The Lost Sense of Vocation

When Luther’s preaching opened the doors of the monasteries and convents, he not only liberated men and women for useful service, he also liberated the concept of Vocation which had been cloistered for centuries. According to the Catholic Encyclopedia, even today the word “vocation” is reserved in Romanist circles for “the religious”—priests, monks and nuns. But it was Luther’s joyful and triumphant discovery in the light of Scripture that “even the milkmaid can milk cows to the glory of God.” Every Christian, lie said, is called to serve Jesus Christ in his work and station. This is his true vocation.

The difficulty today is that the milkmaid is being replaced by the milking machine. To trip a lever in a bubble gum factory or to sell tranquilizer pills tor dogs is to earn a paycheck, but does it glorify the Creator through the work of our hands? Whoever equates modern-day work with the word “vocation” faces a serious dilemma. In fact, as a contemporary English writer has put it, the trouble about the word “vocation” is to find out what it means.

The changes that have taken place since Reformation times in the meaning of the identical words Calling and Vocation are so profound that no dictionary can adequately represent them. The process might be described as polarization. Thus the Christian Church clings to its classic scriptural interpretation—Vocation is God’s action in calling a man to salvation—so that a Scottish theologian, J. A. Robertson, can depict Vocation as “the supreme category of religion.” At the other extreme, the fields of education, industry, and trade have co-opted the term “vocation” to devolve into a convenient synonym for “occupation.” The inference drawn is that a man’s work today is not what he was divinely appointed to do, but simply that which occupies his time. Meanwhile “vocational” high schools have come to mean non-college-preparatory or trade schools, and nearly every country in the world is erecting a vast state-controlled “vocational guidance” edifice through its school system. Industry is itself developing a built-in program of “vocational selection” to weed out the misfits.

This profane deterioration of the word “vocation” is not just an American phenomenon; a similar fate has overtaken the German word Beruf, the Dutch beroep, the Danish kald, the Swedish kallelse, and no doubt others. Should we then agree that Luther was wrong; that the sacred cannot invade the secular, and that no one truly has a “vocation” who is not engaged in “fulltime Christian service?” Many persons believe there is no other way to rescue the word and the concept. Yet such a narrowing-down seems foreign to the mind of Paul. He clearly was not limiting himself to the “clergy” or to the field roster of a missionary society when he be sought the Christians of Ephesus to “walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called.”

The solution seems to lie in a restudy of the biblical basis of God’s Call, clearly distinguishing it from the modern use (or misuse) of the term “calling.” The confusion probably began through a misunderstanding of Paul’s counsel to the church of Corinth (1 Cor. 7:20) in which he urges, “Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called.” The word “calling” was thought to refer to a man’s work, but the context does not suggest it, for Paul’s illustrations are slavery, circumcision, and marriage. The “calling” is really the condition of life in which a man finds himself. His “calling” is his total situation as he was when Cod called him. It is his state of being called. Thus Paul tells the Corinthians that in the short time remaining before Christ returns, they are not to be restless but to remain quietly “in their calling.”

If we desire a revival of the divine sense of Vocation today, the best place to start is where God himself started—not with Paul but with Abraham. As the Letter to the Hebrews has it, “By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place which he was to receive as an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was to go” (11:8). Abraham’s call was a summons out of something and into something else. It was a change that affected his whole life and all that he did thereafter. It shaped his life work by turning his life into a mission for God, which was to build a nation that would be God’s people.

Vocation, then, is primarily God’s call to life mission in the Lord. The Christian is not merely called into the fellowship of the Beloved, he is handed a set of orders for his life. 1 his may involve work, as with Nehemiah; it may involve denunciation, as with Amos; it may involve any or all of the spiritual gifts as set forth in the New Testament; it may involve martyrdom. Vocation invariably goes beyond God’s call. It becomes also our response to God by way of witness to Jesus Christ in and through our environment—or, as it might be termed, through our function in the social order.

When we ask where one is to perform the service to God set forth as the Christian vocation, the only answer can be “everywhere.” Yet in reality the average Christian has only a limited number of places in which he moves: his home, his church, the homes of friends, occasional public gatherings, a few streets, one or two centers of leisure time activity, and his work. In all of these areas he can and should be witnessing to his Risen Lord. So far the greatest uncharted, unexplored region remains the place of work.

Work today has become the most important thing in life for millions of people. An industrial society tends to gravitate increasingly about the factor—the house of the machine. The machine does not ask a worker’s philosophy, it only demands the output of effort. The worker is required to bring to his labor the full scope of his efficient powers. A Christian witness at work is at a great advantage. Many Christians do not realize that there are thousands of workers who have almost no social intercourse outside of their work. It would never enter their heads to attend a church; yet they will discuss the claims of Christ with a fellow-employee.

The Christian, too, can be seen at work for what he is, and not for what he says he is. His vocation takes on new significance when his fellow-workers watch him react to the conditions they may face: temptation, corruption, danger, ennui, abuse, and all the rest. The Christian’s spoken testimony is gauged by his conduct. For many, the value of his witness in leisure hours and in church will depend upon the way in which he pursues his Vocation at the place where he works.

Taking Christ into the world of work raises many issues for the believer which cannot be dodged or winked at. If we are to follow the biblical injunction, “Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might” (Eccl. 9:10), our work must validate itself before God. If we do not believe that God is interested in the work we do—if we believe that work has nothing to do with Vocation—we are playing not only into the hands of the medievalists, we are also abandoning the whole field of labor to the Communists. For Marxism has a carefully-thought-out doctrine of work which is designed to turn a man into a slave of the state, while brainwashing him until he is unaware of what has happened to him. One quotation from Vyacheslav Molotov, made at the Stakhanovite conference of 1936, will illustrate the point:

Counting minutes and seconds during one’s work means introducing a rhythm … means introducing culture in one’s work. It is therefore not a question of overstrain on the part of the worker but of a cultured attitude towards work (quoted in Koestler, The Yogi and the Commissar, p. 162). Such a comment indicates how hypocritical are the Marxist complaints about the “inhumanity” of the “capitalistic” machine age.

Communism, in fact, poses a warning threat to the Church of Jesus Christ. Unless the Church quickly reclaims her doctrine of Vocation, preaching and teaching the direct Call of God to every child of His, she will find herself without the real answer to the questions raised by the worker today. The twentieth century has seen men rise to power—perhaps for the first time since barbarian days—with a truly demonic sense of vocation. These men believe themselves to be chosen by the inexorable forces of historical destiny to rule the world. They merely underscore the fact that the task of winning the world for Christ is deadly serious work.

The enduring Labor Day message of the Church is therefore this: Whatever the particular task at which we labor, we must be prepared to use it, together with every other aspect of our lives, in the cause of the Saviour. The Call of God is not one that brooks an uncertain or half-hearted response. God makes no “deals.” He deals with men only at the Cross. Every committed heart finds its true Vocation at Calvary.

TIME TO QUIT PLAYING AT SUNDAY SCHOOL

The need for a living, vital Christianity has never been more urgent. In the nation there is a definite breakdown in morality and spiritual conviction; in the world atheistic communism threatens both faith and freedom. Education with Christian ends in view has new significance as a means of maintaining, strengthening, and advancing all that is best in American life.

There is no more effective agency of Christian Education at the grass roots of our society than the Sunday School. One of its foremost advocates is J. Edgar Hoover of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. His recently released 1959 crime chronicle reveals “an alarming 7 per cent increase in the number of crimes against the person … as compared with crime figures for the previous year reported by cities over 25,000” and that 5 per cent of this rise must be attributed to juveniles. The most significant increase was a 21 per cent jump in the number of murders in cities in the 500,000 to 750,000 grouping. Here again juveniles were the chief offenders.

It is Hoover’s conviction growing out of years of experience that

The Sunday school is a citadel of real spiritual influences. Religion to a boy or girl becomes a reality based on love and not on fear. Youngsters come to know that God asks more than mere lip service to His commandments; that He asks us to live under His guidance and love.

The Sunday school teaches the power of prayer and the need to make God an intrinsic part of our daily lives. The Sunday school teaches the child to “rule his spirit” and to place a reliance upon God which will not be shaken in later years. It stands as a strong bulwark against the angry waves of evil presently sweeping across our nation. It is a powerful medium in materially reducing the army of youthful offenders and delinquents.

The emphasis on Christian education in the local church in this issue of CHRISTIANITY TODAY corroborates and enlarges this view. In the midst of the profoundly disturbing events of our generation we need with new imperative to turn the minds of our youth to the Word of God and to Christ as Lord and Saviour. We have been playing at this task too long. We have downgraded the Sunday School and the Sunday School teacher and failed to provide the money and equipment essential to their effectiveness. Greater attention needs to be given to the development of a valid philosophy of Christian education, an adequate curriculum and competent professional workers to direct the teaching of the Scriptures with an incisive relevance to our crisis times. This is a task of staggering proportions but we must needs be about it with all our might. The night is far spent. The day is at hand.

LABOR DAY AN OCCASION FOR RECOGNIZING RESPONSIBILITY

All men stand under the judgment of God. All are objects of his preferred redemption. But sinful nature prompts men to resist this realization.

The labor movement could find no better way to observe this time of year when it is singled out for particular recognition than to affirm awareness of its responsibility before God.

Neither labor nor management can be confronted by the Church on terms other than those of the Christian ethic. God’s laws which apply to the one always apply to the other.

Labor-management rapprochement can never endure under the immoral stress of minority exploitation, coercion, or the perpetuation of inequities or injustices, regardless of the source from which they come.

The Christian community commends management and labor leaders who recognize the evils of our day and seek their eradication. Such men deserve our full support, and their deeds ought to be publicized and emulated.

There is but one Gospel. This gospel applies to labor and management. The warfare that exists between these two social elements must yield to enlightened realism.

STRATEGY FOR DISASTER: BURN THE FIRE TRUCK

In our rightful concern over the gradual spread of communism abroad we may prove to be like the man who vigorously fought a grass fire in a neighbor’s yard while his own house was ablaze.

The wide-spread revulsion against the late Senator McCarthy’s wholesale charges has resulted in apathy, indifference, and fear in respect to the exposure of subversive activities today. It is still highly popular to denounce Communist aggressions abroad. We are almost unanimously indignant over Moscow’s aggravating of the situation in the Congo. We view Khrushchev’s rocket-rattling in Cuba with alarm.

But what about subversive influences at home? What about the philosophies closely paralleling those of Marx advocated in the class rooms of our schools? What about atheism, the Siamese twin of Communism, espoused and taught in leading institutions?

We have before us a letter describing the sorrow of a man well advanced in years, one who for a long time has been an active Protestant churchman. His two grandsons were brought up in the church but succumbed to non-Christian influences in high school and now, in college, have become atheists and at the same time speak favorably of communism. Is there not some line of action against such things? Do Christians and taxpayers have to sit by idly while unworthy men and women subvert their children?

We know that academic freedom must be maintained. Tenure must be preserved. But neither academic freedom nor tenure should permit the unchallenged indoctrination of biases which strike at the very foundation of the life of the nation. Changes cannot be effected over night. Injustice must never be used as a tool to eradicate imagined wrongs. But every institution is governed by responsible citizens who owe it to the institution and to students to see that subversive teaching is not a covert part of the curriculum.

Equally responsible are the pulpits and Sunday School classes of America. A strong faith in God is the greatest single enemy of communism, and where such faith is fostered a bulwark is set up against materialism in all of its manifestations.

All of us need to recognize communism for the monstrous evil that it is. Posing as humanitarian, it is inhuman in application. While speaking of freedom, it enslaves. Catering to the material, it destroys the spirit. Denying God, it makes a god of itself.

Christian citizens should be the bulwark against which the designs of the international conspiracy of communism founder. To accomplish this, Christians must be informed as to the true nature of communism. They must recognize it in its various garbs and take the remedial action necessary.

While we fight brush fires in other lands we are in grave danger of ignoring the slow burning conflagration in our midst. Concerned over Communist aggression in other nations we ignore the termites of infiltration here at home. Some even fatalistically assume that communism will eventually dominate the world and shrug their shoulders in apathetic indifference. While we fight the fires of communism abroad let us beware of the Red-inspired pyromaniacs here at home.

WHAT CHRISTIAN INFLUENCES REACH 3 MILLION COLLEGIANS?

Three million future leaders are being trained in the colleges of our land. We are told that the number will more than double in a decade. Will the nation on that account be in more competent hands?

The present university training of these future leaders is seldom reassuring. The classroom emphasis at Harvard, a typical Ivy League school preparing many students for career service in government, is reflected by a student evaluation in the Harvard Crimson: “Economic proposals that might have sent people to jail not long ago and are still denounced as dangerously radical find remarkable acceptance within the college community.” The article points out that students are quietly absorbing the economic and political beliefs of the “left wingers.” One third of the students interviewed favor government ownership of basic industry, and socialization of all medicine. The same individuals are for the abolition of atomic tests, and an overwhelming number of students favor admission of Red China into the United Nations.

What of “religious revival” at Harvard, of which President Pusey has spoken from time to time? The Crimson is aware of no such “revival.” A random survey on the Harvard campus of the ethical views of 319 undergraduate students from leading homes in America discloses that 62 per cent of the students have no objection on religious grounds to extra-marital relations, and 78 per cent have no objection to premarital intercourse, homosexuality, divorce, or legalized abortion. Some students question the advisability of these activities only because of social consequences.

Do Christian students stand up under such pressures? In many cases they do not. An evangelical from a fine Christian home stated that the fellows in his group, meeting for prayer and Bible study, are sure only that they are certain of nothing. The pressure of lectures keyed to the norm “reject everything before accepting anything,” and reading lists generally slanted against more conservative views (according to the Crimson), softens up less stable students and exposes the woeful ignorance of many Christian students of the historic doctrinal and apologetic formulation of basic Christianity. Still others so superficially appropriate the life of Christ that faith does not stand the test, and they fall before the onslaught of secular education. One is left to wonder just how much faith they really had to lose.

If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do? They must seek to rebuild these foundations, no matter how costly, no matter how difficult. How can this be done most effectively in student work?

First, we must re-evaluate our priorities in the outreach of evangelism and missions. We popularize such clichés as “Win the Student Today; Win the World Tomorrow,” “The Campus—America’s Greatest Mission Field,” “America’s Most Strategic Mission Field.” Tragically enough, the Church is not doing enough.

Because Paul said that “Not many wise, not many mighty” are won to Christ, evangelicals have allowed the intellectuals by default to remain outside the circle of evangelistic outreach. The Communists have not made this mistake. Witness the infiltration of university centers around the world.

Efforts such as Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship, Campus Crusade for Christ, and International Students need our support; as well as every denominational student work that centers its ministry in the proclamation of the Gospel and the whole counsel of God. But the local church also must do more. Less than one per cent of our students on the campus are now being reached by evangelical causes. A Harvard survey of religious beliefs of students disclosed the local church to be one of the least significant influences in their lives. Of more than 300 students interviewed, 74 per cent had nothing to do with any church while in college. The local church must prepare its prospective collegians for the onslaught of secularism. It must equip them with an apologetic, giving a sure reason for the hope within.

Moreover, we need to make the Gospel relevant to the student mind. Too many students today feel the Church is behind the times, and in many cases they are correct. Not only the language we speak, but the problems we face, must be contemporary. The Word of God, through the Holy Spirit, is relevant to the needs of our generation for its message is still the sovereign power unto salvation, even for moderns.

Furthermore, there must be cooperation, both church with church, and church with the local campus Christian groups. Students are the first to discern if our Gospel draws us in love to fellow believers of other denominations, or if we are factious and sectarian in outlook. Nor can we expect the blessing of God on these human failures. In Greater Boston, where groups such as Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship, Campus Crusade for Christ, and International Students have united with each other and with local evangelical churches in an unprecedented way for campus outreach, this cooperation has made a constructive impression on both students and college administrations.

Finally, the local church needs the on-campus students. The outreach of the local church must be campus-centered, for here is the great mission field to be reached. The indigenous emphasis of evangelism is still the basic New Testament teaching. Students make the best evangelists and missionaries in an effort to reach other students.

Have something to add about this? See something we missed? Share your feedback here.