stand in for God,” and say hard things when they need to be said to your boss or customers.How can we be freed from fear—from this work beneath our work? The same way we are freed from performance and avoidance: the person and character of Jesus Christ.In today’s passage, Jesus promised his followers that if we “seek first his kingdom and his righteousness,” he will meet our every need. Why can you trust this promise when your job is on the line? Because God provided for your ultimate need of spiritual redemption even when it cost him the life of his Son. If God kept that promise, surely he will keep his promise to provide you with food and clothing. If the work beneath your work is fear, let that truth free you today. But maybe the work beneath your work isn’t fear, avoidance, or performance. Maybe it’s something else that I don’t know.But here’s what I do know: Until God’s glory and the good of others is the predominant motivation for your work, you will never be satisfied. You will never be able to truly rest. You will never find sustainable fuel for the good works God has called you to do.So do the hard work of identifying the work beneath your work. And meditate on the gospel of Jesus Christ that frees you to work solely for his glory, the good of others, and your joy.

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: The Work Beneath Your WorkDevotional: 3 of 4In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:5-8)We’re in a four-week series exploring the work beneath our work—in other words, the ultimate why underneath what we do.Now, if you are subscribed to my devotionals, part of your motivation for your work is undoubtedly to leverage your vocation for the glory of God and the good of others. But if you find yourself consistently overworking—if you find that you’re unable to rest and “turn your brain off” at home—it’s worth asking whether there are deeper motivations for your work that are less than God-honoring.Last week, we looked at one of those motivations: performance. Today we look at another: avoidance.I know a lot of Christians who are using their work as a narcotic to avoid dealing with their depression, conflict with a family member, or a sense of inadequacy they feel when they’re at home compared to when they’re at their desk.It’s a lot easier to work hard at the office than it is to deal with these things. And so we work hard to numb the pain that comes with doing the harder work that awaits us when we step away from our laptops and workbenches.How do we free ourselves from this work beneath our work? By looking to Christ.As today’s passage reminds us, Jesus was under no obligation to enter our mess and save us. It was perfectly within his rights to avoid our sin and suffering. And yet, he “did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing,” on our behalf (Philippians 2:6-7).What is our response to Christ’s unfathomable grace and mercy? To “have the same mindset as Christ Jesus” (Philippians 2:5) which includes entering into the messes around us rather than using overwork as an anesthetic against hard things.Is God bringing to mind something you’re trying to avoid with your overwork? Ask him for the Christ-like courage to lean into that hard thing today for his greater glory.

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: The Work Underneath Your WorkDevotional: 2 of 4Then the eyes of [Adam and Eve] were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves. (Genesis 3:7)Last week, I asked you this: What is the work beneath your work? In other words, why are you working so hard?Over the next three weeks, we’ll explore three of the most common answers to that question. And while this will be far from an exhaustive list, I’m confident it will be a helpful one.Here’s the first: Performance, or using your work to earn the respect, love, and acceptance of others.For the first few years of my career, this was the primary work beneath my work. I wasn’t working primarily for the glory of God and the good of others. I was working to impress you. And so I would not-so-subtly name-drop big brands I had worked for and impressive people I knew—not to facilitate great conversation, but to make you think I had the most impressive LinkedIn profile in the room.Why did I do this? Why do you? For the same reason Adam and Eve sewed fig leaves for themselves in Genesis 3: to cover up the fact that underneath it all, we’re not OK.Of course, we don’t cover ourselves with literal fig leafs today, but we do with metaphorical ones to be sure. And because professional performance produces one of the thickest fig leaves of our modern era, we can work ourselves to the point of burnout, not because we need to financially, but because we need to spiritually.This work beneath our work of performance is laid bare in Taylor Swift’s autobiographical song Mastermind. She writes:No one wanted to play with me as a little kidSo I've been scheming like a criminal ever sinceTo make them love me and make it seem effortlessWhy are Taylor, you, and me working so hard? To perform. To “make them love” us.What can free us from this exhausting work beneath our work? Christ alone. 1 John 3:1 says that Christians are to be “called children of God…that is what we are!” Through Christ, I am an adopted child of God. A co-heir with Christ (see Romans 8:17). No amount of professional success will ever give me a loftier title than that!It is meditation on that truth that God has used to slowly but surely free me from the work beneath my work. The same will be true for you.But maybe the work beneath your work isn’t performance. Maybe it’s avoidance. It is to that work that we turn to next week.

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: The Work Beneath Your WorkDevotional: 1 of 4Jacob made love to Rachel also, and his love for Rachel was greater than his love for Leah….When the Lord saw that Leah was not loved, he enabled her to conceive, but Rachel remained childless. Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, “It is because the Lord has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.” (Genesis 29:30-32)In today’s passage, we find one of the best biblical case studies for what Tim Keller calls "the work beneath [our] work.” On the surface, Leah’s work was that of childbearing. But her real work—the true why underneath all of her labor—was the exhausting work of winning Jacob’s love. After her first son Reuben was born, Leah said, “Surely my husband will love me now” (v. 32).But evidently, he didn’t, because Leah said the Lord gave her a second child, “Because…I am not loved” (v. 33).Maybe the third son would be the proverbial charm, Leah must have thought. So she gave birth to Levi and said, “Now at last my husband will become attached to me, because I have borne him three sons.” (v. 34). Do you hear Leah’s angst? Her striving? Leah was desperately trying to get something from her work that God never designed her work to give her—namely the love and affection of another human being.But by the time Leah had her fourth son, something had changed. When she gave birth to Judah, Leah didn’t say anything that would connect her work as a mother to her attempts to earn her husband’s favor. She simply said, “This time I will praise the Lord,” and “then she stopped having children” (v. 35).It was only once Leah found love and acceptance outside of her vocational performance that she could rest her body and soul. It was only when the praise of the Lord was her primary ambition that she was freed from the work beneath her work.The question, of course, is what is the work beneath your work? And how does the gospel free you from that work? Those are the questions I’m going to challenge you to answer over the next few weeks. Now, the reality is that the “why” of your work is always going to be mixed. Some of your motives are likely honoring to God, while others aren’t.But we’d be wise to discern the primary motives of our hearts. Because until our motivation is predominantly to “praise the Lord” through our work, we will be restless, unsatisfied, and overworked.Start this morning by praying that God would begin to reveal the work beneath your work. And join me next week as we explore one of the most common ambitions that the gospel can free us from.

Sign-up for my free 20-day devotional, The Word Before Work Foundations, at http://TWBWFoundations.com--Series: Wisdom for Work from the ExodusDevotional: 7 of 7When his father-in-law saw all that Moses was doing for the people, he said, “What is this you are doing for the people? Why do you alone sit as judge, while all these people stand around you from morning till evening?” Moses answered him, “Because the people come to me to seek God’s will. Whenever they have a dispute, it is brought to me, and I decide between the parties and inform them of God’s decrees and instructions.” Moses’ father-in-law replied, “What you are doing is not good.” (Exodus 18:14-17)Moses’s father-in-law Jethro was blunt. But he was also profoundly helpful. So much so that Exodus 18:24 tells us that “Moses listened to his father-in-law and did everything he said.”What did Jethro tell Moses to do? In short, delegate the work of governing Israel. Exodus 18:13-26 gives us a front-row seat to the masterclass Jethro taught Moses on delegation. Today, I want to turn your attention to five principles from that passage that are relevant to you today, whether you lead a team of 10 or 0 and are simply delegating work around your house.Principle #1: Identify the work you’re most uniquely equipped to do. For Moses, that was to “be the people’s representative before God and bring their disputes to him” (v. 19). He was the only person God had called to that task, and so, Jethro urged him to focus his time and energy on that singular activity.Principle #2: Select trustworthy people to delegate other work to. In verse 21, Jethro told Moses to “select capable” people to delegate the work of judging Israel to. But when he explained what he meant by “capable,” he didn't focus on technical skills, but matters of the heart, urging Moses to select “men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain.”Principle #3: Make the time to train well. One of the most common mistakes I see people make when delegating is not making the time to delegate well. Jethro warned Moses against this, instructing Moses to “teach [his team God’s] decrees and instructions, and show them the way they are to live” (v. 20).Principle #4: Trust your team. “The simple cases they can decide themselves,” Jethro said in verse 22. In other words, don’t micro-manage, Moses! When we trust those we delegate work to, it not only serves us by freeing us to focus on the work we’re most uniquely equipped to do, it also enables others to do their most exceptional work.Principle #5: Delegate, but don’t abdicate. Jethro didn’t advise Moses to let his team handle all cases on their own. Just the “simple” ones. Jethro said, “have them bring every difficult case to you” (v. 22). Why? Because, to quote Michael Hyatt, “Delegation is not abdication. The outcome is still your responsibility.”Why does it matter that we, like Moses, learn to delegate well? Because it enables us to excel at the very thing God saved the Israelites and us to do: Work for his glory, the good of others, and the advancement of his kingdom!