Vocation. When most people think of the word, they think about their employment or job. Our common use of the word betrays its deeper meaning. Vocation comes from the Latin root vocatio, which means “calling.” Our vocation in life is actually our calling in life.

Our vocation is to follow Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. In doing so, we seek to live out the Great Commandment to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength (Mark 12:30-31). We also pursue the Great Commission and strive, through the power of the Holy Spirit, to make disciples of people from every ethnic group (Matthew 28:19-20). Our vocation, or calling, is essentially to love God and make disciples.

Christ-followers have jobs so that we can support our efforts to love God and make disciples. Our employment is a means for kingdom deployment. We work to fund the spreading of the Gospel of Jesus Christ through our own activity and that of our churches. Working puts food on our tables to sustain our bodies so that we can have energy to worship God and make disciples. We can witness within our jobs, seeking to make disciples of our coworkers, but we can also use the resources we gain from working to be disciple-makers in our communities and around the world. In short, we work not to advance our careers, but to advance the Gospel.

Sadly, some who claim the name of Christ Jesus do not see their employment as a means to the end of advancing the kingdom of Christ. Numerous self-professed Christians treat their employment as an end in itself. They work to obtain a comfortable retirement. They work to acquire more stuff. Their employment, rather than following Jesus Christ, is their vocation. They are like the couple in John Piper’s book “Don’t Waste Your Life” who worked and saved up a retirement so they could cruise up and down the coast of Florida collecting seashells and playing softball. Piper depicts a tragic picture of them bragging to the Lord at judgment about the shells they collected. They did not use their employment as a means of kingdom investment and advancement. Rather, they squandered their employment on themselves.

Does your life reflect their tragedy? Do you see your employment as a means for kingdom deployment or as an end in itself?

Perhaps you are a college student who desires to land a great job. That is an admirable goal to set for your future; however, will you use that job to invest your life and resources for the advancement of the Gospel and the kingdom of Christ? Perhaps you are a successful businessman or businesswoman who knows God is calling you to take your expertise and use it for his glory by sharing the Gospel while equipping businesspeople in your area or overseas. You might be a retired couple reading this article and feel the calling to spend your retirement serving in missions in the United States and around the world. How is God calling you to use your employment for kingdom deployment?

I leave you with a counter story from Piper juxtaposed against that of the retired couple on the Gulf Coast. He tells the story of two single ladies in their 80s who died while conducting medical missions in West Africa. The brakes on their vehicle failed, and they drove of the edge of a cliff. Piper asks: Was that a tragedy? Two lives, driven by one great passion — namely, to be spent in unheralded service to the perishing poor for the glory of Jesus Christ, even two decades after most of their American counterparts had retired to throw away their lives on trifles. No, that is not the tragedy. That is a glory. These lives were not wasted. And these lives were not lost. “Whoever loses his life for my sake and the Gospel’s will save it” (Mark 8:35).

So I ask you: What is your vocation? What is your calling? Are you using your employment as a means by which to invest in the kingdom of Christ?

Your employment is simply a means for Gospel deployment.