What is important?

As a young Medical or Dental student or graduate, you will be busy with your studies, your dreams for career, future, experiencing the daily pressures of examinations and assessment etc. Amid these pressures sometimes, we do not have time to focus on the “important” things of life. The urgent pushes out the important.

This short write up is to challenge you to continue to keep the important thing upmost in your life and to give you a biblical frame work to look at your whole life, your work and the choices you will be making sooner or later.

What is important for our life? Is it the degree we get, the career we build, the spouse we will marry and the resources we will generate with our skills and talents or something else? All these things are important, but the ultimate and most important thing in our life, is our relationship to God. Unless our life finds its purpose in that relationship with God through Jesus Christ and His work on the cross, all what we consider as important will not make sense. This relationship will give us a framework to look at life, our work and our choices.

A frame work for life

If you have such a relationship, then the next question will be how you see your life? Do I have a frame work to guide my life?

Jesus when He called His disciples, called them with simple but four significant purposes. These remain true for us too.

One – To “Be with Him”. We are called to be with Jesus, to grow in that relationship and knowledge of Jesus. Like the disciples, we are called to be on a daily journey with Jesus, growing in that relationship with Him. Our primary Calling is to Be with Him!

Two – as we live and walk with Him, we will and need to Become like Him. As we spend time with Him through the word, in prayer, in relating to Him for the challenges we face each day, He will teach us to respond like He did, and be transformed in our Character, by the renewing of our mind. It is this walk of growing into His likeness that He expects from us.

Three – And as we embark on this journey, He invites us to join with Him in what He is doing in this world. Be Send out to be part of the Kingdom He is building. Contribute to what He has started in this world, Building His Kingdom - the redemption and restoration of the world, using the training, the career, the skills and talents He has given us.

Four – And in this journey of being part of what He is doing, He does not expect us to do it alone. But Be part of New Family, the Community of the church. Holding hands with each other, we are expected to Be with Him, become like Him and Be part of the Kingdom He is building!

This should be our overall frame work for life.

A biblical framework to look at work

The question will arise then, how does our studies, the career we are building, the work we are doing, fit into all this?

Work started before creation – God is a God of work - one who worked to create. He continues to work even today. This is what Jesus said when He was asked why you are working, He said, my Father is at work and so I am.  So, we follow a God, who worked, who is working and mandated us to be part of the work he is doing in His world.

He, in the garden of Eden gave four mandates to humanity.

One - to be involved in Manual labor – the 8 to 5 jobs that we do today, as His representatives in the places where He has kept us. In the area of responsibility, He has given us, to be His representatives. 

Two -  He gave humanity a stewardship role – to rule over, to be a steward of creation. A leadership role of being an influence, using the context where he has kept us, to influence each other and the context for His purposes.

Three – He gave Humanity a scientific role – to name the animals and birds and plants. To be co-creators with Him, to excel in the areas of knowledge creation, innovation and creativity, expressing His creative character.

Four – He gave humans a relationship role too. All the above had to be done in the context of a relationship with each other, in family, community and team.

It is important for us to understand that the work we are engaged in, is mandated by God. We are His representative in the locations where He has placed us. To be His hands and feet, engaging in our area of responsibility, influencing the context for His greater purposes, being excellent in our work, being co-creators with Him and work together as a community of caring.

A practical framework to look at our Medical work

Taking this forward, we need to ask ourselves, how do we see the actual health care work and positions and roles God has given us in our work place?

We might see work as job, that gives us a meaningful engagement and salary and livelihood. Salary and fulfillment are important, but our work should not be limited to salary and personal fulfillment alone.

We need to excel in our areas of responsibility as we build our career in the field which God has given to us or the field that we have chosen to pursue. Such excellence will glorify God through our work and our contribution.

But we need to go beyond seeing work as a job or career alone, to see work as a vocation. Or avocation as some others may call it. Seeing work as God given, to care for people in need and in contexts and situations where there is a need and we can make a difference.

The most desirable way of seeing work, is to see the same as calling. God calling us to use God given talents, skills, positions and roles, to care and take care of those for whom His heart pains. Aligning our life to God’s Kingdom purposes in the context where God has kept us using the work given to us. Thus, being people who use their God given talents to build His Kingdom.

A frame work for our choices

Such a frame work for our life, our work and job, will go a long way in guiding our choices. Choices of context where we want to work, the kind of work we want to engage with, the specialty or subject we want to choose, the spouse we will chose to journey life together etc. All these choices will have to be seen through the frame work of our life frame works.

 We will start asking, and looking around, where is God moving and what is God doing in His world? We will start looking at where are the needs in our nation. We will look at the Bible and will start understanding what He is telling us about the context and the needs around. We will be sensitive to the nudges the Spirit of God puts in our heart. We will ask God to help us to understand what we are good at and how our skills can be used for His purposes. We will allow our fellowship members and mentors to speak into our lives. We will step out trusting in the sovereignty of God. We will pray for a spouse with whom we can journey in this walk with God, for His Kingdom purposes.

Every choice will be evaluated by one question – is it enhancing the overall life purposes for which God has called me. How can this choice enhance my being part of what He is doing in this world?

We will no longer ask, what can I do for God, but will explore, how I can be part of what He is doing in this world and our nation.