What is your office?
Sometimes it isn’t easy to be a mom or a dad, an employee, a boss, a teacher, or a student. We often have to make tough decisions in order to carry out the tasks we’ve taken on or been assigned. In thinking about the different roles we each fulfill, I’ve often been drawn to the concept of an “office.” But not the kind of office with a desk and a computer!—office as defined as “a duty or function assigned to or assumed by someone” (American Heritage Dictionary).
Mary Baker Eddy writes about the office of porter in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, when she describes standing “porter at the door of thought.” She goes on to ask the reader to perform his or her office as porter and “shut out … unhealthy thoughts and fears” (p. 392 ). She also describes God as having different offices: “Life, Truth, and Love … represent a trinity in unity, three in one,—the same in essence, though multiform in office: God the Father-Mother; Christ the spiritual idea of sonship; divine Science or the Holy Comforter” (Science and Health, p. 331 ).
Although the Bible doesn’t use the term “office,” it certainly has many references to one’s appointed function or duty. Moses was a leader who brought the children of Israel out of Egypt. David was elevated to the position of king. Mary became the mother of Jesus. Jesus was appointed by God to reveal the Christ, preaching the gospel, healing the sick, and raising the dead. Each of these individuals demonstrated that by relying on God and expressing the qualities of their offices, they were successful in their endeavors.
In humbler ways in my own life, I have been called upon to uphold various offices, including employee, renter, neighbor, teacher, mother, church member, and so forth. When I prayed to be able to fill each particular office, I found I was supported in my work and decision-making by the qualities of that office. For example, as a teacher, I was sometimes called on to make decisions that weren’t easy—but I learned over the years that my role wasn’t to win students’ approval or assert my own authority, but to express my role as teacher. The children were expected to uphold their roles as students, observing, discovering, studying, and following through on instruction.
As a teacher, sometimes I was called upon to make decisions that weren’t easy.
Some years back I served as a substitute teacher in a high school classroom of students who had been labeled slow learners and, to some extent, behavior disordered. It was a small group of students, and, for the most part, they were cooperative kids. But one day, after the class had begun, a boy came in late. I had been instructed by the administration to require a classroom pass in order to admit a student to class. This student was a big boy, considerably taller than I. When I asked for his pass, he said, “I don’t have one.” I asked him to go to the school secretary to get one. He refused. The whole class got quiet. So did I.
As a Christian Scientist I had been learning that God’s creation, including each man and woman, is good (see Genesis 1:31 ). As a teacher I needed to expect good from my students and to expect them to respond to instruction. I knew this kid had a duty as a student to be obedient to the school’s instruction, and I told him as much, knowing that it was natural for him to want to be good.
But the class laughed at my use of the word obedient. “That’s what dogs are supposed to be,” one student said. But I pointed out that being obedient applies to them as students, too. They needed to obey the rules of the school, just as I needed to uphold the school’s instructions. The class grew quiet, and the boy obediently left the room, coming back in a few minutes with the pass.
Things proceeded well during the remainder of the class time, but, near the end of the class period, another boy got up and said he was leaving, adding that he often left early. I had had no indication from their regular teacher that anyone was supposed to be dismissed early, so I told him to wait until the closing bell. He got up and proceeded to walk to the classroom door.
My thought went again to the idea of one’s office. I could let him leave a few minutes ahead of time. What difference would it make? But I felt there was a lesson here for both student and teacher. I needed to uphold the office of teacher and expect the student to remain in class per the school rules. As a student he needed to respond to the school’s rules and the teacher’s instructions. It wasn’t a case of my will over his, but of recognizing that we each are carrying out our respective roles.
I could tell he was responding to these thoughts even though he continued to edge toward the door. It was still several minutes before the bell would ring. He opened the door but leaned on the jamb saying he was leaving. I simply reiterated that I expected him to remain in the class per the school’s rules. He stayed in the doorway. Soon the bell rang. He said goodbye with a smile, and so did I.
I was touched by these experiences. We, student and teacher, were upholding our offices, not expressing self-righteousness or personal power, not trying to prove something to others. We simply assumed our assigned office. I guess you could say we did our part, and the Christ, that lovely presence and power of good, did its work.