Shortly, I’ll be writing an article on the "full circle journey" which so many Christians around the world appear to be experiencing, but few understand or even realise they’re on. For so many, the journey has involved following a call into "ministry" only to discover that that calling was in fact to be worked out in our regular daily lives and not as staff members of churches or as itinerant preachers.

Of course, as we make the journey, God sheds small amounts of light on our path to help us see the next step or two. It’s usually from this position that new insights are gained, books are written, conferences called and Christian fads ignite. The problem however, is that these momentary insights are literally that .. momentary. They are of the moment, for the moment .. designed to help us take the next few steps.

These insights are not full spectrum. They are the equivelent of seeing a room through a keyhole and nothing more.

One such momentary insight is marketplace ministry. And with all the continuing focus on this "ministry" as being an end in itself, I wonder what Saint Jerome (a.d. 345-420) of the early Middle Ages would have thought about it? I’ll let him speak for himself. He wrote:

“Avoid, as you would the plague, a clergyman who is also a man of business.”

Ouch! I’ll let you make of that what you will.