Spending Time with God in the Workplace
January 10, 2023 | Andrew Zakhari
In the last post in this series, we discussed how to begin the day with God. In this post, we discuss how to spend the day with God in the workplace.
No two people have exactly the same working arrangement. Some work from home. Others work in an office. Some have jobs with frequent contact with people. Others have jobs that are more project based. Some have fast-paced jobs. Others have less day-to-day pressure but have several important deadlines throughout the year. Your job might be a combination of all the above. Let’s not leave out parenting – that’s a full-time job in and of itself!
But no matter how our workday unfolds, the goal of our spiritual life remains the same for everyone. We see this teaching put differently in both the Old and New Testament.
Proverbs 3:6 teaches: “In all your ways acknowledge [God] and he will direct your paths.”
In I Cor. 10:31, Paul says: “In whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”
Here’s how Richard Baxter put it: “Remember your ultimate purpose, and when you set yourself to your day’s work or approach any activity in the world, let holiness to the Lord be written upon your hearts in all that you do.”
When you put these statements together, they teach us to be consciously aware and honoring of God’s presence throughout the day. If the aim of our efforts is to honor God, his closeness to us is more greatly sensed.
Here are four ways to consciously be aware of God’s presence throughout the day:
- Your life in Christ is a response to God’s grace.
- The best that could ever happen in our lives has already occurred because we belong to God through Jesus Christ. Whatever our work calls us to do for the day, we can approach it with the mindset that the One who has put these tasks in front of me is the One who has poured out his life for me. It is not a burden to give back to someone who loves us well. The same is true in my relationship with God. We do our work for his glory in response to the grace he has given us.
- Throughout the day offer your work to God.
- As long as the work we engage in is morally good, we can ask for God’s blessing before, during, and after we complete tasks. 1 Peter 2 calls the people of God a royal priesthood. A priest’s life is about continually offering to God all that is entrusted to him. We can offer our client appointments, spreadsheets, research findings, conversations with children, etc. in the same way.
- This also reminds us that we should be mindful of how we can sin against God in our work and to avoid it. If we can’t in good conscience ask for God’s blessing upon what we are doing then we should refrain from doing it.
- Repair your relationship with God throughout the day.
- At various points throughout the day, we may be convicted of doing something that we should not have, or failing to act when we should have. We have lost sight of God and have come to this awareness by the Holy Spirit. This is called conviction. Conviction is God’s way of calling us back to himself. When this occurs we can acknowledge our wrongdoing to God and ask for his forgiveness. And if someone else is affected by our actions we must ask for their forgiveness as well and endeavor not to do it again. Repentance that leads to restoration makes amends with those we wronged, not just with God.
- Return to God throughout the day.
- Sometimes in the midst of lots of tasks and appointments we can become aware that we have lost sight of God. This is different than losing sight of God because of conscious sinning as discussed in the previous point. This kind of losing sight of God is experienced as a longing for God and that is a good thing. This is an opportunity to return back to God by praying, meditating on Scripture, worshiping God through song, etc.
The above is by no means an exhaustive list of strategies, but they do highlight some ways we can consciously spend time with God. The common thread in all of these strategies is that we seek to have continual concentration on God in whatever places he has called us to work.
Next post: Ending your day with God