Six Christians in the workforce, ranging from professors to CEOs, joined Naomi Norton, Point Loma Nazarene University ASB director of spiritual life, in Brown Chapel for a Q&A event on bridging faith and career on March 26 from 6:30-7:30 p.m.
The evening forum was a part of Norton’s “As You Go” chapel series project, which explored the balance of cultivating spiritual awareness in a secular world.
With May graduation approaching, Norton said her intention for the event was to support soon-to-be graduates in bringing their faith with them beyond PLNU. About 150 students attended the event.
“What does it look like to leave Point Loma and move into the workplace or next season of life, taking what we’ve learned here about being disciples of [Jesus] Christ?” Norton asked the panel in the Q&A after the event.
She ping-ponged around the semicircle of speakers, throwing out questions about spiritual growth, servant leadership and vocational stewardship. One recurring motif among the speakers’ stories of how they got where they are today was the doubt they experienced along the way.
Allyson Golden, a pediatric nurse, author and speaker who was a part of the panel of guests, shared her struggle against hopelessness and despair while working with sickly kids in Rady Children’s Hospital.
“There have been times when I’ve asked, ‘Where are you, Lord?” Golden said.
Jazzy Tapia, a first-year nursing major who attended the event, said she was touched by Golden’s testimony and felt more prepared for her future career in medicine.
“Hearing her [Golden] be so open about her challenges and trouble in her career made me feel like I wouldn’t be alone in that,” Tapia said. “I can see ways to overcome once I get there.”
Golden said that most nursing students, like Tapia, have the fortune to know what their careers will look like after graduation by working in clinical rotations at the hospital while earning a degree. Not all majors are so well mapped, however, especially those in the School of Arts, Humanities and Public Engagement.
Lindsey Lupo, dean of the School of Humanities, Arts and Public Engagement and a part of the panel, mentors students with these more open-ended majors. During the panel, she shared how students benefit from networking with alumni who prioritize their faith in their profession and responding to coworkers and clients like Jesus Christ would.
Lupo and other panelists Mark Douglas, the president and CEO of LCPtracker and Rob McKenna, CEO and founder of Wild Leaders, Inc., each gave a piece of advice on how to navigate the transition between college and career with patience, self-forgiveness and perseverance:
“Just because there’s not a clear path doesn’t mean there’s not a path,” Lupo said.
“Go slow until you know,” Douglas said.
“For 25 years, I felt like God was preparing me,” McKenna said.
Among the six religious believers, several achievements revolved around storytelling as a tool for spreading the gospel.
As a CEO, Douglas said he practiced public speaking often and felt a calling to talk about God often – around coworkers, in front of the boardroom and behind the podium. Not preaching but rather leading as an example by opening up about the importance of God in his life and praying for others.
Not every listener would hear God speaking through him in his way of sharing the gospel through words of affirmation and vulnerability. Yet, Douglas said there was always at least one.
“100% of the time, there were people in that audience who needed to hear it,” Douglas said.
McKenna built off of Douglas’ public speaking vocation and was eager to hear from the audience in the Q&A section of the forum at the end of the event.
Reflecting on his TED Talks, McKenna said that listening is equally as important as speaking to find Jesus in every connection and conversation.
“Every person’s story is the gospel,” McKenna said. “Give any person a chance to tell their story, and you’ll hear the need for Jesus.”
Panelist and Naomi Norton’s father, John Norton, a literature professor, author and speaker who helps lead the Around-The-World Semester at Concordia University in Irvine, CA, also said he desired to give students a global perspective in his literature classes. He found learning and faith to be inseparable and talked about how engaging with other cultures is a form of respecting God’s creation by seeking to understand it.
“Literature can be this incredible bridge between communities,” John Norton said. “We are far more alike others than we are different.”
In addition to giving time to learning about and serving other communities, the speakers brought up the sacredness of family and how a healthy work-life balance is essential to preserving this.
Naomi Norton’s choice of her father for the forum reflected this key theme.
Panelist Kim Hogelucht, assistant dean and professor of business, emphasized the idea with her story of getting involved in her kids’ classrooms as they grew up and how grateful she was to have a career where she could afford to spend that time with her child.
Lizette Vieth, a third-year marketing major who attended the event, said she enjoyed Hogelucht’s business communication class last year and that she had developed a greater trust in the business school’s leadership after hearing the dean share that story.
“I think she leads with a kind heart,” Vieth said. “I feel good knowing that [the business school] is in good hands.”
Naomi Norton concluded the event with a surrender prayer, as she called it, and each student raised their open palms in a gesture of receiving Jesus Christ’s grace.
“Live an open-handed life in a closed-fist culture,” Naomi Norton said.
Kailyn Collette