Bridging the Sacred-Secular Divide: The Need for Theological Education Reform

As is typical, the first part of a new year is spent reflecting on the past year. For DML, this means collecting all the data on the activities that we have engaged in and assessing both what went well and what was a challenge.

We continue to be very, very busy, and we are seeing good impacts from those activities! As you probably know, we work directly with churches and denominations, business leaders, and people engaged in every workplace.  

(Our annual report will be coming out soon, but here is a sneak peek at the numbers from 2024 compared to earlier years. We thank God for all of our partners who work together to help this message get out there!)

However, one audience we do not share as much is our focus on getting courses into Bible colleges, seminaries, and Christian universities, relating to workplace discipleship and breaking the sacred/secular divide.  This particular audience tends to move very slowly and with great difficulty, as any changes must undergo rigorous accreditation processes to add or change courses.  While that is the reason often given for the slow process, I think the challenge goes deeper than that.

Recently, I was reading a book called Our Secular Vocation by J. Daryl Charles. (I don't like the title of this book—it's confusing.  But that aside, it's a good book.)

He said this about this topic (emphasis mine):

Any emphasis on the priesthood of all believers that calls Protestants back to their roots and to the sacredness of work in the marketplace is scarcely to be found in seminary and divinity school coursework. Substantial curricular change would require institutional reform on a wide scale, reform requiring a different academic model. What is needed in theological education is nothing less than the transformation of its core components. Every course in every theological topic at the seminary/divinity School level needs rethinking to eliminate the perpetual "sacred versus secular" residue and to foster the integration of faith, work, and vocation in a holistic way. At the most basic level, among those things needing serious examination in terms of course content are the following: a theology of creation, a theology of work, human flourishing, a theology of vocation, the history of the sacred-secular divide, the Lutheran breakthrough of the 16th century, the importance of engaging competing worldviews, ethical and economic challenges of the workplace, a theology of stewardship, service toward the common good and community flourishing, and redefinition of "mission."

The challenge is not just adding a course, such as DML's "Church-based Business as Mission" course, but a much broader institutional reform to break down the sacred-secular divide.  

While we have seen great progress in the faith and work movement, it continues to be led by church members rather than church leaders. Relatively few participants in this movement are pastors or priests. This is in large part because theological educational institutions are not keeping up with the opportunity and potential of this movement.

In addition, for those pastors who are already leading churches, the great majority of pastors or church leaders have not spent a significant season of their lives working in the marketplace.  When the leaders can't identify with the challenge and the opportunity, 99% of members will continue to belong to churches that help them worship weekly but leave them unsupported for where they spend most of their waking time.  Many people ask our DML teams if pastors should be co-vocational - having a job in the marketplace and leading a church?  We say that it is not necessary (but may be helpful for a season).  But at a minimum, the pastor should spend time meeting with at least one member in a learning position every week, asking, "What is God doing in your workplace, and how can the church support you to join Him in that work?"

It is good to see this movement change and grow.  We are seeing more and more Christians grow in their understanding that their work can be an act of worship.  We are seeing more and more denominations open their doors and embrace the need for discipleship in this area, especially denominations in Africa.  

(Picture is from Emmanuel University in Malawi, which has adopted DML courses into its curriculum and has undergone accreditation.)

We continue to pray that theological institutions will begin to train and equip every pastor to know how to equip the priesthood of believers to view their workplace as a place for worship and mission.  Please continue to pray with us for a breakthrough in this area!

Common Grace/Work and Saving Grace/Work

I cancelled my trip to India for the month of February to attend to some family and personal matters.  It was a difficult decision, but I'm so happy to see the India teams stepping up to support each other and work together.

Over the past weekend, I made my third drive to Canada this year to help with the moving process of my mom, and while I drove, I listened to a podcast that was recommended to me by one of our leaders in Togo.  The podcast was on the intersection of faith, work, and life, something that I've spent the last twelve years immersed in, but I'm always interested in learning new ways to express the call to work in ways that will resonate.

The speakers introduced a theme of "common work" relating to "common grace," and then linked "saving work" and "saving grace."  It really resonated with me, so I'm sharing it with you, with my own spin on it.

One of the things that Christians believe is that there is common grace in the world.  By this we mean that God is good to all people, regardless of their beliefs.  This includes general blessings like sunshine, rain, food, and water.  Matthew 5:45 says, "He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous."  

Common grace leads to saving grace.  Saving grace is for those who claim Jesus as their Lord and Savior and leads to salvation and eternal life.  Common grace points us to an awareness or understanding of the goodness of God; saving grace is when we make a personal decision to accept and follow this God.

Strong's concordance defines grace as "the divine influence on the heart and its reflection in life." I like this definition as it is not just the acceptance of a blessing of grace, but it implies that we are blessed to be a blessing - it is to be reflected in our life.

So how does this apply to work?

God has called us to work.  Work is a gift.  Work is one of the purposes of our creation.  Every person, in every place, works.  Not everyone has a job, but there is work for everyone.  The work that we do is like common grace - we do our work for the blessing, or for the benefit, of the customer, business, the community, and the nation.  We seek to do our best, regardless of how we feel about the customer, the owner of the business, the government leaders.  We work for the common good. We are blessed to work, and it is then a blessing for others.  That is what we are to do as Christians.  We are to do our work as an act of worship - as unto the Lord and not for man.  Receiving this grace has an influence on our heart and it should reflect in our life.

But our "common work" can then lead to "saving work."  When we do our work with a MISSIONAL goal, to make disciples, we participate in the Great Commission.  We help people to know about Jesus, which can lead them to saving grace from our Lord and Savior.  People can come to know Christ through our work by being disciples and by making disciples. We integrate our faith and work. 

In DML, we often teach a quadruple bottom line (goals): economic, environmental, social, and missional.  But maybe this simplifies it to two:  work for the common good (which actually would include economic, environmental, and social) and work for the saving good (missional).  The work for the common good SHOULD lead people to the saving good or saving grace.  

I like the simplicity of this - we work for the common good...but we don't stop there...our goal is to help all those in our spheres of influence - our customers, employees, employers, vendors, colleagues and more - to learn about this amazing, loving, merciful God and Father, and to receive the saving grace that comes through Jesus.  

May your work be a blessing for the common good and saving good this week! 

Is the Church jealous of Jesus?

Over the Christmas break, I read a book called "Great to Good" by Pastor Jae Hoon Lee from South Korea.  This book was written in response to the book, "Good to Great."  In his book, Pastor Lee asks whether or not the church is jealous of Jesus (not in terms of zealous protection but in terms of envy).  That question perked my ears (or eyes?) up. 

What does he mean by this?  How can the church be jealous of Jesus?

He refers to the book of John, and how in John 3:29, John the Baptist portrays himself as the friend of the bridegroom - what we might call the "best man" today.  [John 3:29 - The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete.] The role of the best man is to support the groom and focus attention on him.  The best man finds joy in witnessing the grooms' delight as he welcomes his bride.  If the best man seeks to overshadow the groom and catch the bride's attention, he becomes an adversary.

Pastor Lee posits that one significant factor contributing to the Church's decline in power and influence is its own jealousy of Christ.  This same jealousy manifested itself in the envy of Jewish leaders of Jesus' lifetime.  He writes, "These leaders, out of jealous desire to maintain religious control of their community, exerted pressure on Roman authorities and ultimately brought about Christ's crucifixion" (emphasis added). 

I think the key phrase that explains this position is "out of jealous desire to maintain religious control." It is so easy for the church to switch from being the best man and pointing to Jesus, to becoming an institution that seeks to maintain religious control. Rather, the church is to play a paradoxical role.  The more it grows and flourishes, the more it must diminish and deny itself. But unfortunately, that is often not the case with the church, nor with us as individuals.  Rather, the opposite takes place.  

A.W. Tozer writes in a book "I Call It Heresy," that we have a "widely accepted concept that we humans can choose to accept Christ only because we need him, as Savior, but we have the right to postpone our obedience to Him as Lord as long as we want."  Ouch. I take what I want, what I need, but I postpone my obedience for my own convenience.  

We do this as individuals, and we also do this as the church.  We get caught up in religion rather than following how Jesus lived, and we too end up crucifying Him again.

We see this in Judas, who was chosen and discipled by Jesus, walked alongside Jesus, and yet ultimately betrayed Jesus.  One of the key ways that the church shows its jealousy is by becoming an institution rather than a movement.  Institutions preserve culture, while movements create culture.  In doing this, the church as gathered in the building, believes that it is the body of Christ, not the people.  When this happens, it is not us who are being stretched, carrying our cross, hanging on the cross in the agony of conflict.  It is the "church."

As we constantly teach in DML, we need to remind ourselves that the church is never a place, but always a people.  

The church is never a fold, but always a flock.  

The church is never a sacred building, but always a believing assembly.

The church is who prays, not where you pray.

Luke 4:18-21 says, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” 20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. 21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Jesus has given us a command to love.  That is WHO He is.  Let us be the best man and let Jesus shine.  Let us be jealous of Jesus not in terms of envy but in terms of zealous protection of WHO He is and therefore WHO we are.

Hurry Up and Wait: Obituary for Peter Kranenburg, my father.

My father, Peter Kranenburg, passed away on Tuesday, January 7, 2025, in Holland Christian Homes in Brampton, Ontario at the age of 95.  I didn't know he was sick on Monday, but we received a call from the doctor on Tuesday morning that he was in respiratory distress and only had a few hours to live.  Michael and I quickly packed and jumped in the car for the 5.5-hour drive.  Sadly, four hours into our drive, my father passed away. 

Hurry up and wait.

In 2010, my father's forgetfulness and dementia increased significantly.  That spring my first husband, Bob Reed, died very suddenly.  My dad was at the stage of dementia at that time, and he would write things down to help him remember; every time he read his note that Bob died, he was shocked and saddened.  Eventually we had to get those notes out of his hands as it upset him.  By the fall of 2010, his short-term memory was completely gone, and he yet he didn't know it.  Care for him became difficult as he was a very strong man and didn't always like being helped to change or shower.  He joined the Holland Christian Homes memory care unit at that time.  Fast forward to 2010 and COVID, which hit these homes very hard.  Right before COVID, my Dad wasn't walking but he still knew my mom and maybe a couple of others, and his very few words were usually, "Love you, love you, love you."  COVID shut his floor down for almost 18 months and by the time we could see him again, he didn't recognize anyone, didn't respond to voices, and didn't talk.  After a while, we were pretty sure he couldn't see or hear.  It was three years of simply existing in a wheelchair, being fed pureed food, and waiting.  

Waiting to see Jesus.  Waiting to be released from his still-strong earthly body.  It was difficult to see him linger, although we are thankful that he was not suffering (as far as we could tell).  

Dementia is a terrible thing and it is very prevalent in my family.  Makes me shudder for my future.  

My dad was a "hurry up" guy.  Breakfast was always at 7 am, lunch at noon, and dinner at 5 pm.  Sharp.  We were done with our meals by 15-20 minutes later, dishes done in the next 10-15 minutes. If there was too much talking, we were told "Spraak verbote!" (Dutch for "stop talking.") The whole process was 30 minutes.  Keeping time was very important.  

Quite the irony to go from a "hurry up" man to fourteen years with dementia.

You can read more about my dad in the obituary below, but since I view this blog as part of my personal journal, I want to share a couple of things here about him that didn't make the obituary.

My dad had a difficult life in many ways.  While the Depression and World War II had an impact on him, he was likewise challenged by emotional health issues (depression and anxiety), which followed him his whole life.  He could be both controlling and insecure at the same time.  That made for lots of internal conflict, as well as external conflict, in different parts of his life.

Yet for a man who could appear to be rigid and legalistic, there was within him an artist, a gardener, and a lover of nature.  And he loved his wife and children, imperfectly of course (as is the case for every person), but we knew he loved us.

As a pastor, he preached God's love and mercy.  He was criticized because he preached too much about God's love and not enough about hell & damnation; yet he found it difficult to personally accept God's love and to forgive himself for his own failings.  

But in this past week, we spent day after day sharing and laughing together as we shared family memories.

I'm thankful for my dad, and all the many facets that made him who he was.  I will miss (and have missed) his kind eyes, soft smile, gentle teasing, and singing voice.  I'm so thankful that he has been released from his earthly body, and I look forward to meeting Peter, the man (not pastor, father, husband) one day in heaven.

Obituary: Rev. Peter Kranenburg

November 7, 1929–January 7, 2025

Peter Kranenburg, aged 95, passed away on January 7, 2025, at Faith Manor in Holland Christian Homes in Brampton, Ontario.  He is survived by his wife of 67 years, Marrie (Quartel); his children: Liz (Rob) Bronsveld, Henry (Marnie) Kranenburg, Janette (Dale) VanderVeen, Yvonne (Brian) Schenk, and Renita (Michael) Reed-Thomson, along with twenty grandchildren, and 28 great-grandchildren.  He is also survived by his brother Henk, and sisters Nel and Gon.  He is preceded in death by his parents Hendrick and Elizabeth Kranenburg, brother Adrian, sister Co, sister Bep, and son-in-law Bob Reed.

Peter, born in Leiden, the Netherlands on November 7, 1929, immigrated to Canada after World War II at the age of 18, in order to go to Calvin Seminary.  He was ordained as a pastor in the Christian Reformed Church in 1957 and served in the following churches in Ontario, Alberta, and British Columbia:  Athens CRC, Westside Community Church Springdale, Ebenezer CRC Jarvis, First CRC Red Deer, Ladner CRC, Strathroy East CRC, Second Toronto CRC, and Grace CRC Chatham. Peter then served as a Chaplain in Queen Elizabeth Hospital and at Holland Christian Homes until his retirement. Peter loved his Lord and Savior, and it gave him joy to share about the love and forgiveness of Jesus.  He continued to do this work, even after his retirement, by corresponding with prisoners. 

Peter was a man of many talents.  He had a beautiful singing voice; he was an artist, painting in oil, acrylic, and watercolors; he loved to garden and excelled at growing vegetables and flowers of many types but had a special love for orchids.

Welcome, 2025! It's time for workplace rededication!

We are thankful to God for the ability to see a new year, and to continue to join Him in what He is doing to reclaim the redeemed marketplace!  And we are thankful for the partnership of many of you who join us in prayer, encouragement, and financial support, to make this possible.  

In our workplace ministry calendar, January and February are the months where we ask every local church to do a business or workplace rededication.  This is a time where every person considers their workplace and asks God to help them fulfill HIS will in their workplace, as it relates to the three great directives from God and the quadruple bottom line.

So we pray together that God will help us to fulfill his Great Commitment Directive from Genesis 1:28 and Genesis 2:15, which brings us to an economic and environmental (creation care) goal.  How does God want me to contribute to the flourishing of my workplace and my environment in 2025?

We pray together that God will help us to fulfill his Great Commandment Directive from Matthew 22:37-40, which gives us a social goal of loving God and loving our neighbor.  What does it look like to love God and love our neighbor in our workplace?  What does righteousness and justice look like there?  How does love manifest itself?

We pray together that God will help us fulfill his Great Commission Directive from Matthew 28:19-20, which gives us a missional goal of being disciples and making disciples in every nation.  Who might God be prompting me to disciple in my workplace?  And as I prepare, am I acting as a disciple in order to be a good witness?

Rev. James Mwalubalile from the Tanzania Assembly of God church in Dar es Salaam (and a DML leader in Tanzania) held this service at his church yesterday and shared these pictures.  His members brought items from their workplace to lay on the alter and they prayed over them together.  They shared testimonies of what God is doing in their workplace and how they are joining Him.  

It's also a time to share laments of the challenges of doing work in places that are challenging, especially to our faith.  And it's a time to pray for those who are looking for a job, so that they too can contribute to the flourishing of their community.

And you can see that his leadership team are all wearing t-shirts that say "work as worship" on them!  

We are thankful for this happening across the 21 countries where we are working, and the many denominations who have said "yes!" to this needed area of discipleship!  

As you enter your work year, we pray too that you will see where God is working, and join Him in His goals for that place!  May you find joy and fulfillment as you contribute to the flourishing of others through your work!