Fine line

Have you ever had those times when you seem to hear the same thing over and over, at different times, from different people? Maybe because it's something you feel passionate about, or something that's been irritating you, or it just seems to pop up a lot. This week I have heard people talking about work in the form of, "I'm just trying to pay the bills" or "This is just a secular job to take care of my family," and "My life starts when I leave here and it ends when I get here." Now I have those times when I think about such things within my time at Panera, and there are days when it is not easy to see it as a time of living out my God given life and gifts to better serve and bless others with. But there are times when I can be so fucused in the true way of knowing that there is no such thing as secular and sacred, but that each breath I take is sacred and so in turn everything I do can be done in a sacred manner. There are times then, that I am working with the mission in mind of being who God has designed me to be and this can lead to people experiencing heaven here on earth.

To say that this is "just a job" or "this is only a secular job," seems like an accident then or a burden at best. I may have not verbally said those things, but I have felt that way and I know how less of myself I live when I feel that way. "Thanks God for designing me a certain way with certain gifts and talents, I'm going to hit pause though while I work this "other job" and I'll get back to being me later." That sounds terrible, but is that what is being lived out within that mind set? "I want to reach the world for Christ, but not in this setting and maybe it will be with these people, but only if they COME to church." Yet again that sounds pretty crappy, yet I have lived that way and dang it if it doesn't feel like crap now. At the time though... man to be changed in my heart to see and hear God IN THE FORM OF PEOPLE AND FROM THE SOUND OF THEIR VOICES! Can you see the faces and hear the voices of those people that you often spend time with, yet find to be interrupting you from what you want to be doing or think you should be doing? As I sit on the other side of the counter at Panera as a customer, I see this and feel this way. May my heart take this on come tomorrow, when I stand NEXT TO these same people as a fellow employee.

Ugghh, the fine line of the heart,
Wallace D.