Editor’s Note: The conversation below is part of an interview between Dr. J. Daryl Charles, senior fellow at the Center for Religion, Culture & Democracy, and CRCD’s executive director, Dr. Jordan Ballor. The full interview can be read at the Reading Wheel Review, and it is republished in part with permission.

What are we to make of the sacred/secular distinction?

Charles: I grant that the title of my book—Our Secular Vocation: Rethinking the Church’s Calling to the Marketplace—might raise questions, and this was by design. Briefly stated, in order to collapse the remarkably persistent “sacred-vs.-secular dichotomy” (hereafter SSD), a divide that is insidious yet perennial, we must view the “secular” as sacred. Thus, we may argue that the sacred is secular, or, conversely, that the secular is sacred; based on a proper view of creation, there is no compartmentalization.

Here we can benefit from the thinking of Dorothy Sayers, several generations removed, whose wonderfully relevant essay “Why Work?” critiques the remarkably strong centrifugal force that keeps religious faith and work as “separate departments,” a divide that mirrors a decisive theological deficiency. This deficiency, alas, mirrors not only an inadequate understanding of creation and redemption but a deficient ecclesiology, pneumatology, and eschatology as well.

As such, the SSD is perennial and has deep roots in ancient culture. Well-known are the assumptions that undergirded Greco-Roman attitudes toward work: Manual labor was viewed as inferior, to be performed by servants and slaves, while political life or philosophical reflection was perceived as superior. Historians refer to this contrast in terms of a vita contemplativa-versus-vita activa divide. What is remarkable is the tenacity with which this dichotomy was sustained even in the Christian era, surfacing in the late-patristic period but becoming deeply embedded in medieval life and thinking.

In its medieval expression, the divide will govern the church’s thinking for well over a millennium, until an Augustinian monk by the name of Martin Luther challenges the church’s basic orientation toward work and vocation. While modernity (and postmodernity) have altered our basic assumptions about community, the church’s authority, and social life (at least in the Western context), it is nevertheless a fact that versions of the SSD persist. This divide, moreover, is to be found among both Catholics and Protestants.

The Lutheran breakthrough of the early sixteenth century, as it affected work and vocation, cannot be overstated. Here we are witnesses to a revolt by a monk himself against the wider monastic system—a system that was propped up by the theological rationale of a higher or superior vocatio for those called to the priesthood or the monastic ideal. This was essentially a calling away from society. Luther’s response was to emphasize the goodness of all work when performed in service to one’s neighbor. Undergirding this prophetic response was the theology of the priesthood of all believers. Thereby, work and vocation were reconceptualized, with the result that any SSD was countered and believers were called to, rather than away from, society for service.

What are some of your favorite scriptural verses or passages about work?

Charles: I find certain scriptural texts recurring in my own thinking and work on the wider topic of work and vocation:

• Ephesians 2:10 – our purpose
• Genesis 1:26-28 – our design
• Exodus 20:8-11 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15 (Decalogue) – our model
• Colossians 1:15-20 – our range
• Ecclesiastes 9:10 – our motivation
• Ecclesiastes 11:1-6 – our potential
• Matthew 5:15-16 – our effect
• Matthew 25:14-30 – our reward and our responsibility

As I noted in the last question, we are created for work; it is part of our design, based on our creation in the image of God as recorded in Genesis. While it is true that work is not our full identity, it is still part of our identity. Thus, the well-intended exhortation of one Christian commentator—that “we are not made for work but for rest and worship,” and that “we are not made for the sixth day, but for the seventh”—is both true and false and thus needs adjustment. We are made for both work as well as rest and worship. Moreover, such a statement pits work against worship, falsely assuming that the two have different identities. Indeed, work is a significant part of our worship; a biblically faithful theology must argue for work as worship.

Our model here, based on human creation in the image and likeness of God, is the Lord God himself, who worked, whose creation was “good” (indeed “very good”), and who then rested from his labors. We work because God works; we create because God creates; and we rest because God rested from his labors.

What is exhilarating is the fact that the full range of our work and activity (the entire created order), as well as our motivation, our potential, and the effects of our work and activity on the culture around us, know no bounds. They are without limit. The range of our work, our service, and our efforts is nothing less than “all things,” since this is the very range of Christ’s lordship. This itself collapses any false division between sacred and secular; all things have been made by, through, and for Christ Jesus. Our motivation and our potential as individual believers, of course, will vary. Not all are motivated in the same way; not all are stirred by the same sorts of factors; not all are prone to step out and take risks in the same manner.

Did you always have this holistic understanding of work and vocation? What are some of the most important influences on your thinking? Who have you learned from?

Charles: Probably as with most people, my own understanding of the two interwoven realms of work and vocation has been characterized by incremental growth. As it happened, two seasons of life contributed considerably to this awareness. The first was my living abroad for an extended period of time. Living in a different culture for a period of years forces one to appreciate culture and the role that culture plays in Christian witness to the world. When transplanted into a foreign culture, one must find ways to honor the host culture—an attitude that might not be easy for most Americans. Foremost in this task is the very hard, though rewarding, work of learning the language.

The second season of life that for me was formative in this regard was doing public policy research in Washington, D.C., before entering the university classroom full-time. On Capitol Hill, I met many Christian believers, Catholic and Protestant, who were serious about their faith. It was during these years that I came to more fully appreciate public service and building the common good in a new and fresh way.

The first is Luther, given his prophetic revolt in the sixteenth century that dramatically altered the church’s thinking about work and vocation. The second is Abraham Kuyper, a remarkable individual for whom “common grace” was central to God’s work in the world. The third is writer Dorothy Sayers, who is perhaps best known not for her theological work so much as her detective mysteries. In any event, her classic essay “Why Work?” retains its force every bit as much, if not more, in our day. And the fourth is John Paul II, whose regularly appearing encyclicals during his pontificate consistently addressed matters of faith and culture in ways that were penetrating, even for Protestants such as myself.