KEY ONE: Encourage Spiritual Passion
Fundamental to giving our best to our communities is keeping faith at the heart of our work.
We need to:
- Be motivated and inspired by God’s love
- Seek to constantly grow in our personal relationship with God
- Ensure we don’t try to do things in our own strength, and trust God no matter what happens
- Delight in God and make sure we focus on him each day
- Be accountable to someone who will watch out for our spiritual growth
“I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” (John 15 v5)
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Learn more about the 10 Keys for impact
God’s promise is that as we remain in him, we will see fruit in our work. Encouraging spiritual passion will also:
- Keep us in line with God’s strategy
(Key 3)
- Ensure we communicate our faith in our words and in our actions
(Key 8)
- Enable us to look after our teams
(Key 5) and give our communities our absolute best
(Key 2)
- Help us keep our hearts right
(Key 10) and ensure we don’t burn out
(Key 6)
This kind of work can be tough but the most important thing is to keep
going back to God; he gave you the vision and he will sustain you as you
fulfil it.
Catherine Smith, Hope Centre
We spend 15 minutes every morning before work praying and have a varied
rota of requests to make sure we don’t get stale and religious in our
prayers.
Dan Lane, Christians Against Poverty
Try to develop rhythms rather than routines so that spiritual passion
isn’t another thing to do. Restful activities (like gardening or
walking) that you enjoy and that give your mind space to pray and
process can be really helpful.
Josephine Knowles, Beyond the Streets
Walking by faith
God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.
(2 Corinthians 9 v8)
Every time we meet with a client we pray for wisdom to understand what a
person’s real needs are. It’s also important to look at situations from
the perspective of what God can do (not you) – he is the God of the
impossible.
Susan Coupland, Destiny Angels
To grow spiritually you have to be prepared to get out of the boat like
Peter did. For us that meant working without the certainty of a salary
for a year; we trusted God to provide and he did.
When we walk by faith and see miracles happen, that builds our faith and
passion.
Gary Wicker and Affi Luc Agbodo, Networkfour
I had a chair in my office set aside for Jesus. Every decision I had to
make, I would look at the chair and ask ‘What would you do?’
Catherine Marshall, Signal
Everything’s got to come from a heart that loves to serve Jesus and his church.
Mark Russell, Greenbank Christian Centre
‘Turning the Key’ – Additional Tips:
- Regularly meet with a mentor/Spiritual Director who will help you grow in your relationship with God
- Make sure you tell everyone when you get a notable answer to prayer
- Take time as a team to ‘stand back’ from your work so you can seek God together, be inspired and enthused
- Make space for restful activities that help you engage with God and hear his voice
- Keep a journal to keep track of words and verses God has given you and ways he has answered prayers