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 PrintableVersion Get a lifeWinning choices for working peopleA job lotGET A LIFE A friend of my son’s, who was struggling to cope with living at ‘home’ and work (as in employment type work!) following the relative freedom of university, summed it up like this. ‘I have a perfect work life balance Ð I hate both in equal measures!’ It doesn’t have to be like that. Paul Valler was Finance and Human Resources Director of Hewlett Packard and he has written this helpful book on the place of work (as in employment type work!) in the life of a Christian. What I liked most about this book was its emphasis on ‘being’ rather than simply doing . . . and above all its short chapters. It has three parts: part one, which focuses us on living authentically, that is being clear about our identity as Christians in the workplace; part two about making the right choices in and around our work; and part three about developing purpose in our lives in our many and various roles. It is punctuated throughout with simple and clear illustrations/stories, some of which reappear and develop in later chapters Ð we live in the soap generation after all. If the book has a limitation (and it is a limitation rather than a weakness), it is set fairly and squarely within the professional and business context and when the author extends beyond the familiar I felt he was tiptoeing somewhat. He tiptoed confidently, however, and with respect. People in the working world will certainly find this book useful, but I would suggest that pastors/teachers and full-time church workers who have been out of ‘secular work’ (how I hate that phrase) for some time would benefit from reading it also (both for themselves and for their congregations). I found that most of my challenges and tensions in and around the workplace were laid out on its pages. If you do intend to read it, I would suggest that you do so soon as I fear that it will date more quickly than most books. I was discussing the book with a friend (does that make us a book club?) who asked, ‘Will you change anything as a result?’ I will and I have. Ian Parker, © Evangelicals Now - August 2008 |
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