May Ministry Reflection: What’s Your Ministry?

Finding your role in tending to God’s garden.

I've been thinking a lot lately about ministry.

I know. Shocking. The guy who works for a national ministry is thinking about ministry…go figure.

We use the word “ministry” often in the Church; but I wonder if we've narrowed its meaning too much. As if ministry belongs only to those who wear cassocks or stand behind pulpits or run programs with official-sounding names.

But what if ministry is far more expansive than we've allowed it to be?

What if ministry is simply the fundamental orientation of every Christian toward the world?

What if it's less about what we do and more about how we do it—in partnership with God, seeking to order the world according to His good purpose?

Over these past months, our What's Your Ministry? series has highlighted stories of Orthodox Christians who have discovered unique ways to serve God and neighbor in their local contexts, using the gifts they've been given.

Each of these stories carries a powerful message: that ministry isn't confined to church buildings or formal programs. 

It happens on mountaintops and living rooms, in parking lots and prison cells. Ministry is just the way humans were created to relate to God’s world.

Even in Genesis we see God place Adam in a garden "to work it and keep it." From the very beginning, humans were invited to participate in God's ongoing creative work. 

To tend. To nurture. To help bring order from chaos, beauty from emptiness.

This, I believe, is the heart of ministry.

Ministry isn't just for the clergy; it's for all of us who bear the image of God and who have been baptized into Christ's death and resurrection. It's for all who have tasted the new life that flows from the empty tomb.

We are all called to minister. We are all invited to partner with God in the healing of the world.

But what does that look like for you? How do you discover your unique ministry?

Perhaps we should consider our own stories in the light of Genesis. Perhaps we should ask ourselves: What garden have I been planted in?

Consider your everyday life. 

What community has God placed you in? What relationships surround you? What physical space do you inhabit day after day? This is your garden—the place God has planted you to "work and keep.”

For some, this garden might be a classroom filled with young minds thirsting for knowledge and formation. For others, it might be a hospital ward where bodies and souls need healing. For still others, it might be a parish coffee hour.

Your garden might be a family dinner table, an office cubicle, a construction site, a research lab, or the checkout line at the grocery store. Wherever you find yourself regularly engaging with God's creation and His creatures—that's your garden.

Next, ask yourself: What needs do I see around me?

Ministry begins with seeing—truly seeing—the world as it is, with all its brokenness and beauty. It means having eyes to recognize where things are not as they should be, where God's good intentions for creation have been distorted or diminished.

What suffering cries out for alleviation? What injustice demands addressing? What loneliness needs companionship? What confusion seeks understanding? What beauty calls for celebration?

The needs we perceive most clearly often reveal something about our own calling. Pay attention to what breaks your heart, what keeps you awake at night, what makes you say, "Someone ought to do something about that."

Finally, consider: What resources has God entrusted to me?

These resources include obvious things like time and money; but they also include your unique gifts, talents, experiences, and perspectives. Your education and skills. Your wounds and healing. Your passions and interests. Even your limitations and weaknesses can become resources in God's hands.

St. Paul reminds us that our gifts are given "for the common good" (1 Corinthians 12:7). They are not primarily for our own benefit but for serving others. And they are diverse by divine design—no one has all gifts, and everyone has some gift to offer.

Your ministry exists at the intersection of the needs you perceive in your garden and the resources you have to offer.

This is where you are uniquely positioned to partner with God in His work of renewal and restoration.

When we look at the stories we've featured in our What's Your Ministry series, we see this pattern again and again. We see people who have opened their eyes to the needs in their particular gardens and have offered whatever resources they have to meet those needs in partnership with God.

This means that anything—truly anything—can be ministry when done in cooperation with God and for the flourishing of His creation.

Ministry isn't about adding religious language or activities to your life. It's about offering your whole life—your ordinary, everyday existence—as participation in God's extraordinary work.

St. Theophan the Recluse wrote, "The spiritual life is not a special kind of life for which one must renounce everything worldly. No, it is life in the world but according to the will of God."

This is ministry—life in the world according to the will of God.

So what is your ministry?

What would it look like for you to engage your life in the world as a partnership with God and God’s people?

Maybe you already know. Maybe you've been faithfully tending your particular plot in God's garden for years.

But maybe you're still searching, still discerning. Maybe you feel like you don't have a ministry at all.

If that's you, I invite you to start simply:

• Look at your “garden.” Where has God placed you? Ask Him to show you how he’s already working in your garden and how you might join Him there. Ask Him to open your eyes and help you see the people you encounter regularly. Ask Him to help you begin to see and the spaces you inhabit as your place to minister.

• Listen for needs. Start a What’s My Ministry Journal. For one month, write down the various needs that you perceive in the garden around you. What brokenness or suffering touches your heart? What possibilities for flourishing do you see that others might miss? Look for patterns in what you notice catching your eye.

• Inventory your resources. In your Ministry Journal, explore the gifts, abilities, experiences, and material resources God has entrusted to you. How might these meet the needs you perceive? Often, others can see gifts in us that we miss in ourselves. Seek guidance from trusted others, particularly your spiritual father or mother so they can help you discern God’s invitation.

• Find companions. Ministry flourishes in community. Look for others with complementary gifts who share your concerns and explore how you might be able to minister together. We’re a Body, and we need each other.

• Take a small step. Ministry doesn't usually begin with grand gestures or perfect plans. It begins with faithful presence and small acts of obedience. Choose one need you can address with what you have, and take action. Not to save the world, but simply to be faithful in your corner of it.

• Share your story with us. If you've found your ministry—or even if you're just beginning to explore it—we'd love to hear from you. Your journey might inspire others to discover their own ministries. Reach out to us at ​​newsletters@theoym.org to be considered for our What's Your Ministry? series.

  
  

Start where you are, with what you have.

Cook a meal for a neighbor. Mentor a young person. Create beauty in a neglected space. Speak truth with love and gentleness. Pray for someone in pain. Use your professional skills to serve a struggling ministry. Listen deeply to someone who feels unheard.

You don’t have to look far to find your ministry. It can be right outside your door, or even in your own house.

In Christ, God is making all things new. Ministry is our participation in that work—our way of bearing witness to the new creation that broke into history at the Resurrection and continues to unfold all around us.

It is God's invitation to partner with Him in the garden of His world, tending and keeping it until the day when all creation will be fully restored and God will be all in all.

What an invitation. What a privilege.

So what’s your ministry?