I Feel Trapped in My Job — What Should I Do?

00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)

00:00:02.580 | - Welcome back to the podcast.

00:00:05.600 | As I mentioned last time, Pastor John is in the middle

00:00:08.040 | of a very busy ministry month of January,

00:00:10.440 | and I would ask for your prayers on his behalf.

00:00:13.120 | He began the year preaching at the Cross Conference

00:00:14.880 | in Louisville, a little later at the G3 Conference

00:00:17.480 | in Atlanta he spoke, and now he prepares

00:00:19.240 | for the 2019 Bethlehem College and Seminary Pastors

00:00:23.160 | Conference on the theme of Christian joy.

00:00:26.080 | Looking forward to that.

00:00:27.020 | That conference is here in Minneapolis.

00:00:29.120 | It begins on Monday and it ends on Wednesday.

00:00:32.860 | Again, your prayers would be appreciated.

00:00:34.940 | And one more time, with Pastor John out of the pocket,

00:00:38.040 | we are joined by Tim Keller over the phone

00:00:40.320 | from New York City to talk about vocation and work

00:00:43.800 | in his really helpful book, "Every Good Endeavor,

00:00:46.280 | "Connecting Your Work to God's Work."

00:00:49.380 | Tim, yesterday we talked about vocational misuse

00:00:52.400 | when we think of work only in terms of self-fulfillment,

00:00:55.520 | self-realization, and how it slowly crushes a person

00:00:59.280 | when they approach their vocation that way.

00:01:01.540 | This is a huge topic for parents who are desiring

00:01:04.320 | to train their kids for this diligent labor in the future.

00:01:07.520 | In your book you write this, quote,

00:01:09.300 | "Work did not come into creation

00:01:12.140 | "after a golden age of leisure," end quote.

00:01:15.840 | That's a great point.

00:01:17.040 | Work did not come into creation

00:01:19.560 | after a golden age of leisure.

00:01:22.020 | Human labor is deliberately embedded into creation

00:01:25.420 | from the start, as you know.

00:01:27.320 | I love this line.

00:01:28.200 | Speak to parents, though, building off of this.

00:01:31.360 | Tim, how do I as a dad teach and train my kids

00:01:34.360 | about the divine value of work?

00:01:37.440 | - Well, you have to get the basic doctrines

00:01:40.860 | of creation and fall and redemption,

00:01:44.360 | and you have to give it to children at every age,

00:01:47.640 | but you have to give it in a form

00:01:49.360 | that they can handle at that age.

00:01:50.480 | But I think you have to say that work was put

00:01:53.120 | into the Garden of Eden.

00:01:54.640 | When God had everything absolutely perfect, there was work.

00:01:59.600 | And that must mean that even though in this life,

00:02:04.600 | work is often difficult.

00:02:06.920 | Our bodies break down, so work can actually wear us down.

00:02:11.920 | Our minds and our hearts aren't what they should be

00:02:14.900 | because of sin, and very often we have trouble

00:02:18.240 | paying attention to things.

00:02:20.060 | But basically, in the end, we were made to work,

00:02:22.640 | and we're only happy if we do work.

00:02:25.240 | And you can even say people that don't have work

00:02:27.480 | or don't do work in the long run get depressed.

00:02:30.200 | And the reason why they do that

00:02:31.680 | is because we were made for it.

00:02:33.580 | We were made to find fulfillment in working

00:02:37.160 | and being useful to others in that work.

00:02:39.920 | And I think there's a way of getting that across

00:02:42.360 | to 11-year-olds and seven-year-olds.

00:02:44.840 | The way I raise children, too.

00:02:46.460 | You say things, you're not sure they get it.

00:02:48.080 | You find out in question and answer

00:02:50.640 | to what degree they understood it

00:02:51.840 | and what degree they don't,

00:02:52.680 | and then you try to make it simpler

00:02:54.760 | until you feel like you've hit home.

00:02:56.560 | - Yeah, absolutely, very true, good word.

00:03:00.000 | Okay, so the kid grows up.

00:03:01.560 | Fast forward to a young man or a woman

00:03:03.520 | now seriously contemplating a career path.

00:03:06.840 | One of the things you say in your book

00:03:07.960 | is that you find in New York City

00:03:09.320 | that a number of young college graduates

00:03:11.440 | select careers as a form of personal identity.

00:03:16.000 | A career becomes something like a car,

00:03:18.840 | is a status marker.

00:03:20.520 | Explain that phenomenon, what do you see?

00:03:22.680 | - Well, there's been a lot of great books

00:03:26.200 | written recently on this idea

00:03:27.800 | that we live in a consumeristic age

00:03:29.840 | in which your identity is seen in the products you consume.

00:03:33.600 | I'm the kind of person that wears this kind of clothing,

00:03:37.560 | owns this kind of, these electronics,

00:03:41.420 | these are the accessories I use.

00:03:44.960 | So you actually get your identity

00:03:46.220 | from the brands that you use.

00:03:48.760 | And I'm afraid that what's happened here

00:03:51.680 | is that jobs are like that too.

00:03:54.720 | And there's just no doubt,

00:03:55.600 | I see plenty of people taking jobs that really don't fit.

00:03:58.600 | A, it doesn't fit their talents very well.

00:04:01.680 | And B, very often the jobs don't necessarily fulfill them

00:04:06.360 | because the jobs aren't really maybe helping people

00:04:09.480 | very much, but the jobs are high status.

00:04:12.160 | And because they're high status,

00:04:13.840 | people feel like I need to be in that job

00:04:16.160 | so I can feel good about myself.

00:04:17.360 | So it's an identity marker.

00:04:19.400 | So people are very often not choosing jobs

00:04:22.640 | on the basis of vocation,

00:04:23.800 | not saying what gifts do I have

00:04:26.000 | and how can I be useful to other people through my work?

00:04:28.280 | But how do I take a job that gives me

00:04:31.600 | the same kind of sense of self-worth I get

00:04:34.900 | when I'm driving a particular kind of car?

00:04:37.080 | - Yeah, that's an important word.

00:04:39.240 | Okay, so let me press into vocation

00:04:41.240 | from the consumer's perspective

00:04:43.000 | and post you a little hypothetical scenario, if you will.

00:04:47.880 | Let's say in ancient Babylon,

00:04:49.720 | there's a man who grows straw.

00:04:52.840 | He's good at it.

00:04:53.880 | He works hard.

00:04:54.880 | He serves his buyer well.

00:04:56.520 | He always delivers the product on time.

00:04:59.920 | He never overcharges.

00:05:01.320 | His straw then is purchased

00:05:03.440 | and is immediately used to create reinforced baked bricks

00:05:07.200 | that are stacked by other laborers into the Tower of Babel.

00:05:11.480 | All of that to ask,

00:05:12.520 | at what point is the straw grower's vocation

00:05:14.800 | made virtuous or corrupt by the end product down the chain?

00:05:19.720 | How do you think through that?

00:05:21.000 | - Well, I mean, I think you have to be

00:05:24.240 | very directly collaborating with the evil

00:05:27.000 | before you start to try to get that.

00:05:29.560 | See, the trouble with the purest impulse is this.

00:05:33.320 | If I make bread and I know that there are criminals in town

00:05:36.920 | eating that bread and staying alive

00:05:38.520 | because of my bread making,

00:05:40.320 | should I really get out of that?

00:05:41.680 | Should I say, okay, well, only a certain percent,

00:05:44.640 | well, only a certain percent.

00:05:45.560 | I'm helping them live.

00:05:46.400 | I mean, if you actually,

00:05:49.080 | Luther would laugh at the idea

00:05:51.560 | that you in some pure way have to make sure

00:05:54.360 | that your work only furthers godly ends.

00:05:58.000 | He says, your job is there to,

00:06:00.120 | God feeds everything that has breath.

00:06:03.760 | Luther expounds the Psalms,

00:06:06.640 | especially Psalms 145 and 146, 147,

00:06:10.720 | where it talks about God feeds everything that has breath.

00:06:14.800 | He loves everything that he's made.

00:06:16.760 | And Luther then says, okay,

00:06:18.720 | well, how does God feed everybody?

00:06:20.200 | Well, he feeds them through the farmer.

00:06:21.440 | He feeds them through the milkmaid,

00:06:24.000 | who's milking the cow.

00:06:25.000 | He feeds it through the truck driver

00:06:26.080 | who's bringing the things to market.

00:06:27.960 | That's really God's work then.

00:06:29.560 | If you're just farming, you're doing God's work.

00:06:31.640 | It doesn't have to be a Christian farmer.

00:06:33.720 | You just do it and it's God's work.

00:06:35.740 | But then at a certain point,

00:06:39.400 | I do believe 'cause I'm Reformed

00:06:41.160 | and I believe in world view, importance of world view,

00:06:44.020 | that work also does need to have,

00:06:46.760 | it has to be done from a Christian perspective.

00:06:49.580 | But I also think that Luther's got something to say,

00:06:52.280 | that all work is good work if it's done well.

00:06:54.620 | And that if you actually try to say,

00:06:56.480 | well, this work is actually helping someone

00:06:58.740 | who's furthering evil ends,

00:06:59.980 | at a certain point you'd be completely paralyzed.

00:07:02.040 | You couldn't do anything.

00:07:03.120 | - Right, yeah.

00:07:03.960 | So apply Luther's logic a step further

00:07:06.160 | and apply it to that Christian brother or sister

00:07:08.280 | we talked about last time on Wednesday

00:07:10.040 | who feels trapped in a vocation that they don't like.

00:07:14.120 | - Luther's understanding of calling

00:07:16.160 | is that the farm girl who's milking the cows

00:07:19.440 | needs to, even if it's the only job available to her

00:07:21.880 | and she'd like to go somewhere else,

00:07:22.920 | she needs to see what she's doing is God's calling.

00:07:25.660 | She needs to see that this isn't just milking cows,

00:07:27.840 | this is my way of participating

00:07:30.000 | in God's care for his creation.

00:07:32.160 | Because he has decided this is how I'm going to do it.

00:07:35.600 | - There's a place where Luther takes,

00:07:38.120 | I forget what Psalm, where he says,

00:07:39.960 | God strengthens the bars of the city gates.

00:07:43.440 | In other words, he gives you security.

00:07:44.800 | And then Luther says,

00:07:45.640 | but how does God strengthen the bar of your city gates?

00:07:48.400 | He does it with good governors

00:07:50.320 | and good policemen and good soldiers.

00:07:53.200 | And what he's trying to get across

00:07:54.880 | is that all good work done well is God's calling.

00:07:59.880 | And that aspect, see,

00:08:02.640 | I actually do think that the Calvinist understanding

00:08:04.760 | of calling, which is doing God's work

00:08:07.760 | from a Christian worldview

00:08:09.400 | and the Lutheran understanding of calling,

00:08:11.660 | which is simply caring for creation,

00:08:14.320 | being useful to other people through the work you do.

00:08:17.220 | I do think they're complimentary.

00:08:18.680 | I really do.

00:08:20.360 | And I think it's a very big part of the book

00:08:24.360 | is to bring out the fact that I think they're complimentary.

00:08:26.680 | You've got to use them both.

00:08:28.440 | So seeing your work as a calling is not a problem

00:08:31.680 | if you're stuck in a job you don't like.

00:08:33.600 | You need to say that right now, it's still God's calling.

00:08:35.840 | And that gives me a set,

00:08:37.960 | I think that gives you a lot of peace to say,

00:08:40.000 | hey, I can still answer God's calling in this job,

00:08:45.000 | even when I am looking for a job

00:08:47.280 | that I think fits my gifts better.

00:08:48.960 | - Really good.

00:08:49.800 | Thank you for your time, Dr. Keller.

00:08:51.080 | I wish we had more time together

00:08:52.560 | and thank you for writing this really excellent,

00:08:55.080 | thoughtful, substantial, and approachable book

00:08:57.720 | on vocation, "We Needed It."

00:08:59.200 | - Thank you, Tony.

00:09:00.320 | I appreciate that.

00:09:01.160 | You are most welcome.

00:09:02.680 | That was Tim Keller from his office in New York City

00:09:04.720 | talking with us about his book,

00:09:06.040 | "Every Good Endeavor, Connecting Your Work to God's Work."

00:09:09.880 | And this was actually a phone interview

00:09:12.640 | I recorded with him a few years back,

00:09:14.320 | but never released in the APJ series.

00:09:16.200 | So there you are.

00:09:17.040 | And speaking of years, in six years,

00:09:18.840 | we have generated over 1,300 episodes in this podcast.

00:09:22.960 | And all of them can be found at our online home

00:09:25.440 | at desiringgod.org/askpastorjohn.

00:09:29.520 | Again, please be praying for Pastor John

00:09:31.320 | and for the Bethlehem College

00:09:32.560 | and Seminary Pastors Conference, which begins on Monday.

00:09:37.000 | It could be live-streamed, maybe, maybe not.

00:09:39.400 | Honestly, I don't know if it is or not.

00:09:41.200 | Usually it is.

00:09:42.440 | In any case, I'm your host, Tony Reinke.

00:09:44.320 | We'll see you next time.

00:09:45.520 | (upbeat music)

00:09:48.120 | (upbeat music)

00:09:50.700 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

I Feel Trapped in My Job — What Should I Do?

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