PODCAST | The Word Before Work (feat. Jordan Raynor)

Resources:

www.Jordanraynor.com

The Word Before Work:  A Monday-Through-Friday Devotional to Help You Find Eternal Purpose in Your Daily Work

Christa Neidig:

Welcome to the Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast. I'm your host, Christa Neidig, manager of marketing and business development here at Vanderbloemen. Today I get to talk with bestselling author, Jordan Raynor. In addition to writing, he also serves as the executive chairman of Threshold 360 and was previously CEO of a venture backed tech startup. He talks about his latest book, The Word Before Work, which features 260 devotional readings, one for every Workday of the year. He emphasizes that work is a ministry and how God intended work to be for the kingdom. We hope you enjoy this conversation. Well, hey everyone, thanks so much for joining us today on the podcast. I get to talk with Jordan Raynor. Hi Jordan, it's so good to have you.

Jordan Raynor:

Hey Christa, it's good to be back on the show. Thanks for having me.

Christa Neidig:

Of course. Today we're talking about The Word Before Work, your third book I believe to God in 12 months, is it?

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, it's crazy. I don't know. Three books in 12 months, it's been quite a year.

Christa Neidig:

Wow. Well, congrats on hopefully wrapping up this year and being able to get a little bit of rest. But let's talk about this book. Why don't you tell listeners who aren't as familiar with your work a little bit of what it's about?

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, so the context of this book is really my own personal context, my own personal story. I spent the first 10 years of my career as a tech entrepreneur. I started and sold a couple of different companies and I loved my work. But I can never kick this nagging feeling that... I don't know, I just felt like a second class Christian because I wasn't spending Monday through Friday working as a pastor or quote unquote "full-time missionary". And I'm sure a lot of your listeners have probably felt the same way if they work outside of the four walls of the local church. And about halfway through my career in tech, God graciously opened my eyes to what His word has to say about work. For the first time ever I was seeing truths like the fact that God himself works as a creator and gardener and builder before He works as a preacher. That we're going to work forever when heaven comes to a new earth.

I was seeing truths like this fact that God calls people into quote unquote "secular work", whatever that means, as much as he calls them out of it. And those truths were so life changing for me, Christa. And I believe in my experience, they're so rarely discussed in the church. I think we got to have tools to renew our minds with these truths on a regular basis. So that's why I wrote The Word Before Work. It's this Monday through Friday devotional to help people see every workday in two minutes the eternal purpose of their work. And what to do in response to the fact that their work matters for eternity.

Christa Neidig:

I think this is so great for two reasons. One, more people are not in full-time vocational ministry than are. What happens to the normal Christian who works a normal job and then goes to church on Sunday and tries to live out their faith throughout the week. And I think this is the perfect way to kind of hit on that second point of we all need these reminders before going into our jobs Monday through Friday. So I think this is such a great resource. I'm excited that this is going out.

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, thanks. And I've been publishing this devotional over the last few years in a weekly format. And by God's grace alone, we've had millions of people in every country on earth read this content. And honestly, it's the stories of those people just writing back, I've never heard these truths. My pastor doesn't talk about these things. These are truly life changing because now I see all of my life as on mission for Christ as being an opportunity to be with God. I think a lot of people in this world view their work as a distraction to quote unquote "the things of the Lord". But when you recognize that God is first and foremost a working creative God. That the first verb in scripture is created in reference to God and His work, that changes everything because now when God is with me wherever I go, that creator God, now there's no such thing as secular work.

The moment that the Creator God indwells me and I walk through the front door of my office, that secular place of work instantly becomes sacred because the Creator God is with me as I'm in that place of work.

Christa Neidig:

Well, let's talk about you mentioned kind of throughout the book, I think there's several themes that you mention that are very evident in scripture as you were digging in the word to start putting this book together. What are some of those themes that the audience can take away?

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, I think the most interesting theme is that the fact that work is on almost every page of scripture from literally Genesis one to Revelation 22. The biblical narrative in a lot of ways starts and ends with us partnering with the creator God. The first commission to humankind was the call to fill and subdue the earth. To procreate but also to fill the earth with culture and to subdue it and make it more useful for human beings. This is Genesis 1:28, fast forward Revelation 22:5, in this prophetic vision of the new earth. And we see that Christ has decided not to rule over this world on His own. Revelation 22:5 says, "We will reign forever and ever with Him." So that theme that God chooses not to work alone, but to work in partnership with human beings is a radical idea that you see all throughout scripture, so that's number one. That's the number one theme that really stands out in my mind.

I think the second theme that I see coming up over and over again when you look for this topic of work throughout scripture, is this unique tension that Christians have to hold between trusting and what the world would call hustling. We love using this word hustle. Gary Vee wants us all to hustle, hustle harder. And listen, scripture supports hard work clearly. Colossians 3:23-24, all throughout Paul's letters, he's commanding his followers to work hard in response to the gospel. So we're called a hustle. But we also recognize what scripture says over and over and over again. See, Deuteronomy 8 is just one example, that we don't produce any results in our work, any, period. I'm not responsible for any of the fruit that my hustle apparently produces.

So Christians are called to this unique tension where yes, we're called to hustle and work hard, but we're also called to trust in God to produce the results through our work. It's this unique dance of trusting and hustling. And I think the symptom that we see throughout scripture that we get this, that we've gotten this right is whether or not we can rest. Whether or not the end of the day we can lay the work down and spend time with our families and just trust knowing that the results of our hustle are in the Lord's hand. So those are two big themes I see throughout scripture. I read the whole Bible front to back for the first time looking just for what it had to say about work. And found literally more than 1000 passages that deal with this topic. But those are the two themes I saw coming up over and over again.

Christa Neidig:

I think that's great. I think going back to, in that first theme you talked about that Genesis 1, which leads to this really interesting point that you bring up in the devotional of that work existed before the fall, before sin entered. And so it was perfect worship. And then you bring up this contrast of it's perfect worship, yet so many of us hate our nine to five, we hate work and our jobs. What do you have to say to that?

 

Jordan Raynor:

Oh man, such a good question. I would say that one day you're going to experience perfect work once again. But to get that, first we got to understand we got to break down this horrific ugly lie that heaven is a glorified retirement home in the clouds. And scripture makes it crystal clear that ultimately heaven is on a new physical material earth and there'll be work to do there forever and ever. So if you die today prior to Jesus returning to make all things new, the present heaven what we might call it, is primarily marked by rest. But when heaven ultimately finds its final resting place on earth that's not primarily marked by rest, it's primarily marked by activity and work. Both Isaiah and Revelation make this absolutely crystal clear, which makes perfect sense given where the biblical narrative begins. Paradise of the garden of Eden that we see in Genesis 1 and 2 was not an endless vacation, but a life giving vocation.

Sin ushers in the curse and now work is curse, but it is not the curse as so many people have come to believe. And one day we're going to work without that curse again. Isaiah 65, let me just read it real quick. Isaiah 65, beginning of verse 17, here's what Isaiah says, "See, I will create new heavens and a new earth. My chosen people will build houses and dwell on them. They'll plant vineyards and eat their fruit. No longer will they build houses and others live in them or plant and others eat, for as the days of a tree so will be the days of my people. My chosen ones will long enjoy the work of their hands." That's a remarkable promise. God's word doesn't say that we're going to be singing, Lord, I lift your name on high forever or reclining a hammock forever and ever.

It says we're going to long enjoy the work of our hands forever. So if you hate your job today, I'd encourage you to do three things. Number one, mourn over it because Jesus understands. We do not have a high priest who cannot empathize with our weaknesses [inaudible 00:10:49]. Number two, look forward to the day when you're going to long enjoy the work of your hands for eternity. And then number three, in the present work hardily as under the Lord knowing that there's a reward in store for you. Paul first wrote those words in Colossians 3 to slaves, "Certainly, we can work hardily in the face of whatever obstacles we face today, knowing that there's an eternal weight of glory that far outweighs any challenges we experience at the present."

 

Christa Neidig:

Yeah, that's so encouraging. I want to ask something going back to kind of the setup of the book and the devotional you have, I think it's 260 devotions in here for every day of the work year. So Monday through Friday, and then you spend those first two weeks kind of outlining. I think you call it the biblical narrative of work. And you may have kind of touched on this, but let's talk about that because I think this is a really important thing to preface.

 

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, sure. Let's make this real, accessible and practical. Theologians argued that you could view the whole of scripture from Genesis 1 to Revelation 22 in five acts, creation, fall, redemption, renewal, and consummation. So let's really quickly sketch out what work looks like in each of those five acts. Act one, creation. Genesis 1, first verb in the Bible, God created. God worked. But contrary to how we treat the sixth day of creation in our Sunday school classes today, the sixth day wasn't the end of creation. The sixth day was just the beginning because the six days when God passed the baton to His image bears and said, "Hey, go continue the work of creation with me and for my glory." Specifically to cultivate heaven on earth. That's act one, that's creation. Act two, the fall, we mess everything up. God wants us to rule over this world with Him.

We screw up our reign. The curse comes in Genesis 3 making work difficult. But this is interesting, Christa, God still commends work way after Genesis 3 always in the context of blessing. Genesis 9, after God floods the earth, He says to first words to Noah, "Be fruitful, fill the earth." And continue to subdue it to make more of it, that's act two. Act three, redemption. We need a redeemer. We can't save ourselves. We messed up our reign. Jesus comes and just as God showed up first on the scene in Genesis 1 as a worker, so does Jesus. Before His vocation as a preacher, He shows up as a lowly carpenter or stone mason. However you want to translate this Greek word tacton that we see in Mark 6:3. So Jesus comes, He spends the vast majority of His adult life working a job that looks pretty similar to the work you and I do today.

And then He redeems us in spite of our works, but He does redeem us for good works. This is Ephesians 2:8-10, Paul says, "Hey, listen, your works..." Your good works or the good work you do in your office, whatever... "None of it is going to save you." None of it has any merit in your salvation. You could do nothing to win your way back to God. Jesus has saved you not by your works, but He has saved you for the good works God has prepared in advance for you to do. See Ephesians 2:10, what are the good works God's prepared in advance for us to do? Go back to act one, to rule and reign over this world in partnership with Him and for the cultivation of His kingdom. But interestingly, when Jesus rises from the dead that first Easter Sunday, perfectly within His power to fully reveal the kingdom of God in the present He doesn't.

That brings us to act four, renewal. He chooses to do that work once again in partnership with us. And now as we all live in this fourth act of this five act drama, we now have a dual vocation. For the first time since Genesis 3, we have the power through the Holy Spirit to cultivate heaven on earth in partnership with God. The first commission which had been fully reinstated. And we're also called to the great commission to make disciples as we go about that work. But act five, consummation, God alone's going to finish the work. We can make progress towards that end through the power of the spirit alone. But we'd be fools to think that we can bring the kingdom to full on earth.

God's going to finish that work. He alone is going to get the glory. And when He does and heaven comes down to a new earth, we will reign forever and ever. Revelation 22:5, "We will long enjoy the work of our hands." See Isaiah 65, which makes perfect sense because the end of the story is largely exactly where it started in act one with us working, and ruling, and reigning, and filling with God and for God forever.

 

Christa Neidig:

Right. That's so good and so beautifully laid out. Let's talk about act 4. Let's talk about where we are now and let's talk about the opportunity that we have as believers in a workspace. Ways that we can position ourself to disciple others and our neighborhoods and here in the middle of Act four.

 

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, I love this. This is so good. I write a lot about this. So there's a whole devotional on this in the book, one of the 260 entries. Here's five things I would say. I've interviewed a lot of people who are great at making disciples in the workplace, and they all do five things really well. First be so good they can't ignore you. 1 Thessalonians 4 Paul says, "You should work with your cans so that your daily life might win the respect of outsiders."

 

Christa Neidig:

That's good.

Jordan Raynor:

Mediocrity doesn't win the respect of outsiders, mastery does. So number one you want to make disciples at work, be so good they can't ignore you. Second, be a great friend. Be the person in your office, you can't just be excellent. It's got to be excellence with love. We got to be the people in our offices who genuinely love our coworkers and not just the product of their work. Number three, at some point you got to raise your hand and identify yourself as a Christian. This old saying from St. Francis of Assisi, preach the gospel when necessary use words is nonsense. At some point we got to say, I am an apprentice of Jesus Christ. And this can be really simple. On Monday morning walk into your office, ask your coworkers how their weekend was. And when they inevitably ask you how your weekend was, say, oh man, church was amazing.

Oh, you go to church? Yeah, I do. I'm a Christian, I go to the Southern Baptist Church. Number four, pray that God will open up doors for you to move from the surface to the serious, to the spiritual with those that you work with because you and I can't pry open that door. God's got to do that work. And then finally number five, always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. 1 Peter 3:15, I think there's a couple of different dimensions to what Peter's talking about here when he is saying be prepared. I think number one, it's be prepared in a theological sense. We should know answers to the tough questions. But I think equally importantly today, secondarily we got to be prepared to clear our calendars.

We got to be prepared when that coworker or team member is ready to go from the surface to the serious, to the spiritual. We got to be ready to clear the decks and fully focus on that one person that God has brought to us in that moment to share the reason for the hope that we have. So again real quick, number one, be so good they can't ignore you. Number two, be a friend. Number three, identify yourself as a Christian. Number four, pray for God to open up doors to move from the surface, to the serious to the spiritual. And then finally, be prepared to give an answer for the hope that's within you. Five ways to be great at making disciples at work.

 

Christa Neidig:

That's good. I love how you have so many points for everything. It's so tangible to digest. And I think that's a big part of your book. That's really helpful. Point one, you talk about being so good that they can't ignore you, you mentioned the word mastery earlier. I believe in Exodus you point out I think 19 times that God called for skilled workers. What does that mean?

 

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, it's fascinating. In Exodus 25 through 40, this is massive chunk of scripture outlining God's blueprint for the tabernacle. And yeah, the Lord calls for these skilled workers 19 times and the point's inescapable. God calls us to the pursuit of excellence in our work. Now we got to make an important distinction here, because while God's work calls us to the pursuit of excellence, I don't see any evidence that he commands us to the attainment of excellence. Exodus tells us that God values skilled labor, but the gospel tells us that God values skilled and unskilled laborers. So regardless of whether we attain any level of excellence at work today, the gospel assures us that you are still a secure adopted child of the king. But that security shouldn't lead us to just sit back and wait for Jesus' return. It should lead us to the ambitious pursuit of excellence for the glory of God and the good of those that were called to serve in the work.

Christa Neidig:

Your organization is unique. Therefore, the way you find your next staff members should be unique too, whether you're a school, non-profit, family office, or values-based business. We are ready to help serve you. Contact us today to get started. I want to talk about, kind of on the flip hand, we've talked about work. We've talked about hustle and ambition. Let's talk about rest because this is one of those key points you mentioned earlier. You've released three books in 12 months. Can you tell us about biblical reference?

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, that's a good question. By God's grace alone quite a bit, so my wife and I even with three young kids in the house both get eight hours of sleep a night in years. We observe... I hate the word observe, I'm trying to stop saying that, we enjoy the gift of Sabbath every seven days. And the reason why we do is because rest I'm learning is a means of preaching the gospel to myself. Rest is a means of reminding myself that I have value and I have work simply by being a human being and not a human doing. I'm equally loved by the Father on my most and my least productive days. And that enables me to... That's the essence of the gospel, that enables me to rest. But it's also the thing that makes me wildly ambitious to do the work God's called me to do tomorrow.

Not because I need to earn any more of God's favor or because I could earn any more of God's favor. But simply as a response of worship to the one who loves me and adores me equally, regardless of how much I get done.

 

Christa Neidig:

I think that's great. I'm reading a book right now with a few friends of mine from church, and we're reading about 10 Commandments. And we're talking about the Sabbath right now. And we're talking about how important it is to take that Sabbath and how much it reminds us that we are not God. And we are not capable of doing what He can do, which is the perfect reminder that every week I need desperately.

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah, me too. And this is what we see all throughout the Old Testament. Frequently when the Sabbath command is reiterated to the Israelites, it's usually in the context of, hey, don't forget I brought you out of slavery. Don't forget that the Lord is the one who provided these things for you. It's a way of remembering that we have value regardless of our productivity. And remembering that it's God not us who's producing the results in our work. And that the world keeps spinning even when I'm not awake, and even when I'm not hustling seven days a week.

Christa Neidig:

So yeah, let's talk about hustle. You talk about this unique relationship with the idea of hustle, and then you talk with trust, hustle and rest. And we talked a little bit about these, but let's dive into that.

Jordan Raynor:

Yeah. I just think as Christians, we just got to have this unique relationship between these things, and especially that word hustle. And I'm afraid that we are in danger. Listen, I'm all about this resurgence of Sabbath and rest within the church today, 100% for it. I'm a Sabbatarian. We observe the Sabbath, we love the Sabbath. But we can very easily swing the pendulum too far in the opposite direction. Rest isn't the point. Rest is a means to an end, and the end is to get back to the good works god's prepared in advance for us to do. That's the point. So it is a both end. And I think a lot of times these ideas of trusting in God and hustling to make things happen are viewed as opposite ideas. I think we're supposed to embrace the tension between them, both of them.

And I think the way that we know that we're doing that is whether or not we can rest. If you can't avoid checking email while you're on vacation, or if you can't get adequate sleep every night, or if you can't take a few hours off to just enjoy God's presence and the good gifts He's given you every week there, there's a lot of factors that go into that for a lot of different people. But one of the most common factors I've found is that people are relying way too much on their hustle and way too little on God's provision. I think rest is a pretty good indicator as to whether or not we're holding that tension well.

 

Christa Neidig:

I think that's a really great point. We talk to a lot of pastors and leaders in ministry where too much is relying on them, to where if they were to get sick, if the unimaginable were to happen, if something were to happen, we need to set ministry and work up for success even. We always say every pastor is an interim pastor. And if that church cannot function without this one person, something has to change.

 

Jordan Raynor:

And you know who's the worst in the world about Sabbath thing? Sorry listeners, pastors. And listen, I'm not interested in getting into the debate of whether or not Sabbath is commanded in the new covenant. Here's the deal, at the end of the day, God's wisdom for humankind. God worked six days and rested one. God didn't need to rest, why did God rest? Probably because He knew that we would forget to, probably because He knew that He designed work to be a good life giving thing. And our temptation would be to turn it into an ultimate thing. And turn it into an idol and suck the joy and the life out of that thing. So like any good Father, He did something that He didn't have to in order to model it for His less mature kids. I use this analogy all the time.

When I cross the street with my young kids, I have an eight year old, six year old, and a three year old. I make a huge dramatic display of looking both ways for cars. I come out of the car and I say, all right, let's look for cars. Let's look left, we look really slowly. All right, no cars. Let's look right, there's no cars coming and then we cross the street. Do I need to do that ritual? Of course, I don't. What I do is teach my kids something. And I think that's why we see God resting on that seventh day to teach us how important this is for our own sake.

Christa Neidig:

Jordan, this was so great. And I know this is going to be so valuable to all of our listeners and to all of your readers. Everyone who decides to almost accept this challenge and for 260 days read this devotional. Where can viewers get a hold of their own copy of this book?

Jordan Raynor:

So the book's called The Word Before Work. It's super easy to find. Just go on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Christianbook.com, wherever you buy your books. I'm not even going to send you to my website. I'll cut out the friction. Just go to Amazon, type in The Word Before Work, and you can find it right there.

Christa Neidig:

That's so great. And I'll even make sure on our show notes on the website, we'll have all the links to your website and to the book so it's easily found right there. Jordan, thanks so much for having this conversation and sharing all of this really great information for listeners.

Jordan Raynor:

Thank you, Christa.

Christa Neidig:

Have a good one. Thanks for listening to the Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast. At Vanderbloemen, we help Christian organizations build their best teams through hiring, succession, compensation, and diversity consulting services. Visit our website, Vanderbloemen.com to learn more. And subscribe to our Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts to keep up with our newest episodes. Thanks for listening.