We sometimes talk about ‘old man strength’, the kind of toughness and resilience that can hold you strong in situations where it would be easy to quit – because you have been here before and you can ‘tough it out’. But I sense there is also ‘old man knowledge’ that can shape and form your identity.
I did a short interview with my friend John Finkelde this week, for his YouTube channel, talking about some of what I wrote in Hi-Vis Faith and my other book, The Future is Bivocational. My ‘prep’ was a gym session where I read the questions and formed some gut level responses.
The final question was this one:
You’ve experienced massive loss in the last few years your son Sam, your brother, your parents. How has that grief reshaped the way you think about work and what really matters?
I pondered that for a bit, wondering what I could offer here, and then realised that the reason I was struggling to form an answer was because it hadn’t ‘reshaped the way I think about work and what really matters.’ In fact what it did was showed me that the stuff I am betting my life on is trustworthy. I didn’t feel like I needed any massive shift because we try to live in light of who Jesus is and what he calls us to. So when tragedy struck we were devastated but not disillusioned.
On Thursday night this week we watched Unsung Hero, a pretty simple story about an Aussie Christian family who lose everything in a bad deal and make their way to USA to try and start over. I’m not usually a fan of ‘Christian movies’ because they often just ooze cheese, but this one was a good story and very ‘easy watching’ when you are tired – unlike a Bourne identity spy thriller. On my way to a job the next day, I was listening to a podcast with Helen Smallbone, the ‘mum’ of the family (the ‘unsung hero’) where she was asked if her faith was rocked by the total financial wipeout. She paused for a moment then said ‘No – our faith wasn’t rocked – our faith and trust in God was what got us thru.‘ She sounded solid and strong – not trying to hard to convince anyone – just a knowledge that this is how it is.
I smiled as I heard that. Her words rang true. When you have as much experience of God’s faithfulness as we have had over our lives then your response to tragedy, disaster or pain isn’t immediate questioning or doubt. It’s taking hope and finding strength where you don’t have strength. I don’t mean that to sound easy, but in one sense it is. If our practice is to reflexively turn to God in every moment of life – in gratitude, in seeking direction or in suffering then this is what we will do.
So if you’re reading this and you’re 21 years old and thinking ‘good for you old man’, then I would want to say that the place we find ourselves today is the result of years and years of practice – decades of ‘focusing Godwards’ in whatever situation we find ourselves. We have had so much to give thanks for over the years – it has been a very good life so far. Yes, we have had tragedy as well and it has marked us, but it hasn’t shattered us.
So if you’re wondering what the key is to a rugged, resilient faith is then my suggestion is that the key is found in regularly turning to God in the many different moments in life. Sometimes that turning may be in gratitude and awe, sometimes in anger and pain – but in all of it acknowledging that a good and trustworthy father is who God is.
If you are over 50 and a cricket fan then chances are you will remember the rise of World Series Cricket in 1977, an attempt by Kerry Packer to make the game faster paced and more engaging for the spectators as well as more commercially viable – for his personal gain of course…
However if you were born 1975 onwards you will never have known a time when players all wore white, where there was only, red balls and 5 day tests with some lesser prioritised one day games. Prior to 1977 cricket was a conservative person’s game and you didn’t mess with the culture in any way.
Packer did. In fact he took a sledghammer to it. His aim was originally to lure cricket from the ABC to his channel 9, but despite pitching significantly higher offers for the rights he was knocked back. So he decided to ‘take his bat and ball’ and set up his own league. He recruited many of the best players in the world —who he knew were badly underpaid— into his rogue competition. And so began World Series Cricket.
The purists hated it. It just ‘wasn’t cricket’. But many top level cricketers dissatisfied with the establishment and lured by the promise of real money signed up for it. Many ordinary punters loved the new approach—white balls, coloured uniforms and field restrictions that made the game more entertaining and watchable. Add to that a cast of star performers (including previously banned South Africans) and it was just the recipe for a consumer culture to lap up. People began to come back to cricket…
Similarly if you had entered a church in the early to mid 70’s chances are you would have been met at the door by a man dispensing hymn books while shaking your hand and welcoming you. Ushers may have guided you to a very hard wooden pew and the room would have been eerily silent, even though it was full of people—all dressed to the nines. The hymns for the day would have been clearly displayed on the hymn board at the front of the building and the order of service would have been entirely predictable. It was church… and this was how you ‘did church. No one questioned it or considered any other way.
Some of you reading this born in the 80’s and later will have never experienced this version of church.
But you get the parallel I’m sure. It seems that what Packer did for cricket, the church growth movement did for church. Even if some of Donald McGavran’s key ideas were employed haphazardly the focus was on the church connecting with the people living locally who were unchurched, dechurched or just over church in general. McGavran was a missiologist who was thinking thru how to connect gospel with culture. Some local church pastors co-opted his ideas much more pragmatically and decided the goal was to serve the ‘customer’ in a better way.
Ah… and so emerges the era of congregant as customer. You reckon that mighta changed things just a little bit?…
Some of the better known outcomes of this era are Saddleback church and Willow Creek church who each innovated to effectively reach thousands of people who had given up on God, church, religion and the whole shooting match. One of Carey Nieuwhof’s recent podcasts explores the impact of the church growth movement and how it moved from being initially focused on missionary thinking to becoming more of a commercial enterprise, asking how a church can achieve greater market share (although no one would ever call it that)
World series cricket changed the game of cricket forever and most of it was for the good. You have to admit cricket could get very very boring some days… Packer and his crew reshaped the game in ways that offended the traditionalists but that appealed to those who were marginally interested, but could be won over. (Think people like my mum…) Nowadays many of the ‘changes’ are woven into the game and the multi-faceted approach to cricket seems to be more attractive to potential viewers.
In a similar vein for better or worse the church growth movement changed the DNA of many churches as they recognised that converts were few and far between and ‘we just have to do something’ to win people back. Some of this was courageous and good. Some of it cringeworthy and horrible. Sadly what happened was that Australia imitated the USA (as we often do) without realising that our cultures were worlds apart. A sympathetic unchurched/dechurched population in the US responded far more easily to churches that sought to reach them than did Australian churches who simply tried to copy their strategies.
The ‘attractional’ expression of church was effective in reaching many people and drawing them back into the fold. But it’s greatest strength was also its achilles heel. If you win them over with bright lights and great music then you better keep dishing that stuff out week after week or they will eventually grow weary of your best efforts and seek a ‘better’ church. My experience as a youth pastor at Lesmurdie Baptist in this time demonstrated this perfectly. We were ‘flavour of the month’ for a while… until we weren’t.
And then there is the question of how to move a person from consumer to disciple without them feeling somehow duped?
Here we are in 2026 and most people will have no memory of hymn books, wooden pews and pastors in suits and ties. Most people will not be aware of the ‘church growth movement’, the ‘missional movement’ or any other culture forming entity. They simply attend church and want to be part of a ‘good church’, however that may be defined.
Fifty years on, the landscape has shifted significantly and the impact of the church growth movement is here to stay. Even if its impact – seen in the formation of larger attractional churches – was not its original intent, it is the outcome that happened anyway. And now it seems to be expected that a church will dish up excellent music, outstanding kids and youth programs as well as spotless bathrooms and easy parking.
I mused several years ago that I saw the church moving in two directions. The big getting bigger and the small either adapting and tapping a niche of people, or simply ceasing to exist. Of most concern were those in the middle with some capacity to imitate the megachurches, but likely at the cost of willing volunteers who would have to serve on rosters more frequently than is fair if they were to keep up. The middle will get exhausted. The middle will struggle.
But the big will get bigger. Bunnings will always outdo Mitre 10 because most people prefer what Bunnings have on offer. Just this week Christianity Today ran an article titled US Megachurches Grow Bigger as Smaller Churches Decline. It’s what I call simply the ‘hardware shop effect’ and I think it’s here to stay.
What does that mean for those of us who inhabit the smaller communities?
Should we just call it a day now and go join a bigger church?
I’d suggest that in the absence of a conscious missiological focus the answer is ‘yes’. If you are trying to do exactly the same thing they are doing and they have 1000 people and you have 50, then it may be a good idea to go and join forces with them. Why duplicate the weekly event? Surely your church could still ‘exist’ in small groups within the larger gathering and perhaps it would be a win/win.
That said, your church may have a clearly thought out missiology that is owned by your people and that is not dependent on church size in any way. It may be that you have excellent clarity around who God has called you to be as a community and you have a strategy for thriving in spite of the hardware effect. If so do your thing and do it well.
There are some things that only a small community can do – but if this is your choice then you do it knowing that some people will come and sniff around for a while before realising your music is average, your programs lack the sparkle of the bigger churches and your facilities are somewhat tired and jaded.
Then they make a choice.
Either they stay with you because you have articulated a reason for the shape the church is taking – why it isn’t strongly attractional – and why you have adopted your approach to community.
OR
They leave and go join a church that fits them better. And that is also a win. Hopefully a win for the larger church as they receive new members to serve and participate – but also a win for the smaller church as they don’t have unhappy members constantly sniping that they want better this that and the other.
You don’t have to be Einstein to know which way my heart leans on this subject. I believe deeply in the local church and in its genuine connectedness in the neighbourhood. 30 years ago I gave the attractional church a caning – I was 32, full of fire and it was easier to polarise than to sit in the grey that is a multiplicity of church forms. (To be fair that post was part of a deliberate exercise in polemics and was the text for a bigger group debate.)
30 years on I have to accept that some attractional churches can produce strong committed disciples and some smaller so called ‘missional communities’ can be gatherings of disaffected, exvangelicals with little focus other than their own gripes.
But… I wonder what the future holds and how we as the Church hold together in the challenges ahead. Smaller churches will need to sharpen their focus and their energies if they want to remain in existence, while larger churches will need excellent systems and processes to ensure people cannot simply remain as attenders, enjoying the show. Add into this the complexities that come with governance and compliance and I am ready to tap out. This is where I do see greater potential for the large and small to work together and serve one another. If a larger central entity can take care of all of the red tape and BS then it relieves the smaller churches of a massive burden. If the smaller churches can then do their focused missional activity well then that can also inform and serve the larger body.
While it may have been driven by self interest and financial gain, Kerry Packer initiated some significant and important changes in the game of cricket – and he copped some heat for it. Similarly McGavran began a process that departed from his original vision, but brought some real focus and purpose back to churches that had become religious clubs. We live in their wake and our job is to sift thru the learning and apply what is relevant to our own unique context.
All that said, I’m still trying to work out what the ‘Big Bash’ ecclesial equivalent would be!
The Bible is a tough book to read and understand sometimes.
I have been reading 1 & 2 Samuel each morning and following the story of Saul and David. There’s a section in 1 Samuel 16:14 that states quite clearly that ‘God sent an evil spirit to torment Saul’
“Now the Spirit of the Lord had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him.”
It is repeated in verse 23, again with the evil spirit attributed to God.
So how do you read this? I sense how we read it depends on where we start with our thinking. If we begin with the authority and inspiration of scripture then chances are we will take it simply as it is stated and accept that God did something we can’t ever imagine him doing.
If we begin with God as revealed in Jesus and then try to imagine him intentionally sending an evil spirit to torment someone it becomes extremely difficult. That isn’t an action I would ever attribute to Jesus so I can’t imagine God doing it.
Conclusion? Whoever wrote this attributed Saul’s actions to God.
I sense we have been trained to interpret scripture using the lens of authority and inspiration first and any time a difficult passage like this arises we accept that God sometimes does things we can’t understand. That’s a fair position as I don’t think we can ‘understand’ God.
The problem it raises is that God sometimes seems ruthless and cruel. Flick across a few chapters to 2 Samuel 6:1-7 where the ark is being brought back and the oxen carrying it stumble. A man named Uzzah sees it about to fall and reflexively reaches his hands out to prevent it.
7 The Lord’s anger burned against Uzzah because of his irreverent act; therefore God struck him down, and he died there beside the ark of God. 8 Then David was angry because the Lord’s wrath had broken out against Uzzah, and to this day that place is called Perez Uzzah. 9 David was afraid of the Lord that day and said, “How can the ark of the Lord ever come to me?”
It’s ‘clear’ in the text that ‘God struck him down’, because of his ‘irreverent act’. The problem is that once again it just doesn’t sound like the God I have come to know.
Having been raised evangelical I am very conscious that scripture is always our authority and everything else runs a distant second. I get it. But I wonder if we have so needed to protect the integrity of scripture that we have allowed God to be portrayed as a monster sometimes.
It is Peter Enns who says ‘God let’s his kids tell the story’. In other words, the person writing this story has perceived the event as the work of God – and it may not be. While I was raised to simply take the words at face value, the more I get to know God, the more I question whether this was actually him doing these things.
So do we begin with scripture or with the character of God?
And yeah, I know… I’m pretty sure the answer is ‘yes’…
But it’s easy to be oblivious, frustrated—terse even.
Kev had bought a diesel heater off me 2 years ago—a cheap one—and his happened to be one of the 5% that failed. He was an old retired farmer, living in the hills but recently had bought a house around the corner from us. Something about his wife having cancer and proximity to hospital etc. And that was the tone in which I processed this information. It was simply that—a piece of data.
He called a few weeks back to tell me the heater had failed again. He was a bit annoyed and wanted me to do a house call to repair it. I felt bad for him. He must have scored a real dud heater… Rare, but they do happen. His caravan was parked on the grass at the front of his house, low to the ground and it was inevitably gonna mean getting wet and dirty.
When I dropped in the first day he wasn’t there, when we scheduled an appointment he had to cancel at the last minute. I was feeling a bit irked myself. It’ll probably end up being some simple user error I thought to myself…
The cancellation actually worked to my advantage as I was able to shift a couple of jobs around and take off for a surf early this morning at one of my favourite haunts. He called me as I was coming home and I agreed to meet him at 3.30 to sort it out. My mood had lifted from being in the water so I was in the right frame of mind for what I had somehow convinced myself was going to be an annoying job.
We arrived and I tested the heater. Definitely not working. The pump was operating so I went underneath to see if it was pumping fuel. Nope.
Faulty pump? Nope.
Fuel filter? Maybe…
We walked to the fuel filter right next to the fuel tank. The tank looked dirty. ‘Dirty diesel?’ I had heard of this, so I opened it to take a look inside.
“I’ve found the problem Kev,” I called.
“Oh—what is it?”
“There’s no fuel. Not a drop in here.” I’d spent half an hour rolling around under this van chasing my tail when all the time Kev had just forgotten to fill her up. I thought some deprecating things in my head, but said nothing. I could see he was embarrassed and to be fair the dark stain on the fuel tank made it look like it was half full.
Kev tipped some diesel in while I scampered back under to get the fuel lines reconnected. Then ‘boom’—we were up and running.
At this point I’m musing somewhere between “well this was a complete waste of time”, to “how do I charge for this?!”
As the heater got wound up we got chatting. Kev was looking to buy a new car—a Ranger—so we talked cars. I asked him how his wife was, recalling a piece of data from a previous conversation.
“She died just 6 months ago. It was terrible.” he said. “I’ve never felt so lost.”
In a moment the “data” about his wife morphed instantly into the stuff of human connection and I realised I was talking to a man who was quite broken and floundering after this tragic loss.
Two years ago I probably would have offered a sympathetic nod before steering the conversation back to cars. Losing Sam has changed something in me. I found myself asking another question… then another.
For an 80 year old cocky, Kev was quite open about his struggle to find joy in life since his wife’s passing. I shared some of my own journey with grief and loss—the overwhelming sense of bewilderment that comes when your world gets up-ended.
As two blokes we stood chatting for half an hour or so about life after loss and how we were coping. The heater roared on in the background, forgotten by both of us for a time.
I ended up calling it to a close as I needed to get going. I walked him through the heater instructions one more time—and cheekily reminded him of the importance of diesel for the ‘diesel heater’ to operate.
“Do I owe you anything for today?” he asked.
I think we both knew the answer to that. It had moved from being a faulty piece of machinery, to an embarrassing error and then to a rich conversation about life after loss. Somehow charging for any of it seemed somewhat mercenary and unnecessary.
——-
As I keep focusing on how we live as the people of God in the workplace I will keep sharing stories like these. They aren’t grandiose and impressive—just quiet moments that may go unnoticed or opportunities for connection that may go untaken—unless we carry the awareness of both the Spirit of God and the voice of the person we are interacting with.
Work has a funny way of reducing people to problems to solve. A broken heater. A difficult customer. A wasted afternoon. I know there would have been a time when I would have seen Kev as a silly old man who wasted my time. Today I looked in the eyes of a man who was staggering his way through life, getting battered by grief each day and who just needed a break—someone to see him and listen.
To be honest I hesitate to share this stuff because it can look like grandstanding. Trust me. It’s not. I just want people to have some real life examples of how we can live faith and love people genuinely in our various work environments.
What’s it like now—over 2 years on from Sam’s death?
Today we are 2 years 3 months and a bunch of days away from the day it all happened. So there is nothing significant about this particular day.
It’s just one of many that have passed and I have been aware of a gradual shift in how I perceive things and respond.
There are moments when the reality of our loss runs thru my entire being like a high voltage spike and everything in me feels like it is about to explode. These moments don’t last long at all – maybe 2-3 seconds or thereabouts.
It’s like my brain then yells, ‘unfixable – move on!’ I realise that’s sharp and blunt, but it feels like that. I can enjoy memories of Sam as they appear from time to time, but anything that catapults me back to March 24 has my heart and mind light up like a pinball machine, shortly before ‘tilt’ appears and the whole experience quickly shorts out.
I get the sense that because I can’t do anything to fix things, or restore him it is easier to think about something else. And it seems that is what happens. I touch the hotplate only to withdraw my hand and then distract myself with something else.
I don’t know if that is healthy or unhealthy, but it seems to be my practice.
There are times I choose to sit in the sheer darkness of it and to remember the loss, but that really does feel like pulling out your own hair. I don’t want to avoid the horror, but neither do I want to sit in pain that I simply can’t do anything about.
‘Missing him’ is a little different too. There is still the simple missing him from our family – knowing we are one short every time we go somewhere and his presence was always large and loud. There is the missing who he would be now – a qualified physiotherapist, possibly married… so many possibilities that we will never see eventuate.
I shared some of our journey through this at a men’s camp a couple of weekends back. I hadn’t spoken about him much in that kind of space, so while it ‘went well’, in the sense that it connected, I was very aware of a ‘grief hangover’ the next day.
If I have learnt anything over this time (and there has been more than one thing), it’s that everyone is carrying something – or going thru some kind of pain – and if they aren’t yet, then it will come. It’s just how life is. And we need ways of processing intense, deep, searing pain. We need to learn how to enter these times with both courage and hope – because these are the marks of a Jesus follower.
Perhaps this is the biggest thing grief has changed in me. I no longer assume suffering belongs to other people. I know now that every one of us lives much closer to catastrophe than we’d like to admit.
Just a few days ago I heard that a surfer/pastor friend, Andy Pitt had died from motor neurone disease. Having watched a brother in law battle this for 9 years, Andy’s 9 months felt incredibly fast. I consciously said ‘goodbye’ to him at the Christian Surfers national gathering in April and it was deeply sad. He was going fast, so it was no surprise to hear the news last week. And yet again, such a good man gone too soon and another family forced into the contortions of grief.
As I spoke with him during the camp, we discussed the question, ‘why me?’ It was a question people had posed to Andy – why you? It wasn’t a question he posed himself so much, in fact his response to that question was ‘why not me?’ That might sound harsh, but Andy was really acknowledging that in a broken world we are all fair game – no matter how connected to God we are, there are no guarantees – none whatsoever. And as I observed his journey from afar and heard stories from those who were close to him, it seems Andy faced death with all the sadness and sorrow you would expect, but also with the hope and courage that comes from a deep knowledge of who God is and what is to come.
Sam loved Andy ‘Putt’ as he called him, often imitating his Saffa accent. So while I am unsure of exactly ‘what happens next’, I imagine there could be a few laughs happening in ‘heaven’ if they manage to catch up.
It sounds kind of depressing to say ‘if you don’t have pain or suffering yet – don’t worry you will.’ But it’s also reality and it’s worth being prepared. Your son may die, your dad may get MND, your marriage may fail or your business may go bankrupt… But the reality is that pain is coming your way. The other reality is that it doesn’t have to take you out.
I haven’t intentionally formed any strategies for dealing with grief. I have just tried to be myself at each point of the journey and allow it to do whatever it’s going to do – much like getting ragdolled by a massive wave.
But even in surviving that kind of flogging there is some preparation – the physical and mental training to be able to absorb the hits and rise to the surface again. For me that has taken the form of simply living close to Jesus for long enough that I know a) this isn’t his doing b) he walks with me in the darkness and I will survive. And while it wasn’t conscious preparation for this exact experience – it was just the stuff that was needed to hold fast in the face of the storm.
So, you can take the worst that is thrown at you and you can stand strong during the assault, but it starts by being ready. Being ‘ready’ acknowledges that we are all part of a broken world but it also means we do what we can to become the sort of people who, when suffering arrives, have deep enough roots to remain standing.
Even if you’ve prepared, you’re still never quite ready for actual impact. We have this inbuilt hope and expectation that we will dodge the bullets of life – that we will be the exceptions – so it inevitably catches us off-guard.
You won’t be the exception.
Consider this your ‘heads up’ that life is coming for you in some shape or form, so be ready, but also be courageous and be hopeful.
Imagine you are experiencing some kind of demonic activity in your life – you are having terrible evil dreams or constant suicidal thoughts and you seem to have no control over these things. They harrass you often and are destroying your life.
Now imagine you go to see your pastor and he says ‘ah – it’s probably an evil spirit from the Lord.’ My hunch is you’d be on the search for another pastor. There is no Christian in their right mind believes a good father would treat his child in this way and no pastor with even a hint of theological education who would offer this as an explanation.
So what then of 1 Samuel 16 where the Spirit of the Lord has left Saul and the narrator says: ‘an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him.’
An evil spirit from the Lord.
It’s there in black and white. What do you do with this statement? Verses 15 and 23 re-state this same idea – that God is sending a spirit to harass Saul.
Really?
Is this how God treats his kids who have messed up? I don’t think so. Assuming, as Colossians says, that Jesus is the perfect representation of God, then it’s hard to imagine him ever doing this. The prodigal son doesn’t get treated this way. Why should Saul?
I’m sure we all have learnt ways of resolving this tension. Scripture is telling us that God is doing something out of line with his character. Some will resolve it in such a way as to make it ‘true’ – God did this – but it was a special occasion or for a certain one-off reason. Others will reject the statement and find another way to hold the integrity of scripture.
I’m curious as to how others have resolved this so I will hold off on offering my thinking – so feel free to explain to me your way of understanding. I’d like to hear.
Does it matter?… Maybe it doesn’t matter to you, but if you do have a genuine sense of calling then you will know that it matters a lot.
What do we mean by each?
Career – is usually a word used to describe the long arc of your working life. It is also a source of employment that has clear opportunities for advancement and increased remuneration. More than likely it will be an area you enjoy, are skilled in and have trained or prepared for with education.
Calling – a deep sense of why you are on the earth and what you have been created for. Your calling transcends a career or a job and follows you wherever you go and whatever you do.
They are very different things – and yes – you can have both.
If you have followed this blog for a while then you will likely have heard me express my sense of vocation. It’s right there in the title of the blog – “backyard missionary” – that’s it. Super simple. Those words describe who I am and who I aspire to be. More specifically, I mean that God has called me / created me to be a person who communicates his love and the good news of the Christian story to the people I live amongst.
And ‘backyard’ is distinct from overseas, or cross cultural mission. I had originally thought my calling was to an overseas country, but as time has gone on I have realised my deep love for this country and these people – both the ones in my literal backyard / street and others around the country who I connect with.
How ChatGPT sees my life…
As a contrast – but also equally a calling, Danelle has felt an enormous sense of calling in this life is to be a mum – and she ‘mum’s her way through all kinds of spaces very well.
So you may ask, why I am fitting diesel heaters and weighing caravans if my calling is to be a backyard missionary? Simple. I need to pay the bills, (‘If a person doesn’t work then neither should he eat – 2 Thess 3:10) I’m good at this stuff and it allows me to both serve in my work, while also having plenty of free time to be engaged in my local community. I could be a full time pastor- but then I’d be head down—bum up in church world for 95% of my days.
If you are called to lead churches and pastor people then that’s the perfect place for you to be. But if your calling involves connecting with people who not part of our churches then it makes sense to have a job that allows that to happen as fully as possible. Running my own business means I have the autonomy and flexibility to take on work, or reject it as fits my calling. Right now I am working hard because this is ‘busy season’ for us—and in that my calling is expressed in the workplace by choosing to serve people in such a way that truly cares and looks after them.
Come summer I will be much freer to walk the dog for longer and chat with the other ‘dog-walkers’ I now know. I will have more time to hang at the beach with the boys and maybe join the e-foiling crew. I will also have more time just to stop and chat in general. And it’s in these spaces that my calling gets lived out.
I began life as a phys ed teacher and as a young ambitious man I guessed that was going to be my career and I was going to set the teaching world on fire, (for Jesus of course). Then came the sense of calling to mission and ministry – a distinct sense that God was putting his finger on me for a different purpose. I entered youth ministry with ‘career thinking’ and set my sights on becoming a top notch youth pastor – with the idea that eventually I would become a senior pastor and lead a large church. That is ‘career thinking’ and it doesn’t always mesh well with Christian mission and ministry – even though we sometimes talk about ‘career missionaries’ (people who have spent their lives in one project).
I feel like I am still coming to grips with the nuances of my calling – even at 62 years old. I know it isn’t to move back into full time permanent church leadership – although I could do some of what those roles require. But it jars with the part of me that needs to live local, be present and connected. There are only so many hours in a day and I have discovered that I am far more alive when I get to spend a significant amount of time in ordinary life, rather than being busy with church life.
So I would think that I haven’t had a ‘career’ as such for many years now. I have hopped from business to business as new ideas have surfaced, but always with the view of the business serving the greater calling. I doubt I will ever pursue a career of any sort any more. Age aside, it just doesn’t inspire me the way it did in my youth.
I don’t think that’s a bad thing though. I would argue that we need people living and operating from their calling first. If the calling leads to a career then woohoo for you – that’s a win. But the calling may take you away from a ‘career driven’ type of life, to a less impressive version of yourself that would still be truly you – in fact maybe more truly you.
So if you’re 17 and just starting out you will be guided to think ‘career’. It’s inevitable. Vocational decisions made in teen years (ironically ‘vocation’ = ‘calling’) are always geared towards a career path. Your task is far more grand that advancing through the ranks of an organisation over a period of years and eventually becoming a CEO or manager. Your job is to discern who you are – who God has made you to be and what things he has called you to do.
So hear me well. A career isn’t bad. I’m not at all against professional development, but the first priority ought to be that of calling. There is no more important question to answer:
Who has God called me to be and what has he called me to do in this world?
It had been a very enjoyable morning; a retic controller installed, (another little sideline I keep afloat), an encouraging coffee with another pastor/author and now I was on my way to install a diesel heater for a client at their home. It was a spectacular winter day and I was almost high on the warm sunny vibes.
Then it all got a bit crazy.
While having coffee with my friend I noticed several missed phone calls, so I began returning them in my car on the way to the job. While doing so Danelle rang, but I declined her call as I was already on the phone to a client. Then she rang again. Two calls in 2 minutes is a concern. Given our life over the last two years I tend to be a little more alert for potential ‘emergencies’. So I quickly finished the call with my client and called her back, hoping it was nothing important.
‘Your 11.00 caravan is here. Says she has booked a diesel heater with you?’ It was said as a question as she knew I was on my way to a different job. In the bigger scheme of things this really was not that important, but it suddenly jarred me out of my winter bliss.
’Oh…’ I replied feeling a little bit sick, ‘Just check their name,’ I said slowly, wondering if maybe I had got it wrong and this was a job I was supposed to do at home.
‘Sally,’ Danelle said. ‘She has a text from you saying to come today. Do you remember?’
‘Ah… nope…’ My gut churned…
Given the deluge of phone calls that seems to hit at this time of year I had to accept that this one had got past my fairly rudimentary admin processes and I was now faced with a couple who had driven from Rockingham to have a heater installed on their way north, as well as a job I was driving to already about an hour from home. What to do.
Plan A is Don’t panic. Seriously – it’’s not life and death. It’s a stuff up on my part, but not the end of the earth.
‘Ok – that’s a bummer,’ I said somewhat understating things. ‘Can you put Sally on and I will talk with her.’
Danelle put Sally on the phone. ‘Do you remember we spoke and you said xyxz…’ As she talked it all faded into oblivion as I realised In had no memory whatsoever of the phone call – but clearly a string of text messages showing it had taken place. Sally sounded frustrated and a little stressed. I couldn’t blame her.
‘Ok Sally, here’s the plan. I have stuffed up, so I will go and do this job, then I will come to you at your campsite and make sure your heater is fitted before evening. It’s my mistake and I will fix it for you. Is that ok?’
‘I suppose so. And what about weighing the caravan? You said you would do that too?’
Did I?… Bugger…
‘Ah, yep, I can do that too…’ I said, while thinking ‘why did I agree to that?!’ I was seeing my afternoon suddenly blow out to an 8pm finish if all went well. “Why don’t you go and have some lunch, I will do this first job and then I will come and see you at your campsite.”
It was not what I needed. A stunning Perth winter day suddenly became a stressful time of wondering how I was ever going to pull this off. Dinner with the local blokes at 6.00pm looked like it was now out of the question.
With Sally off for lunch I arrived at the first job, a massive off-road van, which is always nice because the ground clearance is enormous and it makes the job much faster. After a chat with the client I got cracking on the job and realised before long I was sweating, because I was doing everything at double speed – also a sure way to make a mistake. However by some measure of fortune I managed to get everything done in double time and working perfectly – a new PB for time taken to install! I knocked on the door after just over an hour to show the owner the finished product. She was happy, so I set off for the Yanchep national park to start on job number 2. I even had time to drop home for a bit to eat and to gather my gear for this next one.
This is where my wife shines. ‘What do you need? What can I do?’
‘ A sandwich and a glass of water would be awesome,’ I replied. I felt a little lighter given the way the first job had fallen into place so easily.
I breathed out. “It’s ok… you may even get to dinner…” I told myself.
I arrived at the park right behind my client who was also driving in from their lunch at the cafe. I meandered around to their campsite.
This one however, didn’t look so much fun. A low to the ground ‘on-road’ van – and the ‘ground’ was dirt… oh well… It was 2.30pm and I knew I’d be out of there by 6 at the latest. I took a deep breath and just decided to relax and enjoy the time – even if I would have rather been at the beach.
I began by walking thru the job with Sally. With massive space under the bed I presumed we’d be installing the diesel heater there.
‘Narp’ said Sally strongly. ‘I want it here.’
I peered into the smallest, most inaccessible area of storage in the whole van… ‘Ok… I can do that,’ I chirped, trying to sound positive, while also realising I was going to be slithering on my back for the afternoon as the space was right behind the two wheels.
‘And what about the fuel tank?’ Sally asked.
I had seen a large front boot and that is usually where they go. ‘Front boot is perfect,’ I said.
‘Narp’ said Sally again sharply. I was starting to not like her.
‘Oh, why’s that?’ I asked.
‘It’s full. No room,’ she barked.
‘Ok where were you hoping?’ I asked. I figured she had already got a plan for this too. She pointed to a shallow space on the rear bumper where you would struggle fit a clipboard, let alone a fuel tank.
‘Norm put his here,’ she said. ‘I can show you a photo.’
‘Ok, I’d need some brackets for that and I don’t have any with me.’ I could have driven home if necessary, but I could already tell that there was no way it would fit.
Sally scrolled her phone looking for Davo’s photo of his tank. She was still scrolling five minutes later and I had begun assembling the heater, while sitting on her step.
We weren’t off to a flying start. I had forgotten them, and now I was feeling like I may end up barking back at Sally if I wasn’t careful.
It was that moment where I stopped and recognised that this could go south if I allowed myself to dislike her, OR it could be an opportunity to smile, engage her and try to win her over. She had irked me with her sharpness, but it’s these ‘pause’ moments that can actually turn a job from chore to pleasure. The pause/pray/startover approach allows for a conscious attitude shift and then a choice to speak kindly and go the extra mile. It’s the ‘Jesus’ stuff’ we talk about translated into simple action.
So I squeezed myself into a tiny cavity under the table and tried to make the heater fit. Once I’d drilled the first hole I slid on my back along the ground all the way up to begin tying all the parts down. I was dirty, my face was almost pressed against the floor and I had only just begun.
Fortunately Barry (Sally’s husband) had come to my rescue and agreed that the front boot would actually be a good place to put the fuel tank. Sally shook her head as if to say ‘well – it’s on you if it doesn’t work!’ Barry smiled and winked at me.
The longer I hung around the more I realised Sally just had a general sharp edge to her voice and she wasn’t actually being difficult or cantankerous. This was just how she spoke. I had misread her initial conversation.
As I worked we got into some conversation. We chatted about our previous jobs, the cost of housing, the level of immigration into WA and a few other random topics. Sally was starting to loosen up and Barry was joining in too.
It wasn’t an arduous job, but it was tricky and I needed to concentrate to get a good end result. By 5.15pm I had got it up and running much to Sally’s delight, who was now crowing about what a neat job it was and how they ‘never used that space for anything anyway’. I wanted to say ‘I know – that’s because you need to be 5 years old to be able to squeeze in there!’
As I began to pack up Sally offered me a beer. ‘Thanks but I’ve given them up’, I replied. Barry grunted that he maybe ought to consider that too.
As I cleaned up and vacuumed it felt like we were almost friends. What had begun with my admin stuff up and what I had perceived as an icy welcome from Sally was now warm and gracious. As I drove home I was reflecting on the simple impact of choosing to pause and stay kind when the first few interactions left me wanting to keep my distance and just do the job as quickly as possible.
There is no rocket science in this – but this is some of what ‘faith in the workplace’ looks like.
That evening a text message came in from Sally, ‘loving the new heater Andrew – we are so warm!’
I think I made a new friend…
We rescheduled the caravan weigh to the following day to avoid making them hitch up and move while in the caravan park. They got to relax and I made it home to dinner with the Yanchep blokes.
The next morning I rocked up to weigh them at 8.15am as Sally instructed, only to wait for 30 minutes for them to arrive… Ordinarily I’d be a bit peeved at waiting half an hour to do a half hour job, but given I had completely forgotten Sally the previous day I felt that maybe I should just smile and accept that sometimes we all get it a little bit wrong.
It was 2007 when I moved from a very white collar, desk and laptop, type job, into a hard grinding trade environment as I started an irrigation and landscaping business. It was unfamiliar territory and it took me a while to get my bearings.
My soft pastor hands came home with knuckles skinned and covered in green irrigation glue, but at the same time I became conscious of the mass of people in our churches who work in these jobs, but are often unsure of what it looks like to live faithfully in that space.
My new book, Hi-Vis Faith, was birthed out of my concern for tradies and service workers, both men and women, who want to follow Jesus faithfully in their workplace, but who don’t connect easily with much of the current crop of books – many of which are excellent – just not speaking their language.
So, “Hi-Vis” is a description of the type of workers who will find this book most valuable—not a term to describe the kind of missional presence a worker should have while on the job. In fact I suggest “low-vis” as usually more appropriate for a secular, trade environment. There are few building sites that appreciate an evangelistic zealot on the warpath, but a quiet, faithful presence that consistently demonstrates the life of faith and answers questions with gentleness and respect is almost always appreciated.
My hope is that our tradies and service workers will have a valuable resource that is easy to read and theologically accessible, while offering some very practical stories and insight on how the life of faith takes shape in tough and sometimes toxic work environments.
I have intentionally asked my friends who work in relatively unseen roles to contribute with their description of how they live their faith in the workplace.
Rob, the local mechanic writes of what it looks like to do auto work with integrity and kindness. Dave writes of recovering his childhood faith and now figuring out what shape that takes in a building environment. Ian writes of seeking a quiet retired life, only to find himself immersed in the life of a retirement village – and loving it. My favourite is Jen, who writes of her work, as a home schooling mum and part time belly dance teacher. It’s a beautiful story of good work done under the radar – as so much trade and service work is.
The book is available on Amazon and the audiobook, read by me is on Spotify and soon to be on audible. The movie is… Well there is no movie yet, but one of the contributors, Yanchep local, Matt just may decide one day to follow the life of some of our often unseen but faithful people who live their faith daily without any applause or recognition 🙂
The subtitle of the book ‘because ordinary work is sacred ground‘, is probably a little understated, but it’s true nevertheless. Wherever you find yourself there you are. That is the space God has placed you.
This morning I drove down to Morley to install a diesel heater for someone who couldn’t bring their van to me. The van was parked on a tarp—on grass and it has been raining, so there were large puddles of water everywhere. Not ideal. I asked if we could move it onto the driveway. That meant driving the client’s old GQ patrol and reversing into a nearly impossible hitch up situation. And… it was an old van and very low to the ground which meant nearly scraping your face on the floor as you slid along on the damp concrete minus the creeper because it just wouldn’t fit.
I could feel my ire rising with every moment spent “getting ready to work” rather than actually doing the job. And then the “other voice” blew in my ear to chill out, smile and relax. Simple enough, but it would have been easy to allow my frustration to spill over onto the young mum who was at home to meet me.
I was conscious of my change of attitude—conscious that I walked in already a little frazzled because of the heavy rain and the thought of enduring a soaking in a place a long way from home. In the end it didn’t rain, the job went well and I was able to shift my headspace to make it enjoyable for the client rather than allowing her to hear the brunt of my Monday morning blues.
Living faith in the workplace isn’t sexy or flashy. There’s no prizes for being a decent human being. But sometimes that’s all it takes to be different – to recognise the sacred ground that is ordinary work and to step up rather than away.
I set the book at $25.00 but for some reason it’s now $29.38 – not sure why – and the hardcopy version is some crazy amount ($100 last I checked!)
When I wrote my first book I felt it was important to have a brand name publisher on it. It felt like it maybe it gave it a little more credibility and gravitas than a random self publish.
But this time I have decided to figure out how to go it alone and self publish – not that I now feel famous and ‘out there’, but simply because I don’t think it actually matters that much. Using a publisher also means they take 90% of whatever $$ are actually made from the book. In my case that isn’t a huge amount, but I’d still rather take that 90% and pocket it myself.
So I’ve worked through the KDP process and the same with Ingram Spark (a bit more finicky). Findaway voices (Spotify) are my go to for audio-books and right now I reckon I am just a few days of final checking away from hitting ‘publish’.
The simple reality is that even if I ‘co-published’ again with some kind of better known name, they aren’t going to be marketing my book anywhere, or trying to help me spread the word.
It will get known in my own circles and through word of mouth, rather than clever advertising. I imagine more and more authors will take this route. I know some of the better known authors are already moving away from big name publishers for this exact reason.
So here’s a kind of ‘preface’ I have slotted into the book that gives you a feel of its focus and intent. If you know of someone who would find this book valuable then please spread the word.
A Quick Word?
So who writes a book and calls it Hi-Vis Faith?
Who intentionally pitches a book at tradies, manual workers and other people generally not typified as readers? Because that is exactly what I am doing here.
Well… Someone who has lived in that world for 20 years and knows it from the inside.
Someone who understands that hi-vis workers—both men and women—want to follow Jesus faithfully in their workplace.
Someone who knows theology needs a practical edge if it is going to carry any real currency in everyday life.
For the last twenty years I have operated three different trade-based businesses while also pastoring churches and reflecting on the challenges of a practical working life.
I have read many books about work and deeply appreciated the way others have articulated the importance of our work in God’s world, but I’m yet to come across someone who writes with the gritty realism of having been immersed in a rough-edged trade environment for an extended period of time.
So this is my attempt to bridge that gap. My hope is that it may empower and inspire these people to make better sense of their work in God’s world.
I could have landed a gig as a full time pastor—but for various reasons as I entered my mid forties, I found myself working in irrigation and landscaping. It was hard work, often done in the brutal summer sun. And it was unfamiliar territory to me. I had always worked in ‘white collar’ jobs, as a teacher or a pastor. Initially I was a fish out of water. These weren’t my people.
But I soon found myself enjoying the different culture—the conversations that happen on a worksite that are quite distinct from those in a church foyer or a school staff room. I appreciated the raw and unfiltered questions about “religion” that were often tossed at me.
I enjoyed doing a hard day’s work and then feeling proud as I looked at the lush green lawn, as I saw the smiles on the faces of the property owners.
As you read—or listen—to this book, I hope that you will feel equipped and inspired to go back to work knowing what your role is as a Christian.
I won’t be teaching you clever ways to convert people. That isn’t why you go to work. I will be helping you develop the conviction that your work matters. And I hope you will receive encouragement to represent Jesus well in tough and sometimes toxic work environments.
Because when you “make it your ambition to lead a quiet life and work with your hands”, as Paul said, people will notice. And if you live that life with integrity and faithfulness, you will win the respect of your co-workers, your clients and your community.
I spoke at a church recently where a young woman introduced herself to me and when I asked about her work she said coyly, “I’m just a check-out chick.” To her credit, that girl’s mother spoke before I could get the words out and said “You are not just a check-out chick.” I applauded the mother’s observation and her insistence that her daughter refuse to let her work be diminished by that label. Although this book is shaped by the hi-vis world, the deeper questions it explores belong to all of us.
Whatever you do—your work matters and the way you do it matters too. You have a role to play in God’s kingdom on this earth and your capacity to live your faith in whatever workplace you find yourself in is deeply needed in our world today – because ordinary work really is sacred ground.
