This is the first in a five-part series on bringing the kingdom of God to your workplace.
After this introduction, I will give you the three essentials to bringing the kingdom of God to your workplace, and you may be surprised to find that evangelism is not one of them. Before I go there though, I need to define some terminology and lay a foundation.
By “bringing the kingdom of God to your workplace” I mean converting your measure of rule at work into Kingdom territory.
Every Christian has people, places and things over which he/she has earthly responsibility. This is what I mean by “measure of rule.” I didn’t make it up. If you look in the Apostle Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, you will find he makes a reference to this concept. (2 Cor. 10:13-16). Whether Paul had in mind the same concept I’m advancing here probably doesn’t really matter so long as you understand what I mean by the phrase.
Think of your measure of rule like a garden, a patch of the earth for which God has assigned you the gardner. At work, your measure of rule is, for example, your office (perhaps the entire floor or building depending on the scope of your authority), the people you supervise and the projects or job duties for which you have responsibility. These are things for which your employer, and King Jesus, will hold you ultimately responsible.
A person’s measure of rule is the smallest unit of the territory of the kingdom of God. Think of it like what a county is to a state. That’s a bit of an oversimplification because, for example, as I’ve explained in another post, Kingdom territory can be mobile. But it’s a good place to start with the concept.
A person’s measure of rule, however, is only Kingdom territory if it is operated under the delegated authority of King Jesus. As I’ve explained in another post, one of the ways Jesus rules the earth is by delegated authority, and if a Christian is doing his will in his measure of rule rather than Jesus’ will, he is not operating under the delegated authority of Jesus.
So, the question is, “How does one operate their measure of rule under the delegated authority of King Jesus in the workplace?”
It is that question we will pick up in the next post. GS