Before Jesus came to re-connect mankind to their creator, the creator had already developed a plan for mankind. It’s not uncommon for Christians to view this plan as solely redemptive – anything Christian MUST revolve around salvation or it is viewed as heretical.
For many, the worldview they’ve established is one of multiple compartments – a compartment for faith and a compartment for the rest of life. As mentioned in her book, ‘Total Truth’, Nancy Pearcey describes this as the secular/sacred divide. We fail to realize that EVERYTHING created and established is protected and empowered by the Common Grace of God. However since the creation of the world God’s plan was simple.
“In Genesis, God gives what we might call the first job description: ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it’. The phrase, ‘be fruitful and multiply,’ means to develop the social world: build families, churches, schools, cities, governments, laws. The second phase, ‘subdue the earth’, means to harness the natural world: plant crops, build bridges, design computers, compose music.”
When humanity elected to choose separate from God the result was an eye opening experience. They realized, albeit to late, that God’s grace had been protecting them from the start. Now they had to experience labor. It was painful for child birth… painful to toil the land… but also psychologically painful. To remember how good things WERE and now to have to wake up to an alternate life experience never intended by God must have been mentally exhausting.
But God never left – God never gave up – because God knew humanity could still be great. He desired to make them great – to restore what was taken – to empower them to do wonderful, meaningful things.
Jesus has not just saved us FROM, but also saved us TO. We can never fail to recognize the sacrifice made for our redemption – but this redemption did not just save us FROM eternal separation from God. It saved us TO greatness within God’s original plan!
This is why there are NO vocations or callings separate from God’s grace. The beauty displayed in the artists painting, the steady hands of a surgeon, the deep thought of a theologian, or the effective management style of a leader are ALL purposed and empowered by God.
We must look at everything created, formed, and performed through the eyes of Christ. It’s what God has saved us TO that holds even greater importance than what He saved us from. We are new creations through Christ – it’s what we do AFTER that experience that truly matters!! What are you saved to? Musician? Doctor? Artist? Engineer? Great! Now realize you can do this job (calling) and experience it fully through the eyes of Christ – this is how it was intended from the start.
The cause of Christ was never intended to separate us from what we do. It can only enhance it when viewed through grace.