{"id":19265,"date":"2014-07-03T05:55:19","date_gmt":"2014-07-03T09:55:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?p=19265"},"modified":"2014-07-02T19:33:43","modified_gmt":"2014-07-02T23:33:43","slug":"unfulfilling-work-as-vocation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/","title":{"rendered":"Unfulfilling work as vocation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

The Patheos faith & work channel\u2019s blog Mission:Work<\/a> gave a nice shout-out <\/a>to us here at the Cranach blog.\u00a0 That site also has a poignant post from a man who left the ministry but all he could find was a factory job.\u00a0\u00a0 He found that kind of work lacking in meaning.\u00a0 So now he quit that to go back to school to get an MBA in his quest to get a more meaningful \u201cwhite-collar\u201d job.<\/p>\n

I link to that post and quote from it after the jump.\u00a0 Then I give some thoughts, taking the opportunity to clear up some major misconceptions about vocation.<\/p>\n

From Larry Saunders, Does blue-collar work have any meaning?<\/a>:<\/p>\n

On leaving my factory job behind after about two years, I have a lingering question about work and meaning. Most of my co-workers there are relatively content spending their working years doing this kind of work, day in and day out \u2013 very few have any plans to leave. Have they simply settled? Or do they find a meaningful connection to their work? Based on my limited anecdotal evidence, I think most do not find their jobs meaningful, but they never expected to in the first place. For them, work is only a means to meet their basic needs and desires for leisure. Their major sense of meaning is derived totally outside the workplace.<\/p>\n

\n

If I had been a pastor to my blue collar co-workers, I would have advised them generally not to get too tied up in an identity derived from their day jobs anyway, but rather to focus on doing a high quality of work and not to equate their jobs with their callings. In the midst of my own foray into working the factory floor, I am now not so sure I would have found that very helpful to hear from my pastor. It is surely easier said than done.<\/p>\n

Whatever negative forces were at work to take me out of the white collar work of ministry, they couldn\u2019t overcome the simple reality that I am not challenged at all in this work, and I want something more. No amount of reminding myself that the products I am helping make in the factory really do make people\u2019s lives better could sustain me over the long haul. My brother actually put it pretty well when he told me that in this line of work, when I come home after my shift, I will never have the feeling of having done something smart \u2013 nothing I contribute to this job results from being a critical thinker.<\/p>\n

(1)\u00a0 Jesus was a carpenter.\u00a0 The leading disciples were fishermen.\u00a0 And St. Paul, a tent maker, urges Christians to \u201cwork with your hands\u201d (1 Thessalonians 4:11).<\/p>\n

(2)\u00a0 Contrary to the common assumption, vocation is NOT about self-fulfillment, self-aggrandizement, finding your greatness, finding meaning in your life, or doing what you love.\u00a0 Vocation is about loving and serving your neighbor.\u00a0 That means, in practice, denying yourself for your neighbor.\u00a0 Or, as Jesus put it, denying yourself, taking up your cross, and following Him in sacrificing Himself for others.\u00a0 (Another Mission:Work post gets it right:\u00a0 Jeff Haanen, What\u2019s Wrong with \u201cDo What You Love?\u201d<\/a>)<\/p>\n

(3)\u00a0 So vocation is not for the self but for the neighbor.\u00a0 It seems to me that more menial jobs tend to be more directly beneficial to a neighbor than jobs that get lots of honor and higher salaries in the world.\u00a0 Being a professional athlete or a movie star are legitimate vocations, but the service rendered by those who pick up our garbage and clean up our hotel rooms is much more significant.\u00a0 The author of this post was working in a factory that made medical devices that would be used to heal the sick.\u00a0 If he gets his dream white collar job in management, he will order around people in cubicles.\u00a0 There is a vocation there too, of course, but still. . . .<\/p>\n

(4)\u00a0 I do feel for the author of this post.\u00a0 He wasn\u2019t happy in the ministry.\u00a0 He wasn\u2019t happy in the factory.\u00a0 I hate to tell him, but he isn\u2019t going to be happy in middle management.\u00a0 Work isn\u2019t supposed to make you happy in the sense he expects.\u00a0 The doctrine of vocation can give meaning to whatever task that is put before you\u2013when you see it as where God is stationing you to love and serve, when you see God Himself in your vocation working through you to give His gifts,\u00a0 when you see it through the eyes of faith\u2013but otherwise, if you just look at it in terms of your self, you will miss the fullness of God\u2019s calling.<\/p>\n

(5)\u00a0 It\u2019s true that lots of people are asked to do work that they do enjoy and find fulfilling.\u00a0 But no one is entitled to that.\u00a0 It\u2019s possible to find satisfaction and pleasure in just about any kind of work, but sometimes you have to learn to do that.\u00a0 But even the good, wonderful, fulfilling jobs have their trials and crosses.\u00a0 (For the interplay of hating your toil and enjoying it, the sense in which it is vanity and the sense in which enjoying it is a gift of God, see Ecclesiastes 2:18-26.)<\/p>\n

What else?<\/p><\/div>\n<\/blockquote><\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Patheos faith & work channel\u2019s blog Mission:Work gave a nice shout-out to us here at the Cranach blog.\u00a0 That site also has a poignant post from a man who left the ministry but all he could find was a factory job.\u00a0\u00a0 He found that kind of work lacking in meaning.\u00a0 So now he quit […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1281,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19265","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vocation"],"yoast_head":"\nUnfulfilling work as vocation<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Patheos faith & work channel's blog Mission:Work gave a nice shout-out to us here at the Cranach blog.\u00a0 That site also has a poignant post from a\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Unfulfilling work as vocation\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Patheos faith & work channel's blog Mission:Work gave a nice shout-out to us here at the Cranach blog.\u00a0 That site also has a poignant post from a\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Cranach\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/cranachblog\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-07-03T09:55:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-07-02T23:33:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Gene Veith\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Gene Veith\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/\",\"name\":\"Unfulfilling work as vocation\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2014-07-03T09:55:19+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-07-02T23:33:43+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/f9ca8670bcc51908a78994c0484dbfa1\"},\"description\":\"The Patheos faith & work channel's blog Mission:Work gave a nice shout-out to us here at the Cranach blog.\u00a0 That site also has a poignant post from a\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/2014\/07\/unfulfilling-work-as-vocation\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Unfulfilling work as vocation\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/\",\"name\":\"Cranach\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/f9ca8670bcc51908a78994c0484dbfa1\",\"name\":\"Gene Veith\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/geneveith\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/054d79faea5d476edd8f99e5f14fb17f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/054d79faea5d476edd8f99e5f14fb17f?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Gene Veith\"},\"description\":\"Gene Edward Veith, Jr. is a writer and retired literature professor, serving as Provost Emeritus at Patrick Henry College. 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