finding a job

Man's days are determined; you have decreed the number of his months and have set limits he cannot exceed. So look away from him and let him alone, till he has put in his time like a hired man. At least there is hope for a tree: If it is cut down, it will sprout again, and its new shoots will not fail.

Job 14:5-7

Maybe Job isn't the best book to be reading when your redundancy is three days away.

I am leaving a job where, as the charming woman who interviewed me yesterday pointed out, I have not been able to implement much, if any, of my planning for the last 10 months. I don't feel I have put in my time. And in the last 3 weeks I've been doing very little, which garners even more guilt.

But there is hope for this tree, there has to be.

The bible has very little to say about people looking for jobs or finding careers. It is a modern phenomenon that women have been able to look for gainful and varied employment (yippee!) and there are new categories such as 'management consultant' or 'investment banker' that really mean 'having a job for the sake of being paid large amounts of money'.

Careers are changed late in life, as 'Good Housekeeping' has features on every few months: How I made my love of tea into a leafy business. Yet young graduates straight out of university are expected to have decided on and gathered experience in their chosen career path in time for their CV to impress strangers.

Fathers no longer dictate the vocation of their sons. Some do, but they are the exception rather than the norm. Children are expected to exceed the salary packet of their parents; even actors and artists.

The two most mentioned jobs in the bible are that of servant (or slave) and hired worker. The former is praised for resourcefulness - although the income is enjoyed by the employer - and chastised for greed and disloyalty. The latter is rarely praised but definitely castigated for greed.

If you look at the London scene, loyalty is not expected of any employee. At Foxtons if you resign they expect you to have left by lunch, if you are fired you wipe your feet of the company on your rapid way out. In the name of career advancement job searches are enjoyed over lunch.

And greed comes as standard. If your CV shows a pay-cut between positions then your application may well be passed over. Unless you are changing careers, every move should be skyward.

Did I say the London scene? Why so specific, it is expected across the country.

Churches and Christian groups, however, do they expect a different standard? Are investment bankers asked over coffee what it is they actually do? Are graduates told not to worry about paying back their loans for the sake of following childhood dreams?

I think we are so far of the world in this that the debate does not exist. Aside from stories of missionaries or kids enrolling in the YWAM diploma, the wider issue of how people earn their living is one rarely broached. Perhaps because those that earn the largest livings are stalwarts in the church roof fund...

I need a job to pay rent. Principles are extraneous. Is what I say on my melancholy days. It doesn't feel quite right.

How to find a calling that isn't solely religious, a vocation that isn't hands-on, a position that isn't unrealistically idealistic and a living with positive outcomes?