A clear vision and mission can help the Christian sharpen, focus and stay true to the core of doing Our Father’s Business or God’s work. The wonderful news is that you do not have to spend much effort to find out what your own vision and mission are, when you abide in Him you will know them in Jesus Christ. In Him, you have the utmost prospect of aligning all that you are and all that you do with His business.

Centre of life

For one who truly desires to be about Our Father’s Business, the centre of life is the Lord Jesus Christ. You live 24/7, acknowledging that He is the Master of all.

Money and earthly treasures do not take centre stage because you know these are temporal, for “the world is passing away, and the lust of it; but he who does the will of God abides forever” (1 John 2:17).

When your life reflects that Jesus is at the centre, you would be living in the “riches and glory of Christ. And this is the secret: Christ lives in you. This gives you assurance of sharing his glory” (Colossians 1:27). What a privilege it is to love and give yourself to Him who has first “loved you and given Himself for you” (Galatians 2:20).

Your vision

The Bible says: “Where there is no vision, the people perish” (Proverbs 29:18). I once read of a blind person who asked St Anthony: “Can there be anything worse than losing eyesight?” St. Anthony replied: “Yes, losing your vision!”

The focus of My Father’s Business begins with your vision – a clear vision of your Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible calls for “fixing our eyes on Jesus” or “looking to Jesus” (Hebrews 12:2). 

The Christian’s vision in life is not primarily a purpose statement. It is not your job or your ministry. It is not your mission endeavours, and it is not even the Great Commission. The Christian’s vision is first and foremost the Lord Jesus Christ.

Fundamentally, your calling is first to your Master, then to a mission. The psalmist writes: “I lift up my eyes to you, to you who sit enthroned in heaven. As the eyes of slaves look to the hand of their master, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, till he shows us his mercy”. (Psalms 123:1-2)

Sharpen your vision in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the place to start, for when He is your centre of interest, your life will be in focus. Life is not that complicated. We make it complicated by filling ourselves with all kinds of things that often clutter our lives so that we lose our chief focus.

Your mission

When a janitor at NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) was asked what his job was, the janitor replied: “I send people to the moon!” This is a gem of a response many bosses can only dream of! If everybody down the ranks of an organisation knows his or her role, the organisation has already gained a huge step forward in its business.

Wouldn’t it be revolutionary if every Christian in the marketplace understands what his or her role is? Whether you are the boss of a company or an employee, you know that you are really about your Father’s business.

Our mission climaxes at the Great Commission: “And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, ‘All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.’ Amen.” (Matthew 28:18-20)

Jesus prayed to the Father: “As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world” (John 17:18). Paul Stevens, in The Other Six Days, points out that “mission is not an occasional activity of the people of God of special interest for ‘mission groups’. The church does not have a mission; it is mission. Under both covenants, mission is the intended occupation and preoccupation of the whole people of God, not merely a few chosen representative or designated missionaries. Put simply, the ordinary Christian is a missionary. And that mission is undertaken in societal occupations, in individual and personal life (home and family), and through one’s corporate life in the church.”

Christians in the marketplace have already been sent into the world. We spend a significant amount of time interacting with colleagues, customers and business associates at work. Like the janitor at NASA who goes about his cleaning roles yet understands his real business of sending people to the moon, may we understand our real business too: “I send people to Jesus, the Life Giver.”