While the church offered copious amounts of advice on what sort of language to avoid at work, how to evangelize co-workers, how to handle alcohol and avoid inappropriate jokes, and how to contribute to the work of the church, there was never once a discussion among the dozen or so B-2 pilots who attended our church as to whether or not a follower of Jesus should fly a bomber capable of dropping nuclear bombs.

A Season of Wrestling

In our early 30’s, my wife and I began leading a college small group. I was a B-2 Bomber pilot and my wife was a stay-at-home mom in the small town of Warrensburg, MO. Toward the end of the school year, one of the students in our group, who had become a good friend, asked me about some internship options he was considering for the summer. He had been offered an internship at a secular firm, which would likely create some great opportunities in the career field in which he hoped to work. He had also received an invitation from his home church to work on staff for the summer. His question for me was “should I spend my summer pursuing the career I hope to begin, or does following Jesus mean that I should spend the summer working in my Church?” I didn’t know how to answer him. As a Christian in a secular workplace, I had been wrestling personally for over a decade with faith and work integration, but when faced with the question from someone else, I realized how little progress I had made. 

That question and the conversations that followed set a course for my personal journey with Christ. I began to ask hard questions about faith and work, and I realized that the Church did not have much to offer beyond ethical principles that applied across all secular vocations. It offered copious amounts of advice on what sort of language to avoid at work, how to evangelize co-workers, how to handle alcohol and avoid inappropriate jokes, and how to contribute to the work of the church. But there was never once a discussion among the dozen or so B-2 pilots who attended our church as to whether or not a follower of Jesus should fly a bomber capable of dropping nuclear bombs. Suddenly, that question seemed much more important to me than whether or not I should laugh at an inappropriate joke. Obviously, I am not a pacifist, and I am thankful that there are Christians involved in the decisions about when and how we exercise military power at every level of leadership. But the question of how dropping nuclear weapons and following Jesus fit together is at least important enough to warrant a discussion.

I came to realize that for many pastors, the faith and work tension has been resolved. They have not personally wrestled in situations where they are contributing to systems and organizations that seem—at least at some levels—to be juxtaposed to the Kingdom of God. Most of the pastors I’ve known well are not trying to avoid the faith/work questions that press hard on those of us in the secular workplace. They simply don’t feel the weight of those questions in their own working lives.  

So, I began reading whatever books I could find on the topic and listening to whoever ventured to speak about it. I pieced together a framework of understanding that was sort of a theological amalgamation of Genesis 1-2 and the Priesthood of the Believer. That framework slowly filled out over time so that I could reference some good material and speak somewhat intelligibly to the more significant faith/work questions. But in my personal experience, I still felt like I had to do mental gymnastics to even remember that somehow the work I was doing in the secular workplace was aligned with the Kingdom of God. 

A Group of Guys

Steve actually bought our first copy of Work and Worship. He only read a few pages before he quit reading and asked me if I wanted it. He said, “I thought it was going to articulate how our work can be an act of worship. But it’s mainly just a book about how to do worship services differently.” I wasn’t even sure I would read it, but halfway through the Foreword by Nicholas Wolterstorff, I was hooked! I knew exactly what he was describing when he wrote, “[Many writers assume] that if Christians acquire the right theological thoughts about work by reading their writings, the breach between faith and work will be healed and integration will ensue.” He goes on to explain that “Theologies of work matter, but they need to be sung and prayed.” A few pages into the introduction, Kaemingk and Willson expound that idea, and what was previously opaque to me became brilliantly obvious: the primary place where we address the work/faith divide is in Worship!

In November, 2023, I began leading a group of about 10 guys through Work and Worship. I explained at the first meeting that the central argument of Work and Worship is that information alone is not effective at changing our heart. The information will only be transformative when it is embodied in worship. This means that we cannot study this book together in a regular discussion format—that would fundamentally oppose the central meaning of the book! I told them that we would be participating as a group in some liturgical elements of worship related to what we’re reading. The group consisted of 1 full-time pastor, 1 part-time pastor, 1 volunteer worship leader and about 8 guys in secular vocations, both blue and white collar. We represented at least 10 different churches from a wide variety of denominations. Several had no clue what “liturgy” meant.

Here’s what I discovered. When these men were given the opportunity to talk to each other about their work, they came alive. The categories of Trumpets, Tears, Ashes, Petitions, and Fruit create ready-made discussion material. Any time I asked the question, “What has been challenging in your work this week?” I had trouble reigning in the eruption of responses! Guys want to talk about this stuff. They just don’t often have an invitation to do so. 

By about halfway through the study, I had refined what I called ‘liturgical exercises’ to the point that I began to repeat the format. I would break the group into pairs or threesomes and ask, “What was the best thing that happened at work this week?” I asked them to take a few notes on what they heard from their partner and then write a piece of liturgy about their partner’s response. The liturgy could be a prayer of thanksgiving, a call to worship, a benediction, a prayer of lament, an assurance of pardon etc. Then we would go around the table and read what we had written. I would usually do a corporate reading of Scripture before or after that exercise, and I would normally include a song, usually from The Porter’s Gate. I played the song on a Bluetooth speaker and we silently listened rather than trying to get a small group of guys to sing along!

This blog was written by Joe Montgomery, former Air Force pilot, current vocational theologian at Lamppost Farms. The second part of this blog will feature a worship service for farmers that took place at Lamppost Farm when they hosted the World Devon Conference earlier this year.