Show Me How to Share Christ in the Workplace

Show Me How to Share Christ in the Workplace by R. Larry Moyer

Bringing together the good news of Jesus Christ and the workplace is not an easy task to practice for many professing believers.  This book, Show Me How to Share Christ in the Workplace by R. Larry Moyer is designed to build up the confidence of believers in sharing the gospel with those whom they work with in a daily context.  Rather than focusing on a specific method or approach in evangelism, Moyer looks at the ways in which believers can communicate their testimony, life, and witness of the good news to others. 

I particularly thought that chapter 5 was very insightful because it dealt not only with the verbal message we send to others but the example of a life given over to following Jesus.  Moyer writes, “But what can’t be said on the job can sometimes be said off the job.  What gives us that opportunity is very often a Christian life well lived on the job” (48).  Consistently telling the truth, thinking about the needs of others, developing self-control are hallmarks of a life others want to ascribe to in the workplace.  Often, how we act is often more important than the words that we say, because our actions are taken as equivalent to the kind of person we are.  I would add to Larry’s words in this chapter that it is often how we act in the middle of ugly situations that speak to the character of our faith.  In other words, if we entertain and promote the degradation of others by our gossip, than how will others want to share deep pain in their lives that often lead to gospel conversations?  There really is no end to the effective witness of a life lived according to the rule of Christ.

Throughout the rest of the book Moyer spells out the fundamentals of a gospel message including sin, the death and resurrection of Christ, and the matter of who someone is trusting when they believe.  I thought his analysis of the specific evangelism phrases that are unhelpful was very good (84, invite Jesus into your heart, Accept Christ, give your life to God, etc.).  Not only are these phrases not in the Bible, but they seem to promote a form of prayer or saying inside of focusing on trusting Christ, for he is the one who saves. His analysis was good because it brought the focus from a method to the person of Jesus, from a principle to a life.

I had some real problems with this book as well.  For one, Moyer’s evangelistic strategy begins with sin, goes to the penalty for sin and the talks about Christ’s death and sacrifice couched in the form of a question about going to heaven.  Now, I don’t disagree with any one point here but I think this is not the whole story.  By beginning where the biblical narrative begins, with God as the one who made all things, including us, and that we are to reflect his glory, we get a picture of God who pursues his creation to the utmost.  Even in the fall, God’s word to Adam and Eve included the coming of the promised one who would destroy death and sin itself.  Part of the goal of the Bible is that God commits himself to love a people through the worst (succession of kings, divided land, idolatry of Israel, scorn of the Messiah, etc.).  Often we even see the marks of God’s common grace in all people for their longing for justice, peace and beauty in a world that rages against these things.  It is easy to make salvation simply about going to heaven when you die in an evangelism message, but I think it much more of a holistic message encompassing the storyline of the Bible when we tell the story of God’s work in the world overall.  And, this message still centers on Jesus Christ, because not only is he the hope of Israel but the hope for us, for the renewal of the creation, for the remedy of a broken relationship with God.

Thanks to Kregel Publications for the review copy of this book in exchange for review.