“What in God’s Name Am I Doing at Dalton’s?” is the title of a one-page handout John Miller frequently gives to friends and acquaintances. Miller, 55, looks like an aging hippie-rimless glasses, jeans, gray hair pulled back in a pony tail-but he loves God mightily and feels called to serve Him in the Warsaw, Ind., foundry where he has worked for 32 years.
A lifelong musician, John alternates playing bass guitar, acoustic guitar, and drums at his church, the Winona Lake (Ind.) Grace Brethren Church. But he feels his primary ministry calling is to his workplace.
“You grow up with your playmates,” John says, “But you grow old with your workmates.”
To serve God in the foundry, John, a senior metallurgical technician, has ministered both in group situations and in one-on-one encounters. In 2004, he organized a group of about 15 employees in his plant, saw that each had a One-Year New Testament, and he encouraged a ministry of reading the Word and coordinating prayer requests. The next year the group grew to about 30 people. Lately, his ministry has been more one-on-one.
“When we just stop and take the time to pray for someone,” John points out, “We see people open up and come to the Lord.”
He often ministers to people who are at difficult points in their lives. One co-worker, who was nearing divorce, asked for and regularly reads a folksy little online collection of John’s writings which he calls “Miller Moments.”
“This is the only church I’ll ever go to,” she told John one day. Later she sent an e-mail telling him she had accepted Christ as savior.
John has seen several deathbed conversions among his colleagues. One individual died of a severe leg infection and another of leukemia-each made a profession of faith before leaving this world for the next.
“God wants us to learn the hurts and needs and people’s stories,” John says. He’s learned that God makes available times and places for people to pray together if they wish to do so. John has contact with a number of his company’s vendors, and he works at building rapport with them. Last year he gave to these vendors copies of The Shack and Blue Like Jazz, books that would spur their thinking about spiritual things.
And finally, because he enjoys writing and telling stories of his family and heritage, John writes Miller Moments e-mails and will add to the list any Dalton employee who wishes to receive it-about 25 at present.
“Tell me what you think of this,” John often says, after handing a piece of his writing to a colleague. And another opportunity has been opened for a spiritual conversation.
John’s lifestyle is his answer to the “What in God’s Name Am I Doing at Dalton’s?” question. By loving people, being sensitive to their needs, living a consistently biblical lifestyle, and looking for openings to discuss spiritual issues, he continues to see God at work in his blue-collar workplace community.