Everyday Life as Worship, Labor as Training
Work Duty within an Apostolic Learning Community
Yard work duty. A student’s work of care and stewardship.
Work Duty is worship, does it not?
Our worship does not stop at the church, the Malmstadt Hall, or the classroom.
The Hebrew word for “to cultivate,” abad, is said to carry the meanings of “to worship, to work, to serve, and to care”.
Like the faithful steward in Luke 16 who was trustworthy even in very small things,
we use our daily Work Duty time not only to tend and organize our living spaces,
but also to continue training ourselves to meditate on God and to worship Him through our lives.
[ From a CYP DTS Instagram post ]
This confession goes beyond a simple explanation of Work Duty. It is a declaration that reveals how the University of the Nations forms people and builds community. At the University of the Nations, Work Duty is not an additional activity or labor done merely for operational purposes. It is part of the learning process and a central pillar of community training.
The University of the Nations is an apostolic learning community. This begins with the belief that learning must not remain confined to the classroom, but must continue in every area of life. Washing dishes in the kitchen, tending the yard, quietly organizing spaces that no one notices, all of these become learning environments where we are shaped in our attitude before God, our posture toward community, and the way we carry the responsibilities entrusted to us.
For this reason, Work Duty is not simply a time to do tasks well. It is training in faithfulness in unseen places. It is a process that helps us recognize the community not as a background for my own ministry, but as the body of Christ that I am called to love and take responsibility for. It is also a time to learn through lived experience how to handle what God has entrusted to us with the right heart and attitude.
This kind of training does not leave students as people who merely carry out assigned work. Instead, it shapes them into people who respond to God’s sending with their entire lives. The apostolic learning that the University of the Nations pursues aims not at the accumulation of knowledge, but at a change in the direction of one’s life.
That is why the sweat and care poured out in the Work Duty setting are never separated from the Word received in the classroom. All of these moments come together to teach us, through embodied practice, how the Kingdom of God can be revealed in everyday life.
This semester, the single photograph capturing a moment of Work Duty reflects more than a neatly ordered space. It bears the marks of training that chooses to live life as worship, and quietly reveals the kind of people the University of the Nations seeks to raise.
ㅡ Yechan Lee, Planning Department
✨ You can find more beautiful and photogenic moments on UofN Jeju’s official Instagram. Check them out below!
