Schools provide poor model for faith-filled living

The premise of the GEO Principle is that God is in Every Occupation. How is God going to get in every occupation? You have to bring Him there! Start by bringing God to your own job, and then help others to bring God to their's.

If you are reading this blog, then your faith is probably important to you. Most people of faith do pretty well living their faith at home and on Sundays. But when it comes to going to work on Monday morning, something happens. They leave their faith at home. They don't take it with them to the office. While many people live a happy home life thoroughly integrated with their faith, they opt for a work life where faith is separated from their occupation. Why?

In many ways, our culture discourages the integration of faith into the workplace. The idea of separation of Church and State has leeched into the private commercial sector to the point where common expressions of faith are discouraged or even frowned upon. Think about the flap that comes up every year in December about whether store clerks should wish their customers Merry Christmas.

My contention, however, is that people learn to segregate their religious inclinations from their professional duties at a very young age, while they are in school. In school, religion and spiritual considerations are completely separated from the study of all other fields. Moral education is set aside for Wednesday night or Sunday morning education. Even in private religious schools, faith is typically treated as music or art class, alloted a 45-minute slot on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

In a perfect world, religion, spirituality and morality would be a part of the discussion of every subject taught in school. It is really pointless to learn math if we don't also learn what it is that we are counting or measuring -- God's creation. All literature, in one way or another, is part of the story of salvation. If that fact is ignored in English class, then students miss the most important part of the story. It is tremendous to study biology and science, but if you can't discuss where life came from in the first place, then all those images under the microscope are going to mean a whole lot less.

I don't really see our school systems changing. If anything, given current educational trends, schools are likely to work even harder to eliminate religious or moral considerations from the teaching of any subject.

As young adults graduate from high school and college, however, they need to know that they do not need to live their lives in a manner that segregates faith from knowledge. The blueprint their schools gave them for isolating faith in a remote place away from all other study, is poor instruction for how to live your life. Once a person is out of school, he or she is free to live their faith all the time -- 24/7. People who understand they are free to live their faith all the time have a much better chance of finding meaning in their work than folks who think they need to keep their faith tucked away into a small corner of their life.

Comments

[Jackie Hilgert]

I can share one easy and concrete way to live your faith in the workplace. When someone treats you badly and makes you feel sad, offer them a smile instead of telling them where they can go, and always remember that God loves them too! I guess Jesus would call this turning the other cheek.

[Tom Bengtson]

That's a great comment. It is never easy to return kindness for grumpiness, but if you can do it -- particularly over a long period of time -- it will make a difference.

[Norbert Bittner]

I invite you checkout this link
http://www.trinityschools.org/about/mission_statement