Nigel Wright

Reflections on work (6)

"It's only when we learn to work with God, learning to see what we do is connected with what he is doing, that we will close the false gap between secular and spiritual,

AS the colloquialism of the message puts it, "So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: take your everyday ordinary life - your sleeping, eating, going to work, and walking around life - and place it before God..."

Alistair Mackenzie, Baptist Minister & Faith work consultant

The above is part of a series for reflection and consideration - things that have inspired and challenged me along my own particular  journey...

Reflections on work (5)

"Spirituality should lead you into the world not lift you out of it"  ( ....think about it...)

Martin Buber, Jewish Philosopher

The above is part of a series for reflection and consideration - words that have inspired and challenged me along my own particular  journey...

Refelctions on work (4)

"Most Christians suffer at some point from a serious disease. This disease is called SSD. If you want to know if you've caught SSD, then listen to your words and look at your actions.

You have the disease SSD if you say things like:

* I know it's poor ethics but business is business;

* God is best found in the church and least found in the secular world;

* I'm not called to live by the same standards as my pastor;

* Or if you belong to a church where you have never heard a sermon on the workplace, but you have tapes in your library that include the series on the measurements of the tabernacle.

That's SSD - The sacred-secular divide!

The belief that some parts of our lives - business ethics, our school, our leisure, our work - are secular and are less important to God than things that are "sacred" - like prayer, church, pastors.

SSD means that we translate the beatitudes like this

* Blessed are th super spiritual on Sundays!

* Blessed are the peacemakers, unless they attack me first!"

Steve Taylor, Baptist Minister, scholar & author

The above is part of a series of reflections - words that have inspired and challenged me along my own particular  journey...

Reflections on work (3)

The harsh reality of the workplace:

"If learning to love our enemies is an idea or theory, dismissal can come easily:

"Well that's all fine in words or in theory, but it won't work in real life."

But when I see someone act it out in the real world )e.g. Ghandi, Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King, Mother Teresa) or when  I learn by trying it out myself, it is hard to dismiss."

Charles Melchert, Biblical & Educational Professor

The above is part of a series of extracts for reflection and consideration - words that have inspired and challenged me along my own particular  journey...

Reflections on work (2)....

"Even when the word work is understood in its commonly used sense, it can be the thing that points us to the sacredness of all life. It can inspire us, ask the best of us, demand of us that we become more than we currently are...

Work can be the place where human beings come together in supportive and creative relationships, building something worthwhile. People have some of their best ideas at work.

Work at its best is life giving."

Rosemary Lain-Priestley, Anglican Priest 

The above is for reflection and consideration - something that has inspired and challenged me along my own particular  journey...

Reflections on work...

"The re imaging of the workplace would help fulfill one of the crucial needs that every individual has: the need to belong.

We want to belong to a group, to a family and particularly to the place in which we work.

Here is the point at which an immense creativity could be released in the workplace. Imagine how lovely it would be if you could be yourself at work and express your true nature, giftedness and imagination.

There need be no separation between your home, your private life and your actual world of work. One could flow to the other in a creative and enriching way."

John O'Donohue, Irish Poet & Scholar

The above is for reflection and consideration - something that has inspired and challenged me along my own particular  journey...