On the job

Trying to get in the habit of witnessing every where I am has its detractors. Not that I'm listening to them.

I lost a blessing (almost dream) job about two weeks ago after I challenged a Roman Catholic on her statement that no one can know that they are saved. (Um, John wrote his Gospel and his First Epistle so that people could know that they are saved, so...) I made the challenge as meekly as I could, but the minute I picked up my Bible (because she said that Psalm 23 teaches us about how to love), the niceties were all over. She said I was trying to intimidate her--but she said that she had read the Bible. In the end, she raised a stink to the boss, and the boss called the temp agency and told them that I was not welcome back.

Now, normally, this would be bad news, but I was only going to get between two and four days work of work over the next two weeks at that point. That Friday night, the night I got canned, I called another temp agency to tell them that I was looking for a job. Well, they were looking for an employee, because someone had failed to show for work that day! (I think he got a better job, because one of my coworkers was telling me that today.) I started that Monday, and have been employed full time for the entire two weeks.

I saw this as a Matthew 6:33 situation. I had needed to make more money than the 2-4 days would have gotten me, so, even though this is a lower pay rate, it is more than I would have had. And there is no guarantee that I would have gotten full time hours with the other job anyway after the first of the year (our workload had decreased).

But some people don't see it that way. I was rebuked by two professing Christians (and of course an unbelieving Jewish friend) for witnessing openly on the job. My reaction is, What, I'm supposed to witness to everyone else and just let my coworkers go to hell? NOT!!

So, after a couple of days on the new job, I started in on a Muslim guy (who was actually my trainer). He gave me the opening by his conversation with the Hindu woman across the table. There were two bystanding coworkers, one of whom just stayed silent as I went through the Law with Ahmed. Ratna, the Hindu woman, chimed in to get a better understanding, and the other coworker said that Christians and Muslims worship the same God. I just shook my head "no" the first time, because I was actively engaging Ahmed in conversation. At the end of our conversation for that day, she said it again, and this time I told her that the Muslim Allah has no Son, but the Bible says that God has a Son. She was shocked.

Our team leader said that we shouldn't be talking about that kind of stuff, because peopel would get offended, and Ratna agreed with him. So we dropped it at that point (I think it was the Friday before Christmas). But Ahmed has been asking more questions about Christianity everyday since. It's been fun. The team leader even asked to look at my Bible today.

Could I get fired again for preaching the Gospel? Yeah. Does that compare to being beheaded or crucified upside down? You decide.