What's On Your Resume?

I don’t know about some of you but the hardest thing for me when seeking a job or a pastorate is the interview and the resume. I try very hard to be a good worker wherever I am employed but the interview is the tough part. Even looking at the interview tips that are online doesn’t help much. Each interviewer is different and some want you to tell it all and others want a synopsis. If you don’t tell how wonderful you are and maybe appear laid back one man may think you are lazy and lack self-confidence. Another thinks you are a braggart if you try to show confidence and highlight your achievements. I got two jobs when I thought I had blown the interview because I kept saying that I didn’t have any experience in the areas they were asking me about yet did not get jobs when I did know the topics and had experience. Go figure!

Proverbs 27:2 says “Let another man praise thee, and not thine own mouth; a stranger, and not thine own lips.” (KJV)

That makes the whole process even more difficult. The best job I ever got in respect to this passage was the one where they never even called me let alone interviewed me. I sent in the paperwork and the next thing I know I was given an appointment for a physical. After that, I got a start date. It was grand!

Some of you may have never had to this but one time. The first job you took is the one you still have or you have retired from and that is wonderful. Unfortunately, I have had quite a varied career after I left the military. Getting a job and keeping it was tough for awhile due to graduating in the middle of a recession. I later found out that I was often hindered because of my military background. Hmm, and I had heard that “your best bet was to a hire a Vet” but not everyone agreed. Also, I know that I was discriminated against a few times because my degree was in Religious Education. Other times I knew that there were other things beyond my control that caused me to be discriminated against but God always took care of me and now I am four months from being able to retire from a thirty year career. Yet, I am still not done with resumes and interviews in this life or the next.

It is tough enough to go through a process of having to let your resume speak for you or to defend your qualifications when you are applying for a job. It would be even tougher if you were the founder of the corporation and had to prove yourself to the people you employed because they questioned your authority, sought to replace you and even discredit you. You say, that’s nuts! How can that happen? Well, something similar happened to the Apostle Paul.

When Paul entered Corinth it was a city of paganism steeped in idolatry, prostitution and materialism. Sounds a bit like any metropolitan area in the US or the world for the matter. Consequently, Paul was the founder of the 1st Baptist Church of Corinth and anyone who was a Christian in that city was won to Christ by him or one of his converts. You would have thought that there would have been some definite gratitude and loyalty in the hearts of the believers. You would have thought.

Unfortunately, though God had blessed that church with every spiritual gift they never matured beyond babyhood. They elevated the least of all the gifts to pre-eminence. They carried over some of the practices of the orgies into the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. They tolerated sin in the church. The rich flaunted their wealth before the poor in the church and they still had respect of persons. Man, and to think there are so many churches today that look to the Church of Corinth as a model to emulate instead of an example of how to not do church. That place was a catastrophe and it had the greatest Doctor and theologian of all time, other than Christ Himself, as its founder and teacher. Makes you wonder why we place so much emphasis on degrees and theologians when it is obvious there is no guarantee that the holder of those degrees will do any better than the fishermen who made up the majority of the Apostles.

The “respecter of persons” thing is what got Paul called into question. Once some of the lads in Jerusalem who believed in Jesus plus the law heard of the success in Corinth they had to jump in and infiltrate. They would not have gotten their hands dirty or taken the risk in starting a church in such an area but they could steal sheep. These lads would show up in their long robes looking very respectable. They carried themselves with charm and class calling each other Rabbi; meaning master or doctor. They were grand orators and philosophers. Those in the Corinthian upper crust would love these guys and believe everything they said. Thus when they started criticizing Paul and preaching their errors, Paul had to write the Church and defend his credentials and supply his resume.