How are We to Think About Vocation? by Dr. Bryan McGraw

Our second author is Dr. Bryan McGraw. This is the first of two blog posts from his chapter. In the first post Dr. McGraw addresses the question: why integrate faith and vocation?  

Author Biography

Bryan McGraw is Associate Professor Politics at Wheaton College. Bryan has always had an interest in the normative and philosophical aspects of politics and discovered political theory only in graduate school. He is particularly interested in the ways modern states seek to establish and enforce their own normative visions and how religion plays into that process. He has taught previously at the University of Georgia, Notre Dame and Pepperdine University. His first book, Faith in Politics: Religion and Liberal Democracy, was published by Cambridge University Press, and he is beginning a project on pluralism, law and religion, and political theology. He earned an AM in Political Science from Brown University, an MA in Russian Area Studies from Georgetown, and his PhD in Political Science from Harvard University. Bryan and his wife Martha, a practicing Neurologist, live in Wheaton with their three children. They enjoy gardening, all manners of outdoor activities, and perfecting the art of pulled-pork BBQ sandwiches.

How are We to Think About Vocation?

All Christians understand that our deepest calling is to live faithfully as recipients of God’s grace and mercy, but we heirs of the Reformation should understand especially well that such a calling includes our everyday lives.  Living faithfully is not just a matter of proper worship or affirming the right doctrines (though those are important).  It is also a matter of living out our “secular” lives, the parts of our lives we share with all.  How to be a banker, a lawyer, a nurse or a carpenter is part of the life of faith, not something to the side of it.  So to think about vocation is to consider what we should be doing with ourselves in spheres of life that we share with all, concerns that often do not differ from what our neighbors and friends outside the faith share with us when thinking about their careers and life choices.  But what makes vocation different for the Christian, distinguishing it from mere career, is that it is freighted with our sense of participation in God’s work, His kingdom-work.  To think about vocation is to consider how our secular lives ought to reflect and participate in God’s providential care in the world at large: what are we called to do in the world as part of what God is already doing?

What is powerful about McGraw's statement here is that it suggests that when God calls Christians to specific vocations, he wants those in vocations to think about how they can do what they do “Christianly” and creatively explore what difference being a Christian makes in different vocations. God’s redemptive work in the world includes the social and cultural institutions that provide the context of our lives, including vocations and professions. Unless Christians think consciously about the integration of their faith into their work, they will adopt the patterns and norms of work in the world around them. They will also miss out on the creative opportunity rethink their work world in a beautiful way.