Faith: The Jubilee Professional Conference 2015

Nine days ago I would have had no idea what the title of the post was about. Yesterday, I experienced the fireworks of what happens when your faith life and your career life meet up and have a sit-down together.

Cody and I were invited by a member of our church small group to attend the Jubilee Professional conference that is part of a much larger young adult faith-based event, Jubliee. Each year the Center for Christian Outreach teams with the Pittsburgh Leadership Foundation to throw a weekend bash that celebrates recent college grads and their careers, lives and other passions in the context of the love of God.

Thankful we we able to attend.

I certainly fall in to the young professional/millennial category - I'm searching for my best fit career-wise using the talents I've been given and cultivated without settling. It was a blast of fresh air to hear a Christian perspective on today's often scary dynamic work situations, and how to put yourself out there in faith, while living your faith.

Jubilee Pro was all about those of us 5 - 20 years out of school creating our careers and being agents of influence, whether we know it or not. How does what we do everyday in our workplaces affect those we work with for the greater good? How do we show love? How do we share our personal transformations in a challenging world?

A number of well-spoken thought leaders and change drivers inspired us to think about why we choose to believe what we do, both politically and spiritually with the metaphor of tribes. How can we break out of 'tribal' thinking, or believing what we do because we just were raised that way, or that's just the group we feel comfortable with; at the end of the day, how do we solve problems focusing on making sure that love is our standard?

One of our favorite presenters left us with these ideas: "Our existence here is to love people because they are people, not because they are on 'our side'." // If we could first find the middle ground with those we seem to be at odds with - how about starting with the agreement that we simply want people to flourish?

Another shared how his tech consulting company has no CEO. As president, he thinks of the CEO as the love and teaching of Jesus Christ. He puts his employees and their dreams front-and-center, as well as the company's and client's values. This atmosphere of support and genuine listening makes for a creative workplace where employees thrive, clients are satisfied and feel heard, and profit can follow naturally. The relationships nurtured are the driving force.

One of my favorite speakers encouraged the church to turn outward to embrace truth about modern career struggles, and speaking to those needs with the unique and amazing resources it has. What a great series it would make - to think through the changes and unforeseen paths our lives and careers take through the safety of the church environment that is primed for our vulnerability.

Cody and I were able to nab some good reading material at the bookstore afterwards on each of our interests.

The FRAMES books look at a variety of research on American society and share ways to understand where you might be in life and ways to think about cultivating your circumstance with a Christian teachings in order to thrive.

Our individual buys on communications & messaging for me, and arts for him ;)

It was an eye-opening few hours, and I can't stress enough how refreshing it was to hear about God's love spoken through career paths, and the blessings that unfold in response for everyone involved. 

Something to leave you with is a solid, simple question asked at the conference. How can we be Christians every day, not just Sunday?