Many years ago, when I was in professional ministry, I had become close friends with the members of our Senior Pastor’s advisory council. They were all Christian businessmen. Occasionally after I preached, they would tell me, “Jason, you preached a great sermon! However, you really don’t know what it’s like in the real world.” These guys had to deal with the daily grind in the dog-eat-dog world of their respective careers.

In hindsight, I understand their perspective. It is fairly easy to put together a good sermon. You choose a topic, use some relevant Bible verses and provide interpretation, then provide action steps, sprinkled with inspirational and/or funny anecdotes or personal examples. Voila! You have a fairly decent sermon. Okay, that’s overly simplistic and there’s more to crafting a sermon than that. The whole process needs to be bathed in prayer and hopefully with specific direction from the Holy Spirit.

But the point I’m trying to make is that a sermon usually addresses deep topics with simplistic and idealistic solutions. And for people like my friends who were struggling to be genuine Christians in a vicious marketplace that defined their careers, most sermons were lacking. Following Jesus based on these kind of sermons seemed unrealistic in their “real world.” Cherry-picked Bible verses, simple interpretations, uncontextualized application, and emotionally-laced stories don’t equip most people to genuinely follow Jesus in the unique and ambiguous circumstances of their lives. 

So when I left professional ministry 20 years ago, one of my goals was to be an authentic apprentice of Jesus in the marketplace. I genuinely wanted to discover if his invitation to follow him actually “worked” in “real life.” I don’t think this is a spoiler for anyone reading this, but 20 years later I can say, “Absolutely!” I have discovered again and again that Jesus is truly the most intelligent person who has ever walked this planet. He can hold his own in knowledge and character among the experts in any field of human knowledge, from business to medicine to finance to quantum physics. In fact, as the true Human, he is a Master of all human endeavors.

So when he invites us to come and learn from him, what he teaches and trains us actually “works” in our relationships, careers and every other aspect of “real life.” But it “works” not because we learn about goals, habits, purpose, empathy, collaboration, emotional intelligence, managing time and money, and the myriad other topics in most popular business, leadership, and self-improvement books. It’s about trustingly apprenticing yourself to the Master, unlearning your current broken understanding of human life, and relearning from Jesus how to be like him within God’s relentless project of love, justice and transformation which ultimately reveals what is truly “real life”. 

Following Jesus is not a simple, linear process to personal success. Rather, it is an arduous process of sacrifice, especially in a marketplace defined by values and activities opposed to what Jesus may be teaching you. That’s why Jesus said if anyone wants to be my student, he must take up his cross and follow me.

I’ve been following Jesus for almost 40 years. The first half of that time was spent either preparing for or actively engaged in professional pastoral ministry. But the last half of that time was trying to learn from and to live like Jesus outside of professional ministry as challenged by my businessmen friends so many years ago. Challenge accepted. As I transition out of my career, I would like to dedicate several posts to sharing some of what I learned during that time.