Session 3A, 2:30pm, Room 114
Many Christians are concerned about doing God’s will as they make major decisions about their work: they want to choose the right field of study, the right job, or the right career path. This is well intended, but it often causes a great deal of stress, because the focus on selecting the “right work” sets up a value scale that elevates some positions (e.g., “ministry”) over others.
I submit that this is the wrong question to ask. In my talk, I will discuss how an understanding of God’s kingdom as the domain over which God rules provides us a different way to understand “kingdom work”. Our task is not to choose the right work, but to bring everything into wholeness under Christ. I’ll draw from scripture and personal experience as I explain how this frees us from anxiety of choosing the wrong path, while giving us a clear commission to perform our work in a distinctly Christian way.
Steven is starting his fifth year as a PhD student at Stanford. When he’s not teaching hundreds of undergrads about the excitement of electrical engineering or avoiding work by reading books or biking in the mountains, he researches tools and techniques for programming specialized computer hardware, particularly for image processing and computational photography.
Passion Talks are short talks by Christian grad students, academics and professionals considering how their faith intersects with and impacts their work. Read more…