Every pastor has regrets. David Platt now realizes that, earlier in his pastoral ministry, he unintentionally implied that all serious Christians go into full-time ministry. “In zeal to raise up pastors within the church, in zeal to call out missionaries from the church,” he recalls, “I was implicitly setting up this tier that, ‘If you’re really passionate about Christ and the spread of the gospel, then [go into full-time ministry].’ I would never have put it that way, but I think that’s the way it often came across.”
In this discussion, Carl Ellis (provost’s professor of theology and culture at Reformed Theological Seminary and associate pastor for apologetics at New City Fellowship), Phillip Holmes (director of communications at Reformed Theological Seminary), and Platt (teaching pastor at McLean Bible Church) talk about why we need Christians in a wide variety of vocational spheres—and the effect their work can have for the kingdom.
Related:
- How a Mortgage Company Is Loving Its Neighbors (Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra)
- The Sacred-Secular Divide Is Pure Fiction (Bethany Jenkins)
- Not All Vocational Pursuits Are Equal (Amy Sherman)
Free eBook by Tim Keller: ‘The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness’
Imagine a life where you don’t feel inadequate, easily offended, desperate to prove yourself, or endlessly preoccupied with how you look to others. Imagine relishing, not resenting, the success of others. Living this way isn’t far-fetched. It’s actually guaranteed to believers, as they learn to receive God’s approval, rather than striving to earn it.
In Tim Keller’s short ebook, The Freedom of Self-Forgetfulness: The Path To True Christian Joy, he explains how to overcome the toxic tendencies of our age一not by diluting biblical truth or denying our differences一but by rooting our identity in Christ.
TGC is offering this Keller resource for free, so you can discover the “blessed rest” that only self-forgetfulness brings.
