by Demi Prentiss

Do the people in your congregation leave worship each week knowing God loves their daily work, and celebrating how they contribute to what God is doing in the world? Equipping people to be co-creators with God – sowing love and justice in the places they live and work – is a transformative purpose of the church. Too often our focus in worship is on what we do while we’re inside the church building, rather than on how we can be God’s agents of transformation once we leave the church grounds.

Made to Flourish is “a network of pastors who seek to encourage and resource each other to integrate faith, work and economic wisdom for the flourishing of our communities.” One of the ways they do that is to challenge pastors – and their congregations – to make weekly worship a place where people learn the many ways they are sent out into the world.

How’s your congregations doing? Made to Flourish pastor Isaac Wardell offers an audit that examines three areas – practice, pastoral care, and posture.

• Practice touches on what we do and talk about during worship, and the difference that can make to people’s understanding of their work.
• Pastoral care looks at some of the ways that some vocations are disrespected in our culture, and how the church might be more intentional in “respecting the dignity of every human being” (Book of Common Prayer, Baptismal Covenant, p. 305), especially in their work.
• Posture deals with how the willingness to become a “learner” opens doors for life-giving relationship with those we pray for and minister to.

Once you’ve discovered an area you might like to work on, Wardell also offers suggestions on small changes that can make a big difference.

Want to go deeper? Take a look at our book Radical Sending for some more stories, suggestions, and strategies.