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Proposed
Christian Employee Network
Dan Olinger, (Ph.D., 84)
Professor of Theology, BJU Seminary
It�s difficult to identify a single most important lesson. Those years were filled with daily lessons, all of them important. One that has truly changed my life, though, is the importance of teamwork. I have come to appreciate Ephesians 4 as a life-directing passage: each member or the body must devote himself to the growth of the body as a whole until the body demonstrates the greatness of Christ. I learned that in a practical way by laboring with my friends at the Press.
Creating books is brutally difficult�much more difficult than anybody who hasn�t done it can appreciate. You need people who know things, people who can say things, people who can make those things look graphically interesting, and people who can organize the whole endeavor. You need people who can motivate customers to buy, people who can solve customer�s problems, and people who can listen to complaints with grace and open-mindedness. You need people who are sensitive to other people�s feelings, and you need people who, frankly, are not. You need left-brained people and right-brained people. You need mechanical people, some who can do repetitious work for long periods. And most importantly, you need Someone who can keep that diverse team motivated in working toward a single goal that is greater than any or even all of them.
Working amidst such great diversity can be difficult. We want, or think we want, people around us who are like us. Sometimes artists rub mathematicians the wrong way, and vice versa. Sometimes people misunderstand someone else�s motives or intent. Sometimes people cry.
But the godly ones learn to celebrate the rich diversity that makes a product and a production great. They learn to recognize their own limits and to seek out the differing strengths of others. They learn to marvel at the wisdom and grace of God in bringing together such diverse skills, personalities, and backgrounds so that every job gets done by someone who�s good at it. And they find themselves rejoicing at the freedom of serving a God who can design such things and who provides every need along the way the way in His own good time.
The Press is not a church, but it nicely illustrates the church environment in which every believer should labor. We are all called to be part of a team, a body, with diverse parts and responsibilities. We are all called to labor alongside those who are not like us and to create with them a rich and multifaceted work that brings glory not to the servants but to the Master. We are all called to be amazed by the far-reaching results of this work, to recognize our own great shortcomings, and to glorify the only One who could have made it happen.
One day the work will be done. The last book will he published. The last believer will enter the fold. The last sermon will he preached. The last nursing home will be visited. And then we will gather with a people who are far more diverse than anything we have ever seen here, and with one voice we will all offer praise to the only One who really matters. We will know all that He has done, not just the things that we noticed. And we will serve Him without the shortcomings and depravities that hound us here. What will our product look like then? And how much more will we celebrate those accomplishments in that eternal day when deadlines are no longer the driving force?
To God alone be the glory.
From Voice of the Alumni Magazine of Bob Jones University, � 2004 Bob Jones University. Used by permission.
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