Exodus 18:18-21 “Thou wilt surely wear away, both thou, and this people that is with thee: for this thing is too heavy for thee; thou art not able to perform it thyself alone. Hearken now unto my voice, I will give thee counsel, and God shall be with thee: Be thou for the people to God-ward, that thou mayest bring the causes unto God: And thou shalt teach them ordinances and laws, and shalt shew them the way wherein they must walk, and the work that they must do. Moreo er thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rules of hundreds, rules of fifties, and rulers of tens.”
Matthew 6:33 “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.”
One of the most common mentorship questions I have received over the years is related to how to appropriately live out your faith in the workplace – most often related to the military environment. The answer is long and multi-faceted, but one of the most powerful components of the answer is related to the first of three core values of the United States Air Force – Integrity First.
Our military service calls on its 700,000 members to live with integrity – consistently and steadfastly.
There are two primary components of integrity – the first is honesty. If I were to live my life in a work setting by scrubbing out the bedrock components upon which my character rests that are driven by my Christian faith, then I would be living a fundamentally dishonest existence. I would be hiding the core component of a world view that shapes my perspective and molds my life. That would be a fundamentally dishonest act. Thus, I must not hide my faith or I would be violating Integrity First.
The second component of integrity is wholeness. It is living an undivided existence in which I align the entirety of my life – my words, my thoughts, and my actions – with my values, morals, and principles. Integrity means not separating your life into components, but living a whole life in which all parts fit together into one complete entity. Again, when I hide the faith component of my life at work, then I artificially divide a character and personality that is meant to be indivisible. As a result, I would be violating Integrity First.
The concepts are simple. If you hide your faith in the workplace, then you are finding two ways to violate the first core value of our organization. This isn’t to say that you go out of your way to inappropriately create a distraction that diverts the focus of the workplace from its mission and purpose. But, it does provide comfort that our own secular organizational core values insist that we don’t hide a core element of who we are and Whose we are!
PLEASE PRAY FOR AMERICAN CHRISTIANS TO INTERWEAVE THEIR FAITH INTO THEIR LIVES SO FULLY AND COMPLETELY THAT IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO HIDE. It is a way to maintain Integrity First!
