Missionary Zeal

I've been grappling with Otis' thought that I really need to look at my job as a missionary endeavor - that I have been placed in this location to be a light for Christ.

I've tended to resist this idea in the past a great deal, mostly from the the thought that I can't believe that God would have me be somewhere less than what I perceive to be the "perfect" job for me. After all, if God had wanted me doing "religious" work, the pastorate thing would have gone a different way.

But as I grappled with the thought further, what I suddenly realized is that it is because it would cause me to have to not be about me.

It seems to me that for any individual to be a missionary anywhere, let alone at work, that it would mean surrendering a great deal of selfishness. For me, that would be surrendering this imaginary or illusory life - call it "fantasy" if you like - about how people look at me, about life as I want to be perceived and living it. In fact, it would require not thinking about any of that at all, instead focusing on how by serving others I can at least demonstrate God's love and God's reality to them.

It would require acceptance of the fact that this life is not my life ("You were bought with a price" says Paul), and that I have no right to ask for anything beyond what I'm given - that my purpose is not about me, or about making my life better or more comfortable, but about making God great. That in the end, the results are not about me or how people think about me, but what they think about God.

"Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me."

The part - beyond the initial "But what about me?" part - that gives me pause is that slightly wicked part of my brain that says "Fine, let's go with that thought. Let's let it be all about God and making Him important. What does that do for you? All you'll end up with is the reality that your life really is small and insignificant. Great and glorious, or small and sticky. And who, in this orgy of being "all about God', will take care of your needs and wants? Trust me, you're not one of the greats, a Hudson Taylor or George Muller or C.S. Lewis. Emptying yourself will simply point to the fact that, in fact, your life is empty . At least with your dreams, you have something to tide you over."

Unflattering thoughts to be sure - but I'd be a liar to say they're not there. If I was a "missionary manager guy" and that's all I was for the rest of my career, never rising above the level I am at now, is that okay? Or is the fact that I struggle with all of this just indicative of the fact that my selfishness and lack of grasping of God's greatness runs much deeper than I like to think?