How do we share our hope in Jesus in what we do?

A career in consulting has given Steve Osei-Mensah opportunities to ask – and try and answer – many interesting questions. He shares how paying attention, loving our neighbours and simply the way we work can bring opportunities to share Jesus Christ.

I hadn’t been working in consultancy long when a coach at work asked me ‘Steve, what's your purpose in life?’

Even as a Christian, I'd never really been asked that question before from a work perspective. I could have told you what my purpose was in Christian terms, and it had quite a lot to do with John 3:16. But that wasn’t the question he was asking. He went on ‘What are you doing at work? What are you there to do? What is your meaning in the context you're in? 

You see he'd spotted something that didn't add up. And I'm so grateful he did. It’s interesting the question didn’t come from someone in church, but somebody in the secular world, who was a great coach who spotted something. And he said, ‘I don't think you're giving your all to this. And I'm curious as to why because you're quite an enthusiastic person, but you're not giving your all to it. Why might that be?’ 

Whatever it is you’re doing, are you giving your all? And if not, why not?

Because if we believe Jesus Christ really is Lord of all our lives, then he might want to use us in our work, even in the things we play at, in all of life.

Some years later, I found myself in a similar position as a coach to a very well-known businessman and I asked him a similar question: ‘What is it all for? What are you living your life for? What are you doing your business for?’

I had an amazing reaction.

He stood up and said, ‘Mr Osei-Mensah’, it had got very formal very quickly, ‘I am leaving now. You will get a call from my PA when I am ready to answer your question.’ Now, amazingly, the guy came back three weeks later. And we had a series of very interesting discussions. But what devastated me then, and is a challenge to all of us was he said, ‘Steve, nobody has asked me that question ever.’ A very successful businessperson, but nobody had asked him that question.  

Sometimes we’ll be in a position to ask that kind of question. But how would you answer it? People want to know what we’re living our lives for. We had better have an answer and something to commend.  

Loving our neighbours

Luke 10:28-28 has meant a lot to me in my Christian life. A teacher of the law asked Jesus what he must do to inherit eternal life. Jesus turned the question around:

‘What is written in the Law?’ [Jesus] replied. ‘How do you read it?’

He answered, ‘“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind”; and, “Love your neighbour as yourself.”’

 ‘You have answered correctly,’ Jesus replied. ‘Do this and you will live.’

I have found these words to be a real challenge in my working life. To love and serve others. Jesus makes it clear that genuine human happiness and satisfaction lie more in giving than receiving, more in serving than in being served.

How do we ask the Lord that he would fill us with a heart of compassion to genuinely love him Father, Son, and Holy Spirit and all that we do, and learn to love our neighbors as ourselves.  

Making good work

I had always prayed for opportunities to share my faith. But had no idea some of these opportunities would simply come through doing my work well.

I was privileged to be asked by my firm to go and work for four months in East Asia in a particularly challenging project. It was only at the very end of the project, about five months later that the senior clients came to me very quietly, and said, ‘Steve, we've been watching the way you've done this project, this has been very difficult project for us. And I have something I want to talk to you about.’ And so began a wonderful conversation literally on the last day of the project. And I can share a number of stories like that with you. And I suspect many of you could do as well, where one has just been faithful to the Lord, doing the job you need to do. He just showed me a little chink of what was really going on, in that particular company in this particular person's life. How might he use you?

So as we go, let's remember who we are. Let's understand our context and calling. It doesn't matter where God has called us, whether it's local or international, what is the context? What has he called us to? Who are the people that we are amongst? How can we care for them and genuinely love them? And of course, if we don't know them, it's rather difficult to love them. How do we make time in our life to do that? For me, the acid test has been prayer. And I learned very early on and I've had to keep on relearning it, that I need to pray for compassion, in all of my life, in work, in relationships and in leisure.

Hear more from Steve on the Work + Go podcast, where he shares further about his experience of business leadership and consulting over the last 33 years. Steve started his career in the financial services industry with Barclays, Legal & General and Cap Gemini. He later progressed to being a partner with PwC based in London and Ernst and Young in East Africa. Steve is now an Independent Consulting Partner, is soon to be an author and is a qualified private pilot.

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