christian business review: inaugural issue - july 2012

WORK/LIFE BALANCE

JULY 2012

ResilienceERNEST LIANG

Transferrable Skills fromBusiness to ChurchDRU STEVENSON

Life Balance in the Vortex of ChangeWALLACE HENLEY

Why Business Matters to God - In the BeginningJEFF VAN DUZER

Life Balance and God’s PrioritiesFRED CALDWELL

A SPECIAL INAUGURAL ISSUE

CHRISTIAN BUSINESS REVIEWA JOURNAL BY THE CENTER FOR CHRISTIANITY IN BUSINESS AT HOUSTON BAPTIST UNIVERSITY

July 2012 Christian Business Review 1

PUBLISHERS

Robert Sloan

Mohan Kuruvilla

CO-EDITORS

Ernest Liang

Leslie Haugen

CONTRIBUTING EDITORS

Richard Martinez

Wallace Henley

SUPPORT & DESIGN

Wes Gant

Justin Lacey

Alan W. Presley

Note to Readers:

The views ex-

pressed in ar-

ticles are the

authors’ and not

necessarily

those of the

Christian Busi-

ness Review,

Houston Baptist

University

(HBU), or HBU

School of Busi-

ness.

Issue 1

July 2012

A publication of the Center for Christianity in Business

School of Business, Houston Baptist University

The Christian Business Review, Issue 1. Copyright 2012 Houston Baptist University. All rights

reserved by original authors except as noted. Submissions to this journal are welcome. Email us

at [email protected]. To learn about the Center for Christianity in Business, visit www.hbu.edu/ccb.

IN THIS INAUGURAL ISSUE

2 Letter from the Editors

4 Living Cases

Life Balance and God’s Priorities One person’s spiritual journey of discovery about purpose in life Fred Caldwell

10 Feature Article

Work Life Balance – How Shall a Christian Professional then Live? Excerpts from a special panel discussion Mark Ammerman, Donna Draudt, Linda Headley, Bill Mearse, Gary Thomas, Brad Hays (moderator)

20 Book Excerpt

Why Business Matters to God – In the Beginning Does business have an intrinsic as well as instrumental purpose in God’s kingdom? Jeff Van Duzer

40 Life Balance in the Vortex of Change Knowing who we are as God’s image-bearers is essential to keeping life balance in an age of dizzying changes Wallace Henley

46 Transferrable Skills from Business to Church Professional skills offer opportunities for growth in the Christ-follower and his(her) church Dru Stevenson

52 Resilience Faith and biblical virtues anchor community and organiza-tional stability needed to weather life’s unexpected turbu-lences Ernest Liang

57 Guidelines for contributors

mailto:[email protected]


FROM THE EDITORS

elcome to the inaugural issue of the Christian Business Review (CBR), a publi-

cation of the Center for Christianity in Business (CCB) at Houston Baptist Uni-

versity‟s School of Business. Although the CCB is a young ministry (founded in

2009), it has a clear vision and big aspirations. Along with conferences and luncheon se-

minars, it tirelessly seeks opportunities to challenge, equip, and edify present and future

business leaders, as genuine Christ followers, to integrate biblical values into their pro-

fessional lives.

The CBR is an ambitious venture to promote this mission. The journal is concerned

with both academic and business communities and views them as complementary to

building a distinctively Christian worldview for business. Accordingly, each issue of the

CBR will, when possible, take up a timely and relevant issue of special practical interest to

the Christian business professional. Please see our website, www.hbu.edu/ccb, for more

information.

In this inaugural issue, we examine the important if controversial topic of work-life

balance. In the secular academic literature, there is already a very well developed body of

research, with early inquiries making their most important contributions by merely fo-

cusing on imbalance as a problem. It wasn‟t until it became costly from both individual

and organizational perspectives that a concerted, often corporate-sponsored, effort to un-

derstand the issue was undertaken. Prescriptive initiatives to help rebalance the employee‟s

workload, acknowledging needs for personal and family investments, included strategies

ranging from organizational policy patches, to redesigned jobs, sabbaticals, and creative

and quasi-clandestine negotiations between supervisor and subordinates.1 Both academi-

cally and in practice this remains a vitally important topic because of the premium on in-

tellectual capital relative to physical capital, and the well-established maxim that a happy

employee is a productive employee (a topic, perhaps, for another issue!).

But in the intellectual sphere touching the world of the Christian professional, the

issue of work-life balance is relatively barren. Seen in the light of eternity, this discussion

in fact is far more critical as it has the potential to reshape the way we think about the role

of work as God intends it. It has the potential to impact countless others as we interact with

them in the workplace, at church, in our community, and at home. It is with this under-

standing that we humbly invite our readers to enjoy, and critically review the messages of

the articles that follow, each one an attempt to flesh out what it is to be an authentic

Christian living and working in a secular, and increasingly secularized, world.

Our inaugural issue begins with a personal testimony from Fred Caldwell, an entre-

preneur in the commercial real estate industry, in which he draws the key insight that life

balance is fundamentally about proper priorities as defined by God Himself. Fred‟s con-

clusion is echoed by several of the business leaders who participated in a Work Life Bal-

ance panel convened by the Center in the Fall of 2011. Their immensely helpful insights

and testimonies are summarized in an anchor article in this first issue entitled “Work Life

Balance: How Shall the Christian Professional then Live?” We trust that you will find these

conversations greatly edifying in your spiritual journey.

In the main articles section, we begin with an excerpt from Jeff Van Duzer‟s recent

book, Why Business Matters to God (And What Still Needs to be Fixed)(InterVarsity, 2010).

In this beginning chapter of his work, Van Duzer develops an argument for business as a

noble calling with roots extending all the way back to God‟s creation mandate. His sound

argument and wise synopsis aptly provide a solid grounding for the purposes of this new

W

http://www.hbu.edu/ccb


FROM THE EDITORS

journal and indeed, of the CCB. In a timely article alerting believers to the relentless forces

of rapid changes in 21st century living, Wallace Henley advances the thesis that the modern

day challenges to work-life balance can be met by a return to “first principles” – a recog-

nition of our nature as God‟s image-bearers and time as His gift and means of developing

that image.

Dru Stevenson turns the conventional wisdom upside down in his article on trans-

ferrable skills, in which he argues that professional skills possessed by believers constitute

a treasure trove for church enterprises – a fact that seems to have been lost on church

leaders but not by Jesus Christ our Lord. His analysis offers a new dimension to our un-

derstanding of balances in the life of a Christian professional: secular skills and spiritual

growth can indeed go hand in hand. Finally, Ernest Liang borrows the concept of resilience,

which has gained currency in the social sciences in recent years, to demonstrate how and

why the biblical values Christ followers are imbued with are inherently important to indi-

vidual and enterprise stability in times of severe turbulences.

We close with an extended quote from William MacDonald, who eloquently captures

what is meant by the Lord‟s appearing (2 Timothy 4:8) and how that relates to our fulltime

occupations:

“If you knew Christ were coming in a week, how would you spend the intervening

days? Does it mean you would give up your job, go to a mountaintop and spend all

day reading the Bible and praying? Does it mean you would go into „fulltime

Christian work,‟ preaching and teaching day and night?

If we are really walking with the Lord today and living in the center of His will,

it would mean carrying on as usual. If however, we are living for self, then it would

require some revolutionary changes.

It is not enough to have kind thoughts about the Savior‟s return. The crown of

righteousness is reserved for those who love it enough to let the truth mold their

lives. It is not enough to hold the truth about His coming; the truth must hold us.”

(William MacDonald, One Day at a Time, Gospel Folio Press (2007): 277)

Our prayer is that the content of this journal would bring glory to God as it serves to

strengthen, edify, encourage and make you wise for the work to which you have been

called.

Ernest P. Liang, Ph.D

Leslie K. Haugen, Ph.D. Co-Editors

1 See for example, MacDermid, S.M., Lee, M.D., & Buck, M.L, “Alternative Work Arrangements among

Professionals and Managers: Rethinking Career Development and Success,” Journal of Management

Development 20(4) (2001): 305-317; Lee, M.D., Lirio, P., Karakas, F., MacDermid, S.M., Buck, M.L. and

Kossek, E.E., “Exploring Career and Personal Outcomes and the Meaning of Career Success among

Part-Time Professionals in Organizations,” in Research Companion to Work Hours and Work Addiction, ed.

R.J. Burke (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2006), 284-309; and Lirio, P., Lee, M.D., Williams, M.L.,

Haugen, L.K., and Kossek, E.E., “The Inclusion Challenge with Reduced-Load Professionals: The Role of the

Manager,” Human Resource Management, 47(3) (2008): 443-461.

CBR Living Cases


God’s Priorities and Life Balance

hat is my pur-

pose in life? This is a question pondered by perhaps

every man. Why am I on earth and what

am I here to accomplish? How do I bal-

ance my life so that I achieve the most

important goals? In answering these

questions, I have found that once we

discover our true purpose, the ability to

manage day-to-day life is much easier.

When I was four years old, my father

was called to enter full-time ministry,

following in the footsteps of his father

and grandfather. That calling took the

family to Del Rio, Texas where we lived

w

Living Cases Personal spiritual journeys of men and women in business

CBR Living Cases



Fred Caldwell

is founder and

CEO of

Caldwell

Cos., a Hou-

ston-based

commercial

and residential

real estate

development

and invest-

ment firm.

The compa-

ny’s vision, as

stated on its

website, is “to

honor God by

stewarding

resources,

cultivating

relationships

and creating

extraordinary

communities

that enrich

lives.”

until I graduated from high school. While

in high school, I participated in many

sports and at the end of high school, had

some desire to continue playing my fa-

vorite sport, football. Thanks to a family

friend, I was invited by the coaches at

Texas A&M University to join their

freshman class of football players as a

walk-on.

I will always remember my first day

on the TAMU campus. I made a com-

ment to my roommate, John, that I

wanted to work very hard during the

two-a-day practices so I could make the

first away game trip to

Kansas. He looked me

straight in the eye and

told me that few if any

walk-on players ever

made the travel team.

He went on to explain

that after several years

as a walk-on, he had

not even had the op-

portunity to suit up for

a game on Kyle Field.

John’s comment woke

something deep inside

me and a determina-

tion developed to

prove that I could

make the team.

But John was right

about the initial trip.

The walk-on journey

was challenging at

best. The walk-on

players wore green

jerseys while the

scholarship athletes

wore maroon jerseys.

The walk-on players

had their names taped

on their helmets, while

the scholarship ath-

letes needed no names

on their helmets as the coaches already

knew their names. The green jersey for

me became a measurement of self-worth

and fed a feeling that I would never be of

value unless I could become a scholar-

ship player.

My desire to succeed had never been

so intense at any prior point in my life. I

put every ounce of effort into becoming

an athlete that was worthy of a maroon

jersey. I grew to have a strong hatred for

the green jersey and the walk-on title. I

became very determined to fight my way

out of the walk-on status.

My football background is a precur-

sor to my discovering the purpose for my

life apart from a game and from how

others might decide to “clothe” me with

their uniforms. Unfortunately, upon en-

tering college my relationship with God

was not secure and my identity was

rooted not in His purpose for my life but

in my ability to perform and achieve.

During the first year of my college

experience, three primary focuses

evolved for me to the exclusion of all

others – weights, school and football. I

did these things not out of any real joy but

out of a deep need to prove to myself that

I was worth more than being a walk-on in

a green jersey with my name taped to a

helmet. My focus left little room for an-

ything or anyone else. Accordingly, I

essentially lived in a self-created cocoon

of work.

Throughout the first year of college, I

masked the pain of my identity being tied

to a green jersey by becoming a very in-

tense young man. I was developing the

attitude of a fighter and acquiring the

toughness necessary to win battles on the

practice field. I determined that the only

way to get out of the green jersey was to

defeat all scholarship athletes who stood

in my way. Thus, my own teammates

CBR Living Cases



became enemies by my narrow definition

of purpose.

In the second year, I was given the

opportunity to play special teams. I

played on Kyle Field, suited up in a game

jersey and was even listed in the program.

These things were a huge step forward in

my pursuit of the maroon jersey. I was

fulfilled in some ways by these small

steps. In the same year during Spring

practice, the head coach, Tom Wilson,

stopped practice one day and told me to

take off the green jersey and put on a

maroon jersey. The other players clapped

and showed great enthusiasm in what

would be one of the more memorable

events in my football experience. I so

enjoyed the moment but the desire to

press forward and achieve did not sub-

side.

After being given a scholarship that

Spring, I made it my goal to become a

starter on the team and once again my

focus increased, which led in turn to

longer workouts in the weight room and

on the field. I started my first game as a

junior and became a two-year starter in

my fourth and fifth years. That fifth year

as I carried a full load of graduate classes

while competing each day on the football

field was perhaps one of the most trying

times in my life.

Our new coach put the team through

grueling practice schedules in the Spring

and Fall. In every practice, we had nu-

merous fights and the game lost much of

its interest for me. During a game with

TCU, my left knee was planted to the turf

and my body pushed in the opposite di-

rection; most of the ligaments in my knee

were torn. As I lay injured on Kyle Field,

a strange relief flooded over me as I rea-

lized I would never play football again.

The battle of five years was over, and

with the end of that battle came great

relief. The hill I had been climbing sud-

denly vanished and I felt some temporary

relief from the pain inside me.

I graduated with my Masters in

Business Finance in 1983, married my

high school girlfriend, Susan, who had

stuck with me throughout college and

moved to Houston. Unlike my classmates

who mostly went to work for accounting

and banking firms, I elected to go to work

for my father-in-law’s home building

business. I became a construction super-

intendent and once again felt I was

wearing a green jersey as my peers

headed off in suits to downtown Houston

or Dallas. I was on construction sites in

boots and jeans, at that time feeling like I

was wasting time and my education; little

did I know then that God was preparing

me for a career in the development of

residential communities. After two years

and the market collapse in Houston, I

changed jobs and went to work for a

commercial developer and investor.

Simply outworking the competition

led to personal achievement but it did not

lead to any true satisfaction. In the mid

1980s, the growing insight that I was not

destined on earth to have the emptiness

left by hard work and success at sports or

business led me to make a decision to

turn to God. Because of my identity being

tied to a sport in college and in the first

few years of my business career, I had

made some poor decisions that had

damaged many relationships. Out of

these decisions came emptiness, regret

and the realization that there was some-

thing better.

Susan and I began attending a church

in northwest Houston and the pastor be-

friended me. His counsel coupled with

other things I was reading caused me one

day in the midst of a “green jersey” day to

simply tell God that I would submit to

Him and follow Jesus. From that point

forward, God began a healing process

CBR Living Cases



that has been ongoing now for over 25

years.

In 1990, I took a leap of faith and

started a real estate company, with the

goal of one day being in the development

and investment real estate business. For

the first five to six years of starting the

business, I was seldom home as I worked

almost every day. My focus was once

again on being “successful.” However,

this time around, God was in the equation

and although my work ethic was poin-

tedly focused on the business, I also be-

gan to have a growing hunger to better

know God. The guilt I felt for not being

home with my family grew stronger over

time and drove me to consider the whole

issue of balance and priority. I was in

need of healing and God was the solution.

The healing that had to occur started

with an understanding of my purpose in

life. My purpose had always been defined

by achieving goals. My life was built on a

platform of goals, each goal leading to

the next bigger goal; and when a person

does not truly know God, goals can be-

come one’s purpose, as was my expe-

rience. The only time I seemed to be sa-

tisfied was when I was distracted enough

by work to not address the emptiness that

existed inside.

In 1999, my oldest daughter and I

attended a ministry focused on par-

ent-teen relationships known as JH

Ranch. This experience was a critical

turning point in my relationship with God,

my family and my career.

I learned many important concepts,

including a better understanding of the

“Law of Diminishing Returns”: the more

I worked and consumed, the less I was

fulfilled. Diminishing returns is an eco-

nomic principle that, in essence, implies

that we are fulfilled less and less by in-

creasing quantities.

As an example, the first scoop of

Bluebell vanilla ice cream on a hot

summer afternoon is outstanding. The

second scoop is very good but not as

good as the first, and if you were to eat

CBR Living Cases



God's Priorities

"The key to a fulfilling life is not a desire to live in balance, but a

desire to live by God’s priorities"

four or five scoops, by the last scoop the

desire for ice cream would be highly di-

minished (and you would likely be feel-

ing a bit ill).

Such was my life of moving from one

goal to the next, hoping that the next,

bigger goal would satisfy. But the return

on each goal that is achieved loses most

of its value once it is achieved, thus the

need to move on to successively larger

goals.

The only case for which the Law of

Diminishing Returns does not apply is

the pursuit of God and His word. In this

case, and this case only, the more we

consume of Him who created us and His

word, the more we desire and thirst for

His presence in our lives.

In understanding the spiritual appli-

cation of the Law of Diminishing Returns,

I began to understand that the legacy I

leave in this world will largely be through

my family and other meaningful rela-

tionships rather than through my business.

I also began to better understand Jesus’

command to love God and people. By so

doing, we fulfill all the law and move

beyond mere religion.

Over the years as I have made the

Bible my friend and source of knowledge

of God’s purpose, I find the meaning of

each day to be much clearer. Through

study, the men and women depicted in

the Bible as examples of faith have be-

come models for my life. Common to all

of them is a calling that supersedes the

things of this world and a passion to first

and foremost glorify God. Looking at

Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, David,

the first disciples, Peter, Paul and others,

little is said of the work required for

sustenance, yet all worked in some

manner.

The remarkable part of their lives was

their pursuit of God and His calling, not

the pursuit of things of temporal value.

They demonstrated that the work of this

world serves as a platform for true pur-

pose to be developed. Jesus made it per-

fectly clear that His time on earth was

invested in glorifying the Father. As the

author and perfecter of our faith, Jesus’

actions make it clear that my actions, also,

should bring glory to God.

Paul and Peter, especially, give me

understanding that God desires our work

to be our platform rather than our purpose.

Both disciples make it clear to me that a

balanced life is not the goal. With much

being written and discussed about living

a balanced life, it seems apparent to me

that Jesus and His disciples did not make

“balance” the key, at least not in the way

we define the term.

We tend to use it in the sense of a

scale, with equal amounts of weight on

each side of the scale. The weight we

measure is time, and a well-rounded life

CBR Living Cases



balances time equally across the most

important things in life. For many, the

allocation of time is spread between

family, work, recreation and spiritual

matters.

If, for example, we are spending too

much time at work and not enough time

with the family, then we feel guilty and

determine to cut back time at work. The

problem, as I see it, is that our desire to

balance time evenly across the multiple

facets of our life is not necessarily in

keeping with biblical principles, nor is

this balancing act demonstrated by the

great men and women of faith.

The principle that removes the guilt

comes from the sixth chapter of Matthew,

where Jesus states plainly that the things

of this world will never satisfy, and that

worry and hoarding of material posses-

sions will lead to problems.

He makes it clear that we cannot

serve two masters, much less three or

four, as we will learn to hate the one and

love the other. The remedy is rather to

“seek first His kingdom and His righ-

teousness, and all these things will be

given to you as well. Therefore do not

worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will

worry about itself. Each day has enough

trouble of its own” (Matthew 6:33-34

(NIV)).

Thus, the key to life on this earth as

God intended is priority. We are to put

God’s kingdom and His call first in our

lives and then, in an amazing promise,

Jesus says we will receive the blessing of

life on earth as He intended.

The early disciples and all the great

men and woman of faith in Scripture did

not seek balance but sought God. They

did not seek fulfillment by making allo-

cations of time to family, faith and

physical needs but by making God their

priority and following Him. I believe that

the key to a fulfilling life is not a desire to

live in balance [as the world defines it]

but a desire to live by priority – God’s

priorities.

Living a life ordered by the Lord’s

priorities is challenging, to say the least.

The world dictates that balance is to be

pursued and that we can diminish the

guilt we feel from unbalanced lives by

simply reallocating time to those areas

we have been neglecting.

The real solution, I believe, lies in

making Christ the priority each day. As

He promises, by focusing on the eternal

priorities of God, our temporal priorities

will become aligned with the right prior-

ities. Seek God first and He will direct

your paths and your priorities and give

you full joy and contentment – the kind of

balance that God intends. He will clothe

you in the perfect jersey, one designed

especially for you.


CBR Feature Article

How Shall a

Christian

Professional then

Live?

*To offer business pro-

fessionals a first person

reflection on the issue of

work life balance by

Christian business lead-

ers, the Center for Chris-

tianity in Business at

Houston Baptist Univer-

sity convened a panel

discussion on Work Life Balance on September 30,

2011. Here are the high-lights.

*Excerpts from discussions of

leadership panel

T

H

E

P

A

N

E

L

Ammerman is

Managing Di-

rector of Scotia-

bank’s Hou-

ston-based

energy banking

operation, Head

of U.S. Energy,

and co-chair of

the global bank-

ing committee of

Scotia Capital.

During his

25-year career

with the bank, he

Mark Ammerman

has built the

energy practice

through acquisi-

tions and more

recently its ex-

pansion into

Latin America

and Europe.

Hays is an expe-

rienced Execu-

tive Coach and

the Houston area

chair of Con-

vene, a national

leadership train-

ing operation for

Christian CEOs

and business

owners. He has

over 35 years of

experience with

Honeywell and

Pennzoil as well

as CEO of two

technology

start-ups.

Work Life Balance

Draudt is Re-

gional President

of Woodforest

National Bank,

overseeing Hou-

ston area lending

operations and

the Treasury

management

sales team. She

has over 32 years

of commercial

banking expe-

rience and spe-

cializes in lend-

ing to

“non-profit or-

ganizations.”

especially

churches.

Headley is a

shareholder and

former managing

shareholder in

the Houston of-

fice of Littler

Mendelson, the

nation’s largest

specialized labor

and employment

law firm. A fre-

quent speaker on

employment law

issues, she has

been named a

Best Lawyer in

America by Em-

ployment Law

Management

from 2001-2012.

Mearse is Man-

aging Director of

Accenture’s

Houston office

and COO of the

firm’s Resources

Sector, a $5+

billion business

involving the oil

and gas, chemi-

cal, utilities,

metal, mining

and paper indus-

tries. He is re-

sponsible for the

growth and prof-

itability of the

Resources global

business and

participates on

several Accen-

ture management

committees. Donna Draudt

Brad Hays (Moderator)

Linda Headley

Bill Mearse

if God Designed

Marriage to

Make Us Holy

More Than to

Make Us Hap-

py?, Pure

Pleasure, Sa-

cred Pathways,

and the Gold

Medallion

award winner

Authentic Faith.

He serves on the

teaching team of

Second Baptist

Church, Hou-

ston, and is an

adjunct faculty

member at

Western Semi-

nary in Portland,

Oregon. His

books and min-

istry focus on

spiritual forma-

tion: how we

can integrate

Scripture,

church history,

and time-tested

Christian clas-

sics into our

modern expe-

rience of faith.

Gary Thomas

Thomas is an

internationally

acclaimed

speaker and au-

thor of over a

dozen books,

including Sacred

Marriage: What

CBR Articles


Work Life Balance Panel

Hays: Let’s begin by having the topic

framed. How should we understand the

whole issue of work-life balance?

Thomas: I want to give my life to a place

that cares if I am gone, where I am not

replaced with just another number but

where it matters if I go. When I look at

the Bible, I see it as being so honest about

the human condition. I used to think

Genesis 5 was one of the most boring

chapters in the Bible but now I believe it

may be one of the more profound. It has a

huge start – the world was being created.

God was sprinkling mountains, creating

time, forming the first man and woman.

Then there was the drama of Adam and

Eve being naked and unashamed, the

great temptation, the Fall and the ba-

nishment, and then a homicide!

But then you come to Chapter 5. It is

nothing but a long list of genealogies:

Seth lived to be 105, had his first kid,

then lived another 807 years and died at

912; then Enosh and Kenan came, etc. It

is just a long, dull list. Yet I think this is a

shockingly honest picture of the human

condition. We have kids. We live a cer-

tain amount of time. We die and get out

of the way.

We don’t know anything about these

biblical characters. All we know is they

lived, had kids, these were the kids’

names, and they died. When I realize that

I couldn’t name my great-great grandfa-

ther or great-great grandmother, just a

few generations removed, I realize how

silly to think that my great-great grand-

children could name me. In one sense, I

have to embrace my historical insigni-

ficance so as to live a life of eternal sig-

nificance and relational purpose because

my kids do know who I am. So then if the

Bible presents that reality, and history

presents that reality, how does it affect

our view of work today?

I believe we find our significance not

in trying to become significant in our day

and age but by becoming significant to

the family that we have been called to

live with and to raise, and as far as our

service to the Lord. If we look at our

work as an offering to God - providing

jobs, offering services, feeding families,

beginning with our own - it becomes an

eternally significant work. When we get

lost in trying to have a false historical

significance that would be swallowed up

more quickly than we can believe, I think

in many ways we would have a wasted

life because of that. So for me, work-life

balance is really found in trying to see

work as one of the primary forms of

worship and offering it up in that regard.

Hays: Let’s look at that significance from

the first blending of life and workplace.

As part of God’s original design for man,

what should our proper response be to

work? How did the Fall affect the attitude

toward work?

Headley: I have dealt a lot with work-life

balance issues from a secular vantage

point, but until now, I have not really

approached it from a Christian perspec-

tive. As I ponder this question, it is

helpful to ask, what kind of work did God

give Adam to do before the Fall? It seems

pretty clear and simple: God gave Adam

a job! He was to be the CEO of the Gar-

den of Eden, which he is supposed to tend

and keep.

So work did not come after the Fall.

Work is a God-given thing. Work is not a

bad thing. It is all about how it fits with

the perspective and priority under Chris-

tian principles, and how it is done so that

we make a difference, being a light in the

darkness and not just more of the dark-

ness in this world. Our work is part of

God’s plan. We shouldn’t shy away from

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work or be lazy about doing it, yet we

must do it to God’s glory. This is a prin-

ciple that has stayed with me all my life.

After the Fall, the curses towards

Adam (and of course towards women as

well since they are in the workplace as

much as men today, but even if they just

labor in the home) – the toiling among

thorns and thistles and laboring by the

sweat of the brow – are sobering in that

there is no let-up until we return to the

ground. It is not like we get to check out

at some point, taking a sabbatical or re-

tiring and everything is going to be roses.

God says we are to work all of our lives.

There is no stopping! Is it any different

than Adam tending the garden? Well,

there weren’t any weeds, no poison ivy,

in a garden where there was no sin!

As an employment lawyer, I think

about how thorns and thistles and the

sweat of the brow would translate into

what I do. You know, we advise clients

all day long and you hear about all these

employment problems. The problems of

the employees are like the poison ivy.

The sin in the workplace that bubbles up

into problems and materializes into law-

suits - those are the thorns and thistles.

Interaction in the workplace with a dif-

ficult boss or a troubling subordinate

employee – those are the poison ivy.

There is the toiling and the sweat of the

brow. There is no smooth sailing. They

all give us our challenges and opportuni-

ties to do all we can to God’s glory.

Hays: What are the different motivations

that drive us to work so much, creating

problems with life balance?

Mearse: Motive is very important. I

started working when I was a teenager. I

went to work for my dad’s company. He

was an executive in a small chain of de-

partment stores in West Texas. I like to

say I started at the top, literally on the

roof, cleaning air conditioning towers.

One thing I remember was that before I

started working, my dad sat down with

me and said, look, there are some things

you need to understand as you go to work,

mainly because of who you are and who I

am. He continued to say that, number one,

everybody is going to know who you are

– you are the boss’s kid and, number two,

they are going to watch everything you

do – to see if you do earn your keep or are

you pulling your weight because your

dad is the boss. There is one more thing,

he said: everything you do is going to

reflect on me.

I have now lived in Houston for al-

most 32 years and I have worked as long

for Accenture, which was Arthur An-

dersen when it first started. I grew up in

Abilene, Texas and attended Baylor, so

my life was not a very wild life, [not a]

fast paced life by any means. I came to

Houston in 1980, went to work for Arthur

Andersen, and attended Second Baptist

Church – all huge places to me but of

course, nothing compared to what they

are today.

Those first years were wild for me –

not from an earthly standpoint, but just

that I had never experienced change on

that kind of scale. I struggled and kept

running into people at work who said

they worked hard in order to make a lot of

money or to get ahead of the game. I was

a Christian. I attended church, and I knew

God was involved in work and all that. So

unlike those people, I sensed that the

self-worth, the power, the money, etc.,

could not be the reason why I was

working. Then three years later, I was

studying the book of Colossians and got

into Chapter 3, where it says work as if

you are working for the Lord. Boom! The

light came on. It reminded me of the

conversation I had ten years earlier with

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my dad. I discovered I was working for

my father again – it just wasn’t my

earthly father but my heavenly father –

and yes, all eyes were on me.

After that my whole perspective

changed. I came to Houston, eager to

move on within a few years, not sure for

what purpose I was in Houston and on the

payroll of Arthur Andersen. With the

new perspective I said, okay, God, I ac-

cept why I am here – I am here to do

whatever You want me to do. Then things

started happening.

My dad was diagnosed with cancer

and ended up spending a lot of time here

in Houston going through treatment. If I

had not been here, I don’t know what

would have happened to my parents. Not

much later I met my wife, got married,

and was about to settle down when Ar-

thur Andersen decided to send me to

Anchorage, Alaska. Even before I ques-

tioned why I was sent there, I was

teaching a fast growing Bible study class

in an otherwise struggling local church. I

came back to Houston and made partner

when Andersen asked me to go to Kuala

Lumpur, Malaysia for a few years. Now

that’s about where work-life balance

drew the line for me. After much prayer, I

left for KL and soon was teaching a big

Bible class in an international church

with people from all over the world.

What I have found from these expe-

riences is that we work to serve God. Our

work is not just a vocation but an op-

portunity to serve – to serve Him not just

at the workplace but, as my Alaska and

Malaysia experiences testify, in minis-

tries that God would open up for us out-

side of the workplace. God wants us to be

where we are to change lives and influ-

ence lives. Andersen and now Accenture

were, and are still, secular places, but I

would tell you that I have seen Christian

influence coming into our organization,

particularly here in Houston. It has not

been through overt evangelism...but ra-

ther through lifestyle witnessing and re-

lationships. At the end of the day, what

we have in this world is God and all those

who have been saved, and that to me

underscores what work is all about.

Surprisingly, when I discovered I was to

work to serve God and obey Him, I got

the promotions, the salary increases, the

self-worth, and all the other stuff people

told me they were striving for, as by-

products.

Hays: When the imbalance specifically

affects the family, how often do you take

family priorities and preferences into

your decisions about work, considering

the priorities of both your family and

your subordinates?

Ammerman: About five to six years ago,

I had my first conversation with our

then-new country head. He phoned,

complaining about the cost of flying into

Houston from New York, and said he was

going over the expenses [of my last Latin

American trip]. I said [the explanation for

the trip] was actually quite simple. I flew

down on Super Bowl Sunday so that I

could be there for a scheduled speech at a

conference on Monday morning and to

make some client visits during the week.

In the meantime, the CEO called and said

he was going to be there the week before

and asked me to go down and accompany

him on visits to oil and gas companies in

that country. So I was there the week

before and the week after, and it just so

happened there was an 8-year old girl

who had a birthday on Saturday morning,

so I went home between the two trips. I

waited for the response. There was si-

lence for a moment and he changed the

topic.

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That fellow I had this conversation

with is now my CEO. That was the first

opportunity I had in a very direct way to

share with him my work culture. It is a

very distinct culture about how I deal

with my family – I am always home for

important events, period. I set the stage

with the people with whom I work. I will

tell them to just take care of the business

at home and we will take care of the

business at work, whatever it takes. Now

you can do this in such a way that will

make people feel guilty as they walk out

the door and regret they ever asked. The

key is to make sure they won’t regret

asking and your motive is genuine.

When we first moved to Houston

years ago, my dad worked as the ABC

Evening News anchor. During weekdays

I didn’t get to see him much because he

would be at work when I got home from

school and I would be asleep when he

returned. I made a commitment when I

started my professional career to do dif-

ferently than that…My employees know

I don’t want to see any email stamps on

Sundays because I don’t want them to be

at work on Sundays. Yet our group is one

of the largest and most profitable in the

entire global bank. As we know from the

story of Chick-fil-A, it is just amazing

how God prospers these things even

when people are in their sleep. The

Psalmist says, “It is vain for you to rise up

early, to retire late, to eat the bread of

painful labors; for He gives to His be-

loved even in his sleep” (Psalm 127:3). It

is so true.

Hays: Does work-life balance create

happier and more productive employees?

Can workplace programs and policies be

effective in promoting and encouraging

life balance?

Draudt: Most definitely. More compa-

nies are starting to recognize that balance

in people’s lives, more flex hours or

four-day workweeks, would make better

employees. I read recently that those

companies that are going this direction

are getting the very best employees.

When I first started working back in

the 70s, women’s role was much differ-

ent than today. I worked on and off

throughout my early marriage when I

needed to stay home to raise my children.

I was out nearly 10 years before I came to

Houston and decided to take my career

seriously. I got back into banking and

started working for a very large financial

institution. They were very good to me,

but as I went up the career ladder, there

came a lot of demands.

The firm was very bottom line driven.

I have three children and they are the

most important things to me in this world,

so balancing work and my children’s

needs, being there at the ball games, re-

cital, etc., was of utmost priority for me.

Incorporating demanding work into my

family life became more and more diffi-

cult and dealing with it required in-

creased suppression of my feelings.

Then seven and a half years ago I got

a phone call from my former boss, a fine

Christian man whom I enjoyed working

with before. He asked me to consider

coming to work with him. Instinctively I

said no; I had over 19 years with my

employer, satisfied clients, and a won-

derful peer group. I had everything, so I

thought. It was my life, my safety net. I

was actually ranked in the top 10 percent

in the nation at my firm. Yet he persisted

and said, “I really want you to think about

it and this is what I want you to think

about: balance in your life because I

know you don’t have it.”

Leaving something that is comforta-

ble to you is very hard. When my advis-

CBR Articles



ers and trusted friends were no help, I

turned to God in prayer and asked Him to

please send me a sign and knock me over

the head with it. Soon afterwards, I at-

tended a funeral of a Christian friend, a

young mother with boys in high school.

As I sat there and watched those boys and

their father, it occurred to me that she had

all the dreams that I had - to see the kids

grow up, graduate from high school, go

to college, meet that special someone, get

married, be there for that first grandbaby,

and so on and so forth - but then how

quickly she was taken away from them! I

could not have asked for a clearer sign. I

made up my mind that day to make a

change in my life. It was all about bal-

ance in my life, something [my former

employer] could not give enough. I took a

leap of faith and went to my new em-

ployer. That was 7 years ago and I have

never looked back.

Not only have I found balance in the

life of my family – myself, husband,

children, grandchildren – but my career

has not faltered. Instead it has grown,

with nearly 90 percent of my clients

ending up following me. Even more sa-

tisfying is that I have developed a passion

to work with churches and non-profits,

which make up a good part of my port-

folio. I feel like I am doing God’s work

while doing my job. That big bonus that I

might have gotten from my former em-

ployer? I get a bigger one in more than

monetary terms and now realize I can be

successful without goals and lots of

pressure. I think working for the right

employer, taking that leap of faith, be-

lieving in God and that He’s got a plan

and a direction for you, opens all kinds of

doors.

Hays: What can we do to manage or

overcome the tendency or compulsion to

work too much so we can live a balanced

life? What are the biggest obstacles and

constraints to creating a balanced life

and what are the greatest facilitators?

Thomas: God often asks us to do the right

thing and lets us pay a price for it. God in

His sovereignty certainly has the right to

do that. So if we want to effect work-life

balance, sometimes we have to pay a

price for that – a missed promotion, an

income cut, a relocation to a different

community or employer, etc. When the

ideals of our family do not line up with

the ideals of the employer, our allegiance

is to the principles and teachings of

Scripture. The result may be earthly

prices we pay, the crosses we pick up

daily in our journey of obedience.

I had the opportunity of being asked

by one of the best-known churches in the

country to join their staff. I told the pastor

that I just told my children we wouldn’t

move again. From a vocational stand-

point, the offer was irresistible, yet I had

to say no to that amazing opportunity

because of my promise to the family. It

was just one of those (take-up-your-)

cross moments. Little did I know, of

course, that an even bigger church here in

Houston would make me the same offer

only a few years later. In hindsight, the

decision was a good one. So for those of

you who haven’t had understanding

bosses, I still think you are making the

right choice by not gauging your work

life on the basis of earthly influences,

finance or promotions, etc.

Turning to the second part of the

question, I am reminded of a family va-

cation we had in Hawaii. As we hiked up

to the top of a mountain, the guide

pointed to the plant next to us and said it

is the most dangerous plant in the island.

It had killed more people than any other

plant. Everybody took a step back when

we heard that, assuming the plant was

CBR Articles



poisonous. It turns out the plant is a fern

that only grows on a very steep incline. It

masks the fact that people close to the

plant are actually standing on the edge of

a precipice. People with a false sense of

security would step on the fern and fall

inevitably to their death.

Let me suggest that there are three

spiritual ferns when we look at work-life

balance. As a pastor, I would advise that

if you experience one of these it should

cause some concern. If you experience

two, you might as well be on the preci-

pice. If you experience all three, I would

suggest that you call a counselor or a

pastor before you head back to the office

just for self-preservation.

First, I find that people who are out of

balance tend to get very lonely. They lose

that relational identity. From a spiritual

perspective, Satan dines on lonely people

and spits them out. Loneliness denigrates

our ability to resist temptation. It is not a

sin to be lonely and it could happen to

anybody, but to allow ourselves to stay

that way is unwise. When we become

lonely, we become very vulnerable, and

most of us don’t manage loneliness very

well. So if you are consistently lonely, it

is a sign of being out of balance and it

should be taken seriously. Second is ti-

redness. When we are tired we succumb

to emotions like anger, treat others im-

properly, give less to our relationships,

and become more vulnerable to tempta-

tion. So a consistently tired body is

something to be concerned about. Last

but not least is a lack of joy. The mark of

a Christian is to have great joy with what

God has done for us. If everything ap-

pears like drudgery to us, then what kind

of gospel are we proclaiming? How can

we be bearers of good news when we live

with a sour face? The effectiveness of our

testimonies is compromised.

What I pointed out is nothing but

simple life management issues. Like spi-

ritual ferns, they are not necessarily poi-

sonous but they set us up for poisonous

acts, attitudes and desires. As such we

need to guard against them. After all, life

balance is not just about ourselves but our

families, too. If we go, our family goes

with it. The church will be affected and

so will be our fellow believers and their

witness in the business community.

Hays: What has been the result for people

who have been able to effect life balance?

What is the richest blessing you ever re-

ceived as a direct result of life balance?

What is the greatest price you ever paid?

Headley: All the research I have done on

Christianity and work-life balance con-

firms that the Bible does not address the

issue, at least not directly. Where the

rubber meets the road is this: God puts us

in this world to work and does not tell us

when to stop. Is that a bad thing? It can be

if we end up stepping on spiritual ferns

and fall over the cliff, as Gary pointed out.

1. Loneliness Spiritual ferns: 2. Tiredness

3. Lack of joy

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In passages that talk about working, God

gives us perspectives through nuggets

such as, masters, be kind to your servant,

or servants, give your master his due, or

fathers, don’t provoke your children to

anger, or wives, submit to your husband,

etc. These are principles that we can in-

tegrate and come up with a recipe for a

balanced life.

In our firm there are 840 lawyers in

50 offices all over the map and I have

been involved in a lot of leadership roles.

One of these roles I currently hold is

co-chair of women’s leadership initia-

tives with a subgroup called work/life

balance. I do think companies can have a

faith-based workplace without being a

Christian workplace, and ours, for ex-

ample, is an inclusive tent with adopted

policies on work-life balance that ac-

tually work.

A personal priority for me in the

leadership role of my company is to help

young women who came into the law

practice to avoid falling by the wayside

because of work-life balance issues.

These young women went through law

school and excelled. They might not be

married when they started with the firm.

The pressure was high, the time-off was

little. They got married, and they had

children. I have watched it happen too

many times when these young women

had no choice but to leave the profession

under the circumstances. In the early

days of my practice of law, there were no

alternative ways, such as some kind of a

flex schedule, to accommodate the needs

of these young mothers. But it does [ac-

commodate them] today. It is something I

have felt very keen about as I managed

the office.

So what is the richest blessing? A

dear friend who had left the firm earlier

this year sent me [a] personal note [ex-

pressing deep gratitude for my support of

her and her family]. What other blessings

do I need when such words and feelings

weigh far more than the money I have

made or the honor or prestige I ever re-

ceived?

I believe in my earlier years I did pay

a price monetarily and in terms of career

advancement. Law firms gauge you on

productivity, which is that all-important

billable-hour. Every law firm I have been

with, there is a threshold minimum. My

view was that what I owed my master

was that minimum. I didn’t owe one hour

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Ammerman

“The way we conduct ourselves tells people we are Christ followers…people know what we stand for even before

they meet us in person.”

Draudt

“I think working for the right employer, taking that leap of faith, believing in God and that He’s got a plan and a direction

for you, opens all kinds of doors.”

Headley

“My view was that what I owed my master was that (required) minimum. I

didn’t owe one hour more.”

Mearse

“God wants us to be where we are to change lives and influence lives.”

Thomas

“As Christians, how we finish is just as important as how we start. If we don’t

finish well, we sort of undercut our whole life of work as a witness for Christ.”

CBR Articles



more. If I got a performance bonus be-

cause of billable hours, then I felt I had

taken it away from my family. So I tried

to hit it and never tried to exceed it. My

employer can always expect me to do a

really good job meeting the minimum,

but I was not going to take away from my

children any more than I already did by

being here.

Hays: What has to happen in order for

work to become a daily act of worship? Is

it even possible? What poses the greatest

threat to victorious living day by day,

year after year?

Draudt: I believe it is important to sur-

round yourself with people who have like

values and morals. All my customers are

special to me but there are some who are

more relatable. I tend to associate myself

with Christian leaders in the community.

They are someone you can pick up the

phone and call, share your thoughts,

bounce ideas off and get good feedback.

To have an active act of worship, you

need to share things that are important to

you with people who are like you, har-

boring strong Christian values.

Ammerman: At church, we have visita-

tion nights when we go visit newcomers

to tell them about the church and get to

know them. I woke up one day and rea-

lized that is what I do as a banker, too.

We visit clients, cold call prospects, tell

them about our business, and get to know

them. In I Timothy 4:12, Paul tells us to

show ourselves an example of those who

believe. Just last week, I was in Europe

visiting clients, [and I had prayed] to find

a way to bridge gaps and build a rela-

tionship so that I could be an example

where not many are followers of Christ.

The way we conduct ourselves tells

people we are Christ-followers, and

people often know us (and what we stand

for) even before they have a chance to

meet us in person. I have strong rela-

tionships with fellow believers who

represent some of the very best clients I

have in this town. There are a lot of big-

ger banks than ours around the world.

How we get these clients into our portfo-

lio often has a lot to do with the glue that

holds our relationships, and more often

than not, it is the witness and the faith

they find in me. Trust is built on our

witness and God rewards that.

Mearse: I have found several truths about

work-life balance. First, work-life bal-

ance differs from person to person. I used

to work with a fellow who had very dif-

ferent work habits than I did, and only

much later did I realize we had different

life balances. We have to manage our

expectations and should avoid comparing

ours against others’.

Second, work-life balance changes

over time. Had you told me after joining

the firm that I had to relocate to An-

chorage or Kuala Lumpur, I would have

quit on the spot. Yet the assignments,

when they came, turned out to be bless-

ings.

Third, there will be times when there

won’t be any balance. I always say at

college recruiting events that we some-

times work under a term paper syndrome.

You’ve got to work a little harder and

later to get the paper done on the night

before it is due. In the business world,

that may not be the night before, but two

or three months before. So there will be

times when your life is out of balance.

The last truth I want to mention is that

you have to manage your own expecta-

tions as well as those of whom you are

working for. But also let them know what

true balance means to you. I remember

there was a time when I was working

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seven days a week while shuttling back

and forth between Florida and Houston.

It was about the time I was up for review

for partner, when I told my boss that if I

had to be working seven days a week

consistently I wouldn’t be here very long.

I had other commitments than just work.

We need to know and set our boundaries

and make them known to those we work

with.

Thomas: An out-of-balance work life is

sort of like smoking. You can get away

with an occasional cigar or a few ciga-

rettes, but eventually, if you get heavily

into it, you get hurt. You can cope with an

out-of-balance marriage for a while, but

if you stop working on your marriage,

you will end up spending a lot of time

working on your divorce. The same goes

for your children. If you don’t spend

the time raising them, eventually you

may spend a lot of time dealing with cops,

courts, and substance abuse counselors. I

am not saying it will happen, but it is

definitely more likely you would have to

deal with the fallout.

It is the same health-wise. If we keep

sacrificing our physical health by not

eating, exercising, or sleeping, our body

can handle that for a while. Yet our life

can be brought to a sudden stop when we

come down with any number of ailments

resulting from a life that has long been

out of balance. So just because the con-

sequences are not immediate does not

mean we should be blind to the effects of

imbalance. As Christians, how we finish

is just as important as how we start. If we

don’t finish well, we sort of undercut our

whole life of work as a witness for Christ.

CBR Articles


Why Business Matters to God

*Taken from Why Business Matters to God

(And What Still Needs to Be Fixed) by Jeff Van

Duzer, Chapter One: In the Beginning.

Copyright(c) 2010 by Jeff Van Duzer. Used by

permission of InterVarsity Press, P.O. Box

1400, Downers Grove, IL 60515.

www.ivpress.com.

A Note from the Editors:

As the Editorial Board of the Chris-

tian Business Review, we look for-

ward to building a great body of

scholarship, literature, and conversa-

tions about doing real business in the

real world, especially as we consider

our mutual challenges in the light of

the Christian scriptures and through

the experience of the Christian life.

In this inaugural issue, we are blessed

to be able to include the introductory

chapter of Jeff Van Duzer's book,

Why Business Matters to God. After

all, that is what we are all working to

understand, and to the extent that we

believe that business does matter to

God, then we are working together to

encourage and help one another to act

as if this is so. We appreciate Inter-

Varsity Press and Jeff Van Duzer for

giving us permission to reprint this

material, and we hope that it will be a

conversation starter for all of us.

Jeff Van Duzer is Dean

of the School of Business

and Economics and pro-

fessor of business law

and ethics at Seattle Pa-

cific University. For twenty years prior to

that, he practiced law in Seattle with an

emphasis on finance and natural resources.

He writes and speaks frequently in both

church and professional settings. He re-

ceived his J.D. from Yale University

School of Law.

http://www.ivpress.com/

CBR Articles



onsider an unfinished parable:

Three students make appointments

to ask a pastor for career advice.

The first student explains that she is

considering going to law school and asks

the pastor why God might want a Chris-

tian to be a lawyer. After thinking about

her question for a moment, the pastor

answers that Christians in law make

sense because God cares about justice.

By becoming a lawyer she can help ad-

vance God‘s desire for a just society. The

second student explains that he is consi-

dering a career in medicine and asks why

God might want Christians to serve as

doctors or nurses. ―That‘s simple,‖ the

pastor replies, ―God cares about whole-

ness, and by pursuing a career in the

medical field you can play a key part in

God‘s healing work in the world.‖ The

last student arrives for her appointment

and says she is considering a career in

business. She asks the pastor why God

might want her to pursue such a career.

At this point, however, the parable

remains unfinished. How should the

pastor respond? If law furthers God‘s

interest in justice and medicine furthers

God‘s interest in healing, what aspect of

God‘s work will a business career further?

Or, put differently, from God‘s perspec-

tive what is the purpose of business?

God’s Purpose for Business

Answering this question is not as simple

as it may seem at first. Indeed, on closer

examination, this one question raises

three other preliminary questions.

First, does it even make sense to talk

about God having a purpose for business?

Or does God only have a purpose for

people in business? Stated more gener-

ally, does God have purposes for institu-

tions? Or is it better to understand insti-

tutions (such as corporations, economic

systems, governments) as merely artifi-

cial human constructs that are in and of

themselves inherently neutral—they can

further or thwart God‘s desires depending

on the intentions and actions of the hu-

man beings within them, but as separate

things they are of no account.

Second, setting aside for the moment

the question of institutions, what do we

mean when we ask about God‘s purpose

for people in business?1 The Westminster

Shorter Catechism (1674) begins this

way:

Question 1. What is the chief end of

man?

Answer. Man‘s chief end is to glo-

rify God and to enjoy him forever.

Is this all that we can say about God‘s

purpose for people active in business?

Does God simply have a general purpose

for men and women—to glorify and en-

joy God—that they are to faithfully pur-

sue across all of their activities? Or can

we say something more? Are there any

unique purposes that God would like to

see accomplished through business ac-

tivities?

And finally, assuming that God has

unique purposes for people in business,

are these purposes intrinsic to the actual

business activity or only instrumental?

For example, businesses can make

money for their owners, who in turn can

use that money to support mission activ-

ities. In this sense businesses could be

said to serve God‘s purposes instrumen-

tally. They generate the funds necessary

to sponsor God‘s desired activity.

Businesses can also serve as a plat-

form from which Christians can share

their faith with others. Here too is a use

for business. Instrumentally, it creates a

forum for the sharing of the gospel. But

still, this is not intrinsic to business itself.

Christians are called on to ―be prepared

to give an answer to everyone who asks‖

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Does business have an intrinsic as well as instrumental purpose in God’s kingdom?

about their faith regardless of the setting

(1 Peter 3:15). In the supermarket, on the

sidelines of soccer fields, in PTSA

meetings as well as in work settings,

Christians are invited to share the good

news sensitively with all who might be

interested in hearing. This fact, however,

does not tell us much about how God

intends to use the practice of business

itself.

Specifically, can we say that busi-

ness activities—analyzing balance sheets,

manufacturing products, marketing

goods, providing performance re-

views—in and of themselves further

God‘s kingdom?2 Does business have an

intrinsic as well as instrumental purpose?

The Search for Purpose

Searching for biblically based answers to

these questions is not easy. In a narrow

verse-by-verse sense there is not much to

work with. One can find a handful of

ethical admonitions such as the Old

Testament‘s prescription against using

faulty scales to apportion out purchased

grain (Proverbs 11:1) or the New Testa-

ment‘s admonitions to pay a worker his

or her just due (Luke 10:7). Unfortu-

nately, even in the aggregate these prove

to be fairly thin threads from which to

weave a whole theology. While there is

certainly a great deal of teaching in

Scripture on economics and a regular call

to fair dealing, there is very little written

directly about the purpose of business

activities, the appropriate limits of busi-

ness and its role, if any, in God‘s work in

the world.

Consequently, rather than seeking to

construct a theology of business from a

handful of specific verses, I have found it

more useful to build on what has some-

times been called the ―grand narrative.‖

All of Scripture (through many writings

and in many genres) tells one basic sto-

ry—one basic story in four great move-

ments.

In the beginning God created a

world and placed human beings at its

center (creation). It was God‘s intent to

enjoy creation and live in a loving inti-

macy with humankind forever. This ini-

tial intent, however, was thwarted by

human disobedience (the Fall). All the

rest of the story is about reconciliation.

God seeks to reestablish the love rela-

tionship that was intended from the be-

ginning (redemption). These efforts cli-

max with God‘s arrival in the person of

Jesus Christ, who breaks down the wall

of separation through his death and re-

surrection and inaugurates the new crea-

tion. The full implications of this victory

are revealed in the last Chapters of the

story, the final conclusion (consumma-

tion).

The choice of a narrative hermeneu-

tic and the identification of these four

great movements of Scripture is certainly

not the only option. Theology can be

shaped in a number of crucibles. For

example, many theologians work in

fields of moral, historical or practical

theologies. Even for those committed to a

biblical theology, there can be many

different organizing principles. And to

make matters more complicated, even

among those adopting a narrative ap-

proach to their biblical theologies, there

are differences over how to divide the

Scriptures into separate movements.3

My choice of narrative is partially

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What did God have in mind at the very be-ginning?

tactical, as ―story‖ seems to be one of the

most effective means of communicating

truth in our current cultural environment.

Hopefully it is also an ecumenical ap-

proach. While the creation – fall – re-

demption – consummation framework is

often associated with the Reformed tra-

dition, as a basic outline of the biblical

story it can be adopted by a wide variety

of Christian faith traditions. Indeed down

through the history of the church this has

been a standard way to describe the

Christian journey. The emphasis placed

on each movement may differ slightly

from tradition to tradition (and the im-

plications that follow from these differing

emphases may be nontrivial), but still as a

basic outline of the overall biblical narr-

ative, this approach should allow for

different traditions to find common

ground.4

In the context of this grand narrative,

then, it makes sense to begin our search

for purpose with a consideration of the

creation movement. After all, the creation

account describes the world as God

originally intended it to be. While the Fall

interfered with this plan (and will need to

be considered separately), it is still useful

to start by considering what God had in

mind at the very beginning.

The Brevity of the Creation Account

When we think of the Scripture story as

comprising four grand movements, it is

remarkable that the description of the

first two of the four movements is com-

pleted by the end of the third Chapter of

the first book. Creation is described in

Genesis 1–2.5 The Fall is described in

Genesis 3. Everything else in Scrip-

ture—the remainder of Genesis, the re-

maining thirty-eight books in the Old

Testament and all of the New Testa-

ment—is given over to the great third

movement of redemption and the fourth

movement of consummation.

For our purposes the very brevity of

the creation account should serve as an

important reminder. First, it reminds us

that God is most fully known in redemp-

tive activity. In some ways, virtually the

entire Bible tells the story of God‘s ef-

forts to restore the relationships that God

desired from the beginning. It is a story of

love—a love that is expressed in a con-

stant reaching out, a grace that seeks

communion with a rebellious people,

consistently offering them that which

they do not deserve. A theology of busi-

ness must be set, first and foremost, in the

context of God‘s desire to restore this

loving relationship.

Second, as we turn to the ―creation

movement‖ itself, the sheer brevity of

this section of Scripture must give us

pause as we seek to draw conclusions

about God‘s original plan. Here we find

only the slightest of hints, almost im-

perceptible nods toward various aspects

of divine truth. On the one hand, this

brevity invites us to speculate from the

tiniest of clues. On the other hand, it re-

minds us that for the most part we are

speculating. The terse account reinforces

our need for humility, reminding us that

we must wrap our conclusions in a cloak

of tentativeness. Much of the meaning of

the creation story will necessarily remain

shrouded in mystery.

Observations from Creation

With these cautions in mind, then, let us

consider what observations we might

make from the account of creation.

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1. The material world matters to

God. The observation that the material

world matters to God is so obvious that it

would be easy to overlook. Throughout

the Genesis account of creation God

makes material things, and each is de-

clared good. Clearly, the material world

matters to God. When God conceives of

human flourishing, it involves, in part,

the satisfaction of the material needs and

desires of men and women.6 Food that

nourishes, roofs that hold out the rain,

shade that protects from the heat of the

sun—these are all part of God‘s good

design. When businesses produce ma-

terial things that enhance the welfare of

the community, they are engaged in work

that matters to God.

2. Human beings are called to

steward God’s creation. The Genesis

account reminds us that the world was

made by God and remains God‘s creation.

God made the heavens and the earth. God

turned on the lights. God parted the wa-

ters to bring forth the sky as well as dry

land. God made plants and wildlife, and

for a finale, made human beings.

Nowhere in the account is there any

suggestion, however, that title to creation

was somehow then transferred to Adam

and Eve. The only things given to them

outright were ―seed-bearing plants‖ and

―fruits with seeds,‖ and these were only

made available to them as food (Genesis

1:29). By the double reference to ―seeds,‖

the account suggests that even in this

provision for them, God did not intend to

relinquish the ongoing productive capac-

ity of God‘s creation to human beings.

They could eat the fruit, and the plants

would continue to grow more fruit. In

effect, Adam and Eve were invited to

enjoy the income from God‘s trust

without invading the principal. God re-

mained the owner. As the psalmist re-

minds us:

The earth is the Lord‘s, and every-

thing in it, the world, and all who live

in it; for he founded it upon the seas

and established it upon the waters.

(Psalm 24:1-2 (NIV))

This is not to say, however, that Adam

and Eve were mere passive beneficiaries

of God‘s largesse. They were given a role

to play. In a short-hand way we can

identify this role as one of ―stewards‖ or

in more modern parlance ―trustees.‖ A

steward (or trustee) is ―a person who

manages another‘s property or financial

affairs; one who administers anything as

the agent of another.‖7 Human beings

were called to steward God‘s creation on

God‘s behalf. ―The Lord God took the

man and put him in the Garden of Eden to

work it and take care of it‖ (Genesis

2:15).

For Christians in business, ac-

knowledging their role as stewards is an

important first step toward understanding

God‘s intentions for business. Implicit in

this acknowledgment is the conviction

that the business does not belong to them

or to any other earthly owners. It belongs

to God. This sets the frame through

which any consideration of shareholder

or stakeholder rights must be viewed.

Of course, this is not the end of the

inquiry. It is not enough just to conclude

that we act as stewards of God‘s creation.

This conclusion invites the next question:

if we are to manage creation for God‘s

purposes, what end should we be pur-

suing? What does the owner want us to

do with the ―trust corpus‖?

Consider, by analogy, a family trust

established today. In law, the trustee who

agrees to administer the trust for the

family is bound to follow the instructions

of the one who formed and funded the

trust, the trust‘s ―settlor.‖ These instruc-

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tions are usually set forth in a trust

agreement. To the extent that the agree-

ment is silent on certain points, the law

will fill in the gaps by implying certain

duties for the trustee. For example, by

law a trustee owes the trust his or her

undivided loyalty. All self-dealing with

trust assets is strictly prohibited. The

trustee may not favor one class of bene-

ficiaries over another and must diversify

the portfolio to avoid unreasonable risk

and so on. Moreover, subject to all of

these constraints, the trustee‘s charge is

clear: he or she is to maximize the return

on trust assets for the benefit of the trust

beneficiaries.

By analogy, then, for Christians it is

not enough just to declare that we act as

God‘s stewards. It is an important first

step but not the end of the discussion. As

stewards/trustees we need to know what

our goal in managing the ―trust corpus‖ is

and what constraints we need to abide by

along the way. More specifically, as

stewards of God‘s businesses, we need to

know what our goal (or purpose) is when

managing the business and what limita-

tions we need to observe to manage the

business in accordance with God‘s de-

sires.8

3. Human beings are made in the

image of God. On three separate occa-

sions we are told that human beings are

made in the image of God.

Then God said, ―Let us make man

in our image, in our likeness.‖ . . .

So God created man in his own

image, in the image of God he

created him; male and female he

created them. (Genesis 1:26-27)

What does this mean? In what sense are

human beings stamped with God‘s im-

age?

This is a difficult question to answer

and Scripture gives few clues. Theolo-

gians have debated the issue at length.

The notion that we have been created in

God‘s image is not confined to the Ge-

nesis account but is repeated on a number

of occasions throughout the Scriptures.

Evidently it involves a close parallel

between the original and the image; on

two occasions—2 Corinthians 4:4; Co-

lossians 1:15—Christ is said to be the

―image‖ of God the Father. It suggests

that the image-bearer plays a role in re-

vealing the essence of the Other.

At a minimum, however, we should

find in the Genesis use of ―image‖ an

intent to reflect those characteristics of

God that have already been described in

the Genesis account. Specifically, two

such characteristics are important for our

purpose. First, God has been described as

inherently relational (―Let us make man

in our image, in our likeness‖ [Genesis

1:26]). Second, God has been described

as a worker. God makes things.

Relationship. The God in whose

image Adam and Eve were created is the

trinitarian God—Father, Son and Holy

Spirit—a God inherently relational from

before the beginning of time. The plural

pronouns in Genesis 1:26 remind us that

before God did anything, God in three

persons was. All of the mighty acts of

creation flowed out of that relationship.

Indeed, because the work of creation was

itself an overflowing of the love nature of

the Godhead, it was a tangible expression

of this relational character. The work

gave expression to the relationship.

Moreover, since creation was designed to

return glory to God, the work of creation

not only came out of relationship but was

intended to return for the benefit of the

Trinity.

As people made in God‘s image we

are reminded that human beings are also

inherently relational. We are only fully

complete in community. As God re-

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marked about Adam: ―It is not good for

the man to be alone‖ (Genesis 2:18). The

nurturing and building of community is,

therefore, one of the fundamental tasks to

be pursued by those seeking to be ge-

nuinely human. To be true to the Genesis

account, any theology of business must

be relational and communitarian in cha-

racter. Relationships in community must

precede labor and productivity. Business

must flow from relationship and be

shaped so as to flow back to support the

community.

Work. The God in whose image

Adam and Eve were created was also a

worker.

By the seventh day God had fi-

nished the work he had been doing;

so on the seventh day he rested

from all his work. And God

blessed the seventh day and made

it holy, because on it he rested

from all the work of creating that

he had done. (Genesis 2:2-3, em-

phasis added)

Men and women, then, were made in part

to work, and by so doing to reflect this

aspect of God‘s glory.

Christians often incorrectly perceive

work as having been assigned to human

beings as punishment for Adam and

Eve‘s disobedience in the Garden of

Eden. Nothing could be further from the

truth. The call and the opportunity to

work were embedded into the very fabric

of human beings as they were first de-

signed by God. Adam and Eve were as-

signed work in the Garden from the be-

ginning.

And it was not just any work. Since

Adam and Eve were created in the image

of God, they were made with an inherent

capacity for and need to be engaged in

creative activity. Of course, their creative

activities differed from God‘s in that only

God creates out of nothing (ex nihilo).9

Human creativity is always derivative,

always derived from the work of the

Creator. But still, to reflect God‘s image

is to create, to innovate—to bring new

things and new ways of doing things into

being.

In business terms God made the ini-

tial capital investment. He richly en-

dowed the earth with resources. Adam

and Eve were the initial managers called

to creatively organize (name the animals)

and manage these resources (take domi-

nion), to enhance the productivity of the

Garden (be fruitful and multiply) in a

sustainable (guard creation) manner.

Creativity is not just a gift given to some

artists or design engineers. It is inherent

in the very meaning of being human.

In addition, if the work that Chris-

tians do is to reflect the work of God, it

must also be meaningful work. After

each act of creation, God examined the

creative handiwork and pronounced it

―good‖ (Genesis 1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25)

and after the creation of human beings,

―very good‖ (v. 31). For our work to

mirror God‘s it too must aim for out-

comes that are good. Good work has

substance and meaning.

When humans engage in creative,

meaningful work that grows out of rela-

tionships and gives back to the commu-

nity they become more deeply human. Of

course, work became more difficult as a

consequence of the Fall (―Cursed is the

ground because of you; . . . it will produce

thorns and thistles for you‖ [Genesis

3:17-18]). But the pre-Fall picture is of

human beings gardening and farming on

land that readily yielded its produce

without demanding payment in sweat and

toil. Indeed, pre-Fall work was inherently

pleasurable.

One last thought about being made

―in the image of God.‖ While there is a

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sacred quality to all creation—it was all

made by God and God pronounced all of

it ―good‖—human beings were given a

unique status and dignity. They alone of

all the creatures were made ―in the image

of God‖ (Genesis 1:27). Down through

history the church has consistently taught

that the dignity of men and women must

be particularly respected in light of their

unique place in the created order.

4. Humans are made to live within

limits. A fourth observation follows from

the third. While human beings were made

in the image of God, men and women

were clearly not made to be gods. No-

where in the creation narrative are Adam

and Eve offered the opportunity to be-

come God, nor are they assured that as

originally created, they are already gods.

In fact, the narrative takes pains to

communicate just the opposite. God

preexists. It is God who speaks the world

into being, setting its boundaries and de-

fining its essence. God is beyond bound-

aries. God is unlimited.

By contrast, God places a limit at the

very center of human existence.

In the middle of the garden were

the tree of life and the tree of the

knowledge of good and evil. . . .

And the Lord God commanded the

man, ―You are free to eat from any

tree in the garden; but you must

not eat from the tree of the know-

ledge of good and evil, for when

you eat of it you will surely die.‖

(Genesis 2:9, 16-17)

Thus, to be fully human is to be inhe-

rently limited.

The serpent understood this. When

the serpent tempted Eve to eat from the

forbidden tree, he assured her that by so

doing she could be ―like God‖ (Genesis

3:5). The fundamental temptation that

Adam and Eve succumbed to was the

temptation to deny their limited nature in

an effort to be, for themselves, gods.10

5. God delights in variety. A fifth

observation that we can take from the

Genesis account is that diversity appears

to be built into the very fabric of God‘s

design. Even before God created human

beings, God created a wide array of other

creatures. Elsewhere in Scripture we are

reminded that God enjoys the breadth of

creation in all of its variety. It is enjoyed

for its own sake and not simply for any

utilitarian value that it serves.11

When God perceived that Adam was

inappropriately ―alone,‖ God did not

make a second Adam. Rather, God made

an Eve. Eve was different—a difference

that complemented and made whole

Adam, who was in himself incomplete.

God‘s love for diversity is reflected

throughout the Scriptures. One of the

more confusing passages in the Old

Testament relates to an early effort by

humanity to build a tower in the city of

Babel (Genesis 11:1- 9). What marked

these efforts was that all those engaged in

the building spoke with one language and

appeared to be motivated by a single

purpose. In this primordial story, God

intervenes in judgment, scattering the

peoples and giving them a multitude of

languages, which precludes them from

communicating with one another.

It is often noted that Pentecost was a

reversal of God‘s judgment at Babel, but

this is only partially true. It is true in that

through the out-pouring of the Spirit,

unity was once again made possible for

God‘s people. Everyone was able to un-

derstand each other and communicate

across cultural barriers (―each one heard

them speaking in his own language‖

[Acts 2:6]). It was not a reversal of Babel,

however, in the sense that it returned

everyone to a single language. Rather, it

appears that in God‘s intended design

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there will always be a multitude of

peoples speaking a multitude of lan-

guages. Even at the end of times we are

told that kings and nations from around

the world, consisting of different peoples

and different cultures, will come to

worship God (Revelation 21:24). God

delights in the diversity of the created

order.

6. The Garden was incomplete. Fi-

nally, in the first two Chapters of Genesis

humankind is assigned certain tasks.

Specifically Adam and Eve were to

―subdue‖ and ―rule‖ over the created

order (Genesis 1:28). They were to ―be

fruitful.‖ In this way they were to ―fill the

earth‖ (Genesis 1:28). They were given

an opportunity to name the animals, to

classify and bring order to creation (Ge-

nesis 2:19-20). They were called to ―take

care of‖ the earth and thereby protect

God‘s created order (Genesis 2:15).

These tasks were given by God to hu-

manity as a blessing. Performance of the

tasks allowed men and women to express

aspects of their very identities and to de-

light in the work itself. But the perfor-

mance of these tasks also served another

purpose.

The Garden of Eden before the Fall

is correctly described as an expression of

God‘s perfect will. Here the goodness of

the original creation prevailed. This

goodness was expressed in a flourishing

and harmonious peace. It would be in-

correct to say, however, that the Garden

of Eden as initially created by God was

complete—that had Adam and Eve only

avoided the forbidden fruit, humankind

would have lived to the end of time in this

unchanging idyllic garden setting.

In Genesis we are told that after

creating the necessary raw materials God

still did not cause the fields to flourish

because no humans were yet available to

work the fields.

When the Lord God made the

earth and the heavens—and no

shrub of the field had yet appeared

on the earth and no plant of the

field had yet sprung up, for the

Lord God had not sent rain on the

earth and there was no man to

work the ground. (Genesis 2:4-5,

emphasis added)

The Garden was created as a per-

fectly balanced and resourced starting

point. As originally designed, however,

the Garden of Eden was not God‘s in-

tended endpoint. God anticipated moving

on from the perfection of the Garden,

relying, at least in part, on the activity of

the men and women who God had placed

in the Garden. They would till the fields.

They would gather the fruit. They would

understand, organize and classify aspects

of the created order. They would create

new things. They would be fruitful. As a

people they would fill the earth and work

the created order to ensure that it was

fruitful in a like manner. In other words,

God anticipated partnering with human

beings to cause the Garden of Eden to

flourish.

Of course, God could have chosen to

provide for the world supernaturally.

Every morning, for example, God could

have dropped manna flakes from heaven,

and our responsibility would have been

limited to running around with our

mouths open and our tongues out. But for

most of history God did not do this. Ra-

ther, human beings were created with a

capacity to pool their resources (what we

now call ―capital‖), to design and build

an oven (technological innovation), to

order and receive shipments of flour

(supply chain), to bake bread (operations),

to put it on trucks (logistics) and to de-

liver it to a hungry world. As Martin

Luther once said, as we do the work to

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God intended that men and women would

take the raw materials that had been pro-

vided and, in partnership with God, help to

grow and construct the kingdom here on

earth.

which we have been called we become

the hands of God.12

We actually take the

bread that God intended to provide for a

hungry world and make delivery on

God‘s behalf.13

This work has intrinsic

and not just instrumental value in the

kingdom of God.

In God‘s economy, to say that

something is perfect is not to suggest that

it is done. The Garden was perfect, but it

was not static. In fact, even the ―end of

time‖ is probably not best conceived of as

a static destination where we will some-

day arrive. As stewards we are not aiming

for a fixed endpoint, just for a further and

more robust flourishing, an ever-growing

and deepening intimacy.14

At the begin-

ning God didn‘t deliver a finished prod-

uct; rather, God provided a setting in

which human beings, working with and

enabled by God, could cause the created

order to flourish.

Thus, to summarize so far, God

created the world and everything in it. It

belongs to God. As a part of this creation

God created men and women and en-

dowed them with a unique dignity. They

alone were created in God‘s image, de-

signed from the beginning to reflect

God‘s glory. They were created for rela-

tionship, with one another and with God.

They were created as diverse creatures

with differences that complemented each

other and delighted God. They were

called to work as co-creators with God, to

steward the creation. God intended that

men and women would take the raw

materials that had been provided and, in

partnership with God, help to grow and

construct the kingdom here on earth. Men

and women were not, however, created to

become God. At the center of their exis-

tence were to be limits and God called

them to live from that place of limited-

ness.

God’s Purpose for Humankind: Nar-

rowing the Question

Let us now return to one of the original

questions. Does the Westminster Ca-

techism say all that can be said about

God‘s intended role for humankind (to

glorify God and enjoy him forever)? Or

can we identify a more specific charge to

Adam and Eve from the Genesis ac-

count?

There is no doubt that the Genesis

account confirms that our primary voca-

tion is to glorify God. Created ―in his

image,‖ our lives are intended to reflect

or reveal the divine glory—God‘s es-

sence and character. But the creation

mandate adds specificity to this general

calling.

For one, we reflect God‘s glory

through nurturing our relationships with

God and with one another. The Garden

narrative in Genesis 3 provides us with a

tantalizing hint of the intimate friend-

ships that must have existed before the

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Fall: Adam and Eve walking and chatting

with God in the Garden ―in the cool of the

day‖ (Genesis 3:8). As we model this

loving intimacy in our relationships with

God and with others we reflect an aspect

of the triune Godhead and give God

glory.

But we also glorify God by engaging

in the work we have been called to un-

dertake. Already we have seen that this

work is to be meaningful, engage our

creativity, reflect our diversity, and grow

out of and give back to the community.

These are characteristics of God‘s work;

when our work reflects these characte-

ristics, we reveal God‘s glory.

But we have also seen that our work

can glorify God in another way. Our

work is actually used to accomplish

God‘s purposes on earth. In addition to

exhibiting God-like characteristics, we

are invited to participate in the bringing

about of God-desired results. In Genesis

God assigns particular tasks to humanity.

Adam and Eve were told to ―subdue‖ and

―rule‖ over the created order, to work the

fields, to ―multiply‖ and ―be fruitful,‖ to

―fill the earth,‖ to give order to creation,

and to guard the earth. One aspect of

these tasks was to involve Adam and Eve

in partnering with God to cause the land

to bring forth its crops so as to provide for

the material well-being of God‘s people

and the created order. In the performance

of these tasks, Adam and Eve advance

God‘s agenda and thereby give God glory.

Collectively, these activities enable the

community to flourish as God intended.

They are to be undertaken for God and, as

it is sometimes said, ―for the common

good.‖15

The Role of Business In the Creation

Mandate

But what does this have to say specifi-

cally about business? Business is, of

course, not the only institution that hu-

man beings operate in. Christians in

business are also members of families,

citizens of nations, congregants in local

churches and participants in various other

institutions of civil society (e.g., book

clubs, intramural sports teams, food

kitchens and environmental groups).

What then is the relationship between the

work of any one institution and the

overall creation mandate?

One possibility, of course, is that

each person is called to perform each

Genesis task in each institution or role. If

this were correct we would conclude that

every Christian in business must through

business engage in every one of the Ge-

nesis activities. But surely this cannot be

the case. Consider one obvious example.

Adam and Eve were called to multiply.

That is, they were to enjoy sexual rela-

tions and produce off-spring. For this

―task‖ there is a corresponding institution,

the family. Presumably, during moments

of sexual intimacy, neither Adam nor Eve

was expected to be tilling the ground or

naming animals.

To house the production of offspring

in the institution of business (or any-

where else other than in the family)

would be a perversion of God‘s intent.

Rather, it would seem that certain insti-

tutions are better suited for certain tasks.

The family is a better institution in which

to situate the bearing and raising of

children (be fruitful and multiply). The

church and neighborhood might be the

best settings to nurture community.

Universities may be the best setting for

the study and analysis of the created or-

der (naming the animals). The govern-

ment, with its coercive powers, may be in

a better position to assume primary re-

sponsibility for guarding creation.

In his letter to the church at Corinth,

Paul talks about all of the different func-

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tions that the church is to perform. These

include teaching, preaching, prophesying,

administering and a number of others.

But was each individual Christian called

to perform all of these functions? Cer-

tainly not.

There are different kinds of service,

but the same Lord. There are dif-

ferent kinds of working, but the

same God works all of them in all

men. Now to each one the manife-

station of the Spirit is given for the

common good. . . .

The body is a unit, though it

is made up of many parts; and

though all its parts are many, they

form one body. . . .

Now you are the body of

Christ, and each one of you is a

part of it. And in the church God

has appointed first of all apostles,

second prophets, third teachers,

then workers of miracles, also

those having gifts of healing, those

able to help others, those with gifts

of administration, and those

speaking in different kinds of

tongues. Are all apostles? Are all

prophets? Are all teachers? Do all

work miracles? Do all have gifts of

healing? Do all speak in tongues?

Do all interpret? (1 Corinthians

12:5-7, 12, 27-30)

In an analogous way, all of humanity is

charged with all of the Genesis tasks, but

each individual and each individual in-

stitution is only one part of the body.

Each institution has only a part to play in

the whole.

Of course, there is no reason to as-

sume that any given institution will al-

ways be responsible for the same aspects

of the creation mandate. As the nature of

these institutions and the societies they

are found in change over time, various

aspects of the creation mandate may be

reallocated between institutional spheres

of activity in different proportions. At

some times aspects of the mandate might

be best furthered by government action.

In different times the same tasks might be

best pursued through private enterprise.

Sometimes a university should take the

lead in advancing research. In other cir-

cumstances it might best be conducted by

the state or a corporation. A considera-

tion of which tasks make the most sense

for which institutions at any given mo-

ment is ultimately a time-bound and

culturally embedded decision.16

So the question boils down to this: In

our twenty-first-century context, which

aspects of the creation mandate are best

suited for business to handle? Or using

Paul‘s language, what is the unique gif-

tedness of business at this time and place

in history?

In my judgment, the answer is two-

fold. First, business appears to be uni-

quely well situated to work the fields, to

cause the land to be fruitful, and to fill the

earth—what we might in modern par-

lance characterize as ―to create wealth.‖

Second, business is also the dominant

institution (although obviously not the

only one) equipped to provide organized

opportunities for meaningful and creative

work. With the collapse of the Soviet

Union and its state-managed economies,

it now appears beyond question that in

the twenty-first century private enterprise

operating in a relatively free market sys-

tem will be the institution best positioned

to efficiently deliver the goods and ser-

vices desired by worldwide consumers

and the most prolific source of new job

creation.

From this I would conclude that at

this time in history, there are two legiti-

mate, first-order, intrinsic purposes of

business: as stewards of God‘s creation,

business leaders should manage their

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Provide opportunities for meaningful work,

allowing employees to express their

God-given creativity

Provide community with

goods and services,

enabling it to flourish

businesses (1) to provide the community

with goods and services that will enable it

to flourish, and (2) to provide opportuni-

ties for meaningful work that will allow

employees to express their God-given

creativity. One goal for the Christian bu-

sinessperson who is stewarding God‘s

business is focused outward—providing

goods and services that enhance the

quality of life. One goal focuses in-

ward—creating opportunities for indi-

viduals within the company to express

their vocation in the performance of God-

glorifying work.17

When managers pur-

sue these particular goals for their com-

panies, they participate directly in God‘s

creation mandate. They engage in work

of intrinsic and not just instrumental

value.18

Before we press on, let me clarify

something about this purpose statement.

So far, I have attempted to identify God‘s

purpose for business as a whole. In effect,

I have been trying to identify those goals

that God might set down were God to

write a corporate mission statement for

the whole institution of business. I have

suggested that the mission statement

would focus on the twin goals of pro-

viding appropriate goods and services

and providing meaningful and creative

work. Of course, by negative implication,

I have also left some things out. For

example, I don‘t believe that ―fostering

of relationships in community‖ or ―pro-

tecting the environment‖ would make

Two Intrinsic Purposes

of Business

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God‘s list of fundamental purposes for

the institution of business as a whole.

This does not mean, however, that these

tasks are not essential for human flou-

rishing or even that they are of no im-

portance to business. As we will discuss

at length in the following Chapters, all

faithful businesses will need to take these

and a variety of other similar concerns

into account—if not as their purpose,

their raison d’être, then at least as con-

straints on their operations. We have

much more work to do. But we begin

with the notion that pursuit of these par-

ticular purposes—providing appropriate

goods and services, and meaningful and

creative work—is a piece of, a starting

place for, what it means to be a faithful

steward of God‘s business.

Three Related Observations

Three closing observations are in order.

First, note that this formulation of the

purpose of business makes the particular

goods and services to be produced a re-

levant consideration. Specifically, are

they goods and services that God would

want to make available to the world at

this time? Many times I have met with

Christians in business who have sug-

gested that the specific output of their

efforts is irrelevant. All that counts, they

argue, is how they engage in their busi-

ness activities (e.g., with honesty and

compassion). I disagree. Virtually eve-

ryone would agree that a pimp or prosti-

tute (even one who does his or her work

with integrity, compassion and caring) is

unlikely to be furthering the kingdom of

God through these professions. A full

understanding of the creation mandate

should extend this further. In certain

times and places, faithful obedience to

God‘s kingdom values might require that

we invest less of our aggregate capital in

the production of violent video games

and more in the development of sanitary

water facilities for developing countries,

less in weapons of mass destruction and

more in quality wood products, less in

fossil fuels and more in renewable re-

sources.

Under the business model that op-

erates in most corporations today, de-

ciding which product should be produced

comes down to assessing which of the

products that the company could produce

would yield the highest return on in-

vestment (ROI). While this is not always

easy to calculate (and is often calculated

incorrectly), it has the seductive quality

of mathematical certainty.19

It does not,

however, necessarily lead to operations

that accord with kingdom values. Online

betting and pornography may yield

higher rates of return but are unlikely to

lead to human flourishing.

Of course, it is not possible to come

up with a particular formula that will

clearly dictate which goods or services

should be produced. There is no single

litmus test. Each of us faithfully listening

to God may come up with a different

answer. But even if we may end up with

different answers, we are called to start

by asking a common question: Instead of

asking in the first instance, Which choice

will maximize my ROI? we ask instead,

Given the core competencies of my or-

ganization and the assets under its con-

trol, how can I best direct the organiza-

tion to serve? Which products or services

could we produce that would best enable

my community to flourish?

And this leads to a second observa-

tion. Note that nothing in this Genesis

model supports the conclusion that

business should be operated for the pur-

pose of maximizing profits. In fact, this

model turns the dominant business model

on its head. In most business schools to-

day and in most corporations (particu-

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The Genesis model views employees and cus-tomers as the actual ends of the business. It places profit in a proper perspective. It be-comes the means to service rather than the

purpose of the enterprise itself.

larly larger, publicly traded corporations)

the sole legitimate purpose of business is

said to be maximizing profits for the sake

of the shareholders.20

Indeed, influential

economists have argued that business

managers have a moral obligation to do

everything within their power (short of

breaking the law and violating conven-

tional norms of society) to maximize

profits.21

Under this model, providing

meaningful work to employees and being

honest and straightforward with custom-

ers are good business practices to the

extent, and only to the extent, that they

enhance the bottom line. In other words

employees and customers become a

means for achieving the goal of max-

imizing shareholder wealth.

Under the Genesis model, however,

the employees and customers become the

actual ends of the business. The business

is run for their welfare. Profit is not im-

portant as an end in and of itself. Rather,

it becomes the means of attracting suffi-

cient capital to allow the business to do

what, from God‘s perspective, it is in

business to do—that is, to serve its cus-

tomers and employees.

Of course, this doesn‘t mean that

profit is unimportant. Generating profits

is critical. ―No margin, no mission.‖

Without profit a business dies. But the

Genesis model places profit in a proper

perspective. It becomes the means to

service rather than the purpose of the

enterprise itself.22

To turn shareholders‘ needs into a

purpose is to be guilty of a logical

confusion, to mistake a necessary

condition for a sufficient one. We

need to eat to live; food is a ne-

cessary condition of life. But if we

lived mainly to eat, making food a

sufficient or sole purpose of life,

we would become gross. The

purpose of a business, in other

words, is not to make a profit, full

stop. It is to make a profit so that

the business can do something

more or better.23

And one last observation. Some-

times I worry that to suggest that one of

the fundamental purposes of business is

to ―produce goods and services that ena-

ble the community to flourish‖ might

conjure up some image of a cookie-cutter

manufacturing process whereby the same

goods are just repetitively stamped out by

machines year after year and handed out

to customers who come by. But this

would be a mistake.

I intend a far more robust under-

standing. Indeed the Genesis model

statement of purpose assigns a very high

calling to business. Business is to be in

the business of ―value creation‖ or

―creating wealth.‖ Put simply, successful

businesses find ways through innovation

to make more or better things from less.

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In so doing, business generates the eco-

nomic capital that sustains the entire so-

ciety.

At the very heart of capitalism . . .

is the creative habit of enterprise.

Enterprise is, in its first moment,

the inclination to notice, the habit

of discerning, the tendency to

discover what other people don‘t

yet see. It is also the capacity to act

on insight, so as to bring into real-

ity things not before seen. It is the

ability to foresee both the needs of

others and the combinations of

productive factors most adapted to

satisfying those needs. This habit

of intellect constitutes an impor-

tant source of wealth in modern

society. Organizing such a pro-

ductive effort, planning its dura-

tion in time, making sure that it

corresponds in a positive way to

the demands it must satisfy, and

taking the necessary risks: all this

has been a source of new wealth in

the past 200 years.24

As Bonnie Wurzbacher, a senior

vice president with Coca Cola put it in a

recent interview, ―As the sole source of

wealth creation in the world, [business]

enables every other social, civic and even

spiritual institutions [sic] to exist.‖25

In

economic terms, all other institutions are

funded (through taxes or philanthropic

giving) by the wealth first created by

business. This can be seen when a new

business moves into a community, and is

often felt acutely when a business closes

or departs.

The call ―to produce goods and ser-

vices that enable flourishing‖ is a call to

participate in this innovative and indus-

trious work. It is a call to constantly be

looking for ways to deliver more or better

goods and services. In fact, it is the

combination of the two purposes I have

identified previously—enabling creative

work (innovation) and producing com-

munity-flourishing products (productiv-

ity)—that really brings businesses‘

unique contribution into sharpest focus.

Conclusion

Let‘s finish the parable we started with.

What can we tell our student considering

a career in business? In short, we can tell

her that she is considering a noble calling

that will involve her in delivering on key

aspects of God‘s creation mandate. If a

Christian lawyer seeks to advance God‘s

justice, and a Christian doctor seeks to

administer God‘s healing, a Christian

businessperson seeks to serve a hurting

world by providing it with the material

goods and services that will enable it to

prosper. The Christian in business

enables individuals to express aspects of

their God-given identities by affording

them the opportunity to participate in

meaningful and creative work. In short,

the Christian in business is in the busi-

ness of rendering service that will enable

humanity to flourish.

Notes 1For convenience and flow of argument, I have

elected to treat the question of God‘s purpose for

institutions as a stand-alone discussion in Chap. 6. 2I make repeated references throughout this book

to the ―kingdom of God,‖ ―God‘s kingdom‖ or

words to that effect. By this I mean simply the

place or places where God reigns, where God is

king. The characteristics of this kingdom are the

subject of numerous parables and other biblical

teaching. While perhaps not all-encompassing,

Paul Stevens identifies four key features of God‘s

kingdom: ―First, [the kingdom of God] brings the

forgiveness of sins. . . . Second, the kingdom

brings healing and recovery of full life: ‗the blind

receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are

cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and

the poor have good news brought to them.‘ . . .

Third, the kingdom restores community by pro-

viding an open table for sharing meals with sin-

ners, with poor and rich. . . . Finally, Jesus de-

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nounced collective, institutional and structural

sin . . . especially for the effect it had on the poor

and the oppressed‖ (R. Paul Stevens, Doing

God’s Business [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006],

pp. 84-85). 3See, for example, N. T. Wright, ―How Can the

Bible Be Authoritative?‖ NTWrightpage

<www .ntwrightpage.com/Wright_Bible_Authori

tative.htm> (creation, fall, Israel, Jesus, church). 4My choice of this particular approach is also a

reflection of my own heritage. I have grown up as

a Protestant primarily in evangelical Presbyterian

churches. Consciously or otherwise, I‘m sure that

I bring a Reformed perspective to this project,

hopefully tempered in part by my current happy

assignment in a Wesleyan institution. 5Additional poetic accounts of God‘s creation can

be found in the Psalms and are alluded to else-

where in the Scriptures. Still Genesis 1-2 remains

the primary account of God‘s initial work at cre-

ation. 6In this book I make repeated references to ―hu-

man flourishing,‖ but this is a difficult concept to

reduce to a simple definition. At its heart, a hu-

man being flourishes when he or she moves to-

ward becoming more the person God designed

him or her to be. As such, this notion has a de-

velopmental character. It implies growth and

change. Human flourishing also taps into the

notion of biblical abundance. Jesus assures his

followers that he has come ―that they might have

life, and have it to the full‖ (John 10:10). But it is

a multidimensional abundance. It includes the

spiritual, physical, intellectual, aesthetic, emo-

tional and social aspects of our lives. It does not

consist of the mere accumulation of more

things—particularly when such accumulation

comes at the cost of the development of other

human dimensions. On the other hand, it is not

merely a spiritual concept. It is not just limited,

for example, to the cultivation of the gifts of the

Spirit. As I have argued in the text, the material

world (and the physical goods derived therefrom)

matters to God. Our physical well-being is a part

of human flourishing. It is also not a solitary

concept. It contextualizes individual well-being

within a community. A rich understanding of

human flourishing acknowledges that individuals

are made for relationships. While it recognizes

the value and dignity of each individual, it also

affirms that individual development must be

grounded in community. 7Dictionary.com, s.v. ―stewardship,‖

<www.dictionary.reference.com>.

8In her book Believers in Business, Laura Nash

describes her findings based on extensive inter-

views with evangelical business leaders. She

notes that the ― ‗good steward‘ was the most

frequently cited metaphor for personal leadership

among the group. For these CEOs it implied ser-

vice, quality, a responsibility to be fiscally pro-

ductive and a detachment from self-serving mo-

tives‖ (Laura Nash, Believers in Business [Nash-

ville: Thomas Nelson, 1994], p.74). 9There is no need here to enter into the debate as

to whether it is best to characterize human beings

as co-creators or subcreators. For our purposes it

is sufficient to affirm that to be human is to be

intrinsically wired for creative work. See the

discussion in Stevens, Doing God’s Business, p.

24; and Stephen Bretsen, ―The Creation, the

Kingdom of God, and a Theory of the Faithful

Corporation,‖ Christian Scholar’s Review 38

(2008): 115-54, 138-39. See also John Paul II,

Laborem Exercens, §§13, 113. 10

Of course, this observation has immediate ap-

plication to business. As I will discuss in much

greater detail in Chap. 2, many of the conse-

quences of Adam and Eve‘s unwillingness to

accept their limited nature show up in broken

aspects of business. Moreover, the institution of

business itself is often unwilling to accept a li-

mited role and is tempted instead to exalt itself to

God-like status, a consequence that I take up in

greater detail in Chap. 6. 11

― ‗Rejoicing,‘ ‗delighting,‘ and even, as some

translations have it, ‗playing‘ in creation charac-

terize God‘s involvement in the cosmos‖ (Loren

Wilkinson, ―Christ as Creator and Redeemer,‖ in

The Environment and the Christian: What Does

the New Testament Say About the Environment?

ed. Calvin B. DeWitt [Grand Rapids: Baker,

1991], p. 35, commenting on Proverbs 8:27-31). 12

―So we receive our blessings not from them

[other human creatures], but from God, through

them. Creatures are only the hands, channels, and

means through which God bestows all blessings‖

(Martin Luther, explanation of the First Com-

mandment, ―Large Catechism‖ [1529], in The

Book of Concord, ed. Theodore Tappert [Phila-

delphia: Fortress, 1959], p. 368). Luther saw a

very close tie between human work and the work

of God. ―God Himself will milk the cow through

him whose calling it is‖ (quoted in Gordon Preece,

―Work,‖ in The Complete Book of Everyday

Christianity, ed. Robert Banks and R. Paul Ste-

vens [Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press,

1997], p. 1126).

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13―Between 1950 and 2000, grain land produc-

tivity climbed by 160 percent while the area

planted in grain expanded only 14 percent. This

extraordinary rise in productivity, combined with

the modest expansion of cultivated area, enabled

farmers to triple the grain harvest over the last

half-century. At the same time, the growing de-

mand for animal protein was being satisfied

largely by a quintupling of the world fish catch to

95 million tons and a doubling of world beef and

mutton production, largely from rangelands.

These gains not only supported a growth in pop-

ulation from 2.5 billion to 6.1 billion, they also

raised food consumption per person, shrinking the

share who were hungry‖ (Lester R. Brown, Plan

B: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civili-

zation in Trouble [New York: W. W. Norton,

2003], p. 131. 14

Isaiah 65:21-22 seems to suggest that work will

continue even in the new heavens and the new

earth. 15

The notion of the common good has a rich her-

itage. It shows up in the writings of philosophers

down through the ages. It is also one of the central

features of Christian, and particularly Catholic,

social teaching. In a very simplistic fashion,

pursuit of the common good can be understood as

making decisions and taking actions that are

beneficial to the community as a whole. But as I

use the concept in this book I intend a slightly

more nuanced understanding. The Catholic reli-

gious tradition defines the common good as ―the

sum of those conditions of social life which allow

social groups and their individual members rela-

tively thorough and ready access to their own

fulfillment‖ (emphasis added). This definition

makes clear that it has both an individual and

communal element. ―Historically, a common

good is considered to be a human perfection or

fulfillment achievable by a community, such that

the community‘s members all share it, both as a

community and singly, in their persons. A com-

mon good then, is neither a mere amalgam of

private and particular goods nor is it the good of

the whole that disregards the good of its members‖

(Helen Alford and Michael Naughton, Managing

as If Faith Mattered [Notre Dame, Ind.: Notre

Dame Press, 2001], p. 41, emphasis added). Ac-

cording to the catechism of the Catholic Church,

the common good concerns the life of all. It con-

sists of three essential elements. First, it respects

the fundamental and inalienable rights of the

human person. Specifically, it respects and fosters

individual human development. Second, it re-

quires the social well-being and development of

the community as a whole. And finally, it requires

the peace and stability needed in order to allow

for this personal and collective development.

Simply put, the common good allows for the

flourishing of the community and the individuals

who make up that community. 16

Here I am siding with Nicholas Wolterstorff in

his critique of a neo-Calvinists‘ position that

holds that there are certain abiding ―types‖ of

social formation—that is that certain institutions

are divinely endowed with certain functions in an

immutable ontological sense. Wolterstorff argues

that ―we must ask how the functions performed

are best parceled out among the institutions of

society: which should be assigned to different

institutions, and which to the same. When we

look at the various societies to be found in the

course of history, we find certain basic functions

regularly performed, but we find them parceled

out among institutions in all sorts of different

ways. Functions that we assign to one institution

may in other societies be assigned to different

ones. . . . Is our assignment a good one for us?

That must be our question‖ (Nicholas Wolters-

torff, Until Justice and Peace Embrace [Grand

Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983], pp. 62-63). 17

―Their view of work is that it has both intrinsic

and extrinsic meaning and purpose. That is, the

particular work someone does, in and of its own

right, is of theological value. Work has the larger

role of serving greater societal purposes and

needs. Discovering that work can be a calling, and

finding meaning and purpose in work are often

significant motivators that draw businesspeople

to the [Faith at Work] movement‖ (David Miller,

God at Work [New York: Oxford University

Press, 2007], p. 135). 18

From time to time I am challenged to consider a

third purpose for business: specifically, that a

business exists to ―nurture relationships,‖ to

―foster community‖ or words to that effect. And I

am almost persuaded. In our twenty-first-century

global economy, business does indeed play a

central role in community-building. Many em-

ployees spend the majority of their waking hours

on the job, so their opportunities for nurturing

relationships outside of work are limited. More-

over, much of the work that business does de-

pends on individuals working in teams rather than

alone. And technology is increasingly enabling

teams to gather in virtual spaces so that online

relationships can be cultivated in the work place

even between individuals who are geographically

dispersed. Consistent with the observations

drawn from the Genesis creation account I can

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also readily affirm that the tasks to be undertaken

by business must be grounded in community,

flow out of community and be designed for the

community‘s common good. Having said this,

however, I am ultimately not convinced. If I were

asked by a Christian entrepreneur to explain why

he should start a new business, it seems sensible

and straightforward to explain to him that he

should pursue his business because he has a

product that can help the world or because he can

employ individuals looking for life-giving work.

These purposes fit the character of business ac-

tivity. Making products and hiring workers are

aspects of a business‘s DNA. I would also have

no problem telling him that his work must in all

cases be respectful of relationships and that he

should nurture a healthy work community. But

this is different than telling him that he should

start a business for the purpose of nurturing rela-

tionships or fostering community. Making com-

munity-building a first-order purpose of every

business stretches the institution of business too

far from its fundamental character. This does not

mean that healthy work communities are unim-

portant. They are critical to healthy businesses.

They are just not its reason for being; they don‘t

rise to the level of a foundational purpose. 19

Al Erisman, long-time head of research and

development in technology and mathematics for

the Boeing Company, has argued that while the

promise is seductive, achieving this certainty is

often not even mathematically possible: ―The

second thing we learn from optimization is that

these problems are very difficult. No one really

knows how to truly solve most nonlinear,

time-dependent mathematical optimization

problems (which is the nature of the problem as

formulated). So we do in practice what any good

mathematician would do—we approximate the

problem by something we can solve. In practice,

what this means is that while it is very difficult to

maximize shareholder value subject to constraints

over the long term, we can likely be more effec-

tive in doing this over the short term. The pres-

sures from Wall Street for short-term results only

support the solution to this problem rather than

the stated problem. It is generally not the case that

a sequence of best solutions for the short term will

together lead to the best solution in the long term.

Anyone hiking in the mountains knows that to get

to the peak you sometimes have to move lower

before climbing higher. Similarly, short-term

thinking in business may look good at the mo-

ment, but it often has very significant longer-term

issues‖ (Al Erisman, ―The New Capitalism?‖

Ethix 66 [2009]: 4-5). 20

Setting my proposed Genesis-stewardship

model against the shareholder-maximization

model presents the most dramatic contrast. Of

course, the shareholder-maximization model is

not the only existing option for describing the

duty of a corporate manager (and the corres-

ponding purpose of the firm). Since the publica-

tion of R. Edward Freeman‘s seminal work

Strategic Management: A Stakeholder Approach

(Boston: Pitman, 1984) a competing approach to

understanding management‘s responsibilities has

been advanced under the heading of ―stakeholder

theory.‖ There have been almost as many defini-

tions of this theory as there have been articles

written about it, but in general terms this theory

assumes that management owes duties not just to

shareholders but to other constituent groups that

have a stake in the company, typically including

at least employees, customers and suppliers.

While this is an overly simplistic statement, in

general this theoretical approach calls on man-

agement to make decisions in the interests of all

stakeholders and to balance competing interests

(in one fashion or another). As such this theory

would certainly allow for a consideration of the

business purposes that I am advocating, although

this theory is not without its own theological

shortcomings (see Alford and Naughton, Man-

aging as If Faith Mattered, pp. 55-60).

There is no doubt that the stakeholder

theory has gained in acceptance since it was first

introduced, although the extent of its adoption in

practice is difficult to assess for several reasons.

First, management focused simply on increasing

shareholder wealth may nonetheless adopt poli-

cies and make pronouncements that outwardly

appear to be focused on other constituencies. For

example, a company might adopt em-

ployee-friendly strategies ostensibly to respond to

legitimate employee desires but actually do so

because it desires to reduce turnover, lower costs

and enhance profits. Conversely, management

actually operating under a stakeholder framework

may nonetheless choose to justify its actions as a

means of maximizing shareholder wealth. Man-

agement might engage in this obfuscation be-

cause claiming benefits for shareholders would

allow management to invoke the ―business

judgment‖ rule and reduce the chance that it

might be the subject of lawsuits alleging viola-

tions of its fiduciary duties. Complicating matters

further, most articles written about stakeholder

theory are theoretical rather than empirical in

nature and are tipped heavily (and disproportio-

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nately) in the direction of large public companies

(André O. Laplume, Karan Sonpar and Reginald

A. Litz, ―Stakeholder Theory: Reviewing a

Theory That Moves Us,‖ Journal of Management

34 [2008]: 1152-89, 1160, 1172). In short, it is

simply hard to tell how much ground the stake-

holder theory has actually gained on the share-

holder maximizing model. 21

See, e.g., Milton Friedman, ―The Social Re-

sponsibility of Business Is to Increase Its Profits,‖

New York Times Magazine, September 13, 1970,

pp. 122-26.

22Chapter 8 contains an in-depth discussion of the

importance and role of profit in a company oper-

ating under the Genesis model of business pur-

pose which I advocate for in this Chapter. 23

Charles Handy, ―What‘s a Business For?‖

Harvard Business Review 80, no. 12 (2002): 51. 24

Michael Novak, Business as a Calling (New

York: Free Press, 1996), p. 120. 25

Telephone interview with Bonnie Wurzbacher

reported on Worldview Matters, October 9, 2009

<http://biblicalworldviewmatters.blogspot.com/s

earch/label/Bonnie%20Wurzbacher>.

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Life Balance in Vortex of Changes

Wallace Henley is the author

and collaborator of over 20

books, including his latest

Globequake: Living in the Un-

shakeable Kingdom While the

World Falls Apart (Thomas

Nelson, 2012). Journalist, leadership consul-

tant, and former White House aide, Henley is

the founder of Headwaters Leadership Institute

and Associate Pastor of Houston’s 57,000

member Second Baptist Church. He regularly

blogs at www.ChristianPost.com

he velocity, scope, and magnitude

of change in the contemporary

world threaten the equilibrium of

individuals and the institutions of their

engagement, including church, family,

education, government, business -

workplace.

Change is the “new normal,” as

Peter Drucker noted at the beginning of

the 21st century, when he wrote,

"Everybody has accepted by now

that change is unavoidable. But

that still implies that change is like

death and taxes — it should be

postponed as long as possible and

no change would be vastly pre-

ferable. But in a period of

upheaval, such as the one we are

living in, change is the norm."1

Velocity is the speed by which the

information that ignites change rushes at

people in the contemporary world.2 The

accumulation of information is the fastest

increasing quantity in the world.3 Re-

searchers at the University of Califor-

nia—Berkeley, examined the total pro-

duction of all information channels in the

world for two different years, 2000 and

2003.4 In 2000, the total production of

new information in a 12-month period

amounted to 37,000 times the informa-

tion housed in the Library of Congress.

By 2003, the accumulation of informa-

tion was growing by 66 percent per year.

The total amount of scientific knowledge

has been doubling every 15 years since

1900.

Information alters existing realities,

and also creates new phenomena. The

velocity of information therefore accele-

rates change. The Industrial Age shows

there are certain periods of mega leaps,

when technologies, systems, and

processes morph seemingly overnight

into radically new forms. An 18th

century

T

http://www.christianpost.com/

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balloon and the Wright Brothers’ flying

machine shared the goal of enabling

humans to fly, but the airplane was a leap

into a new category.

Information is a primary catalyst of

change. No previous historic period has

experienced the present velocity of the

increase of information; therefore, the

contemporary period is unique—up to

this point of history. This is why change

is the new normal.

The scope of upheaval is worldwide.

Old values are displaced in the quest for

new globally “shared” values. Individu-

als find the traditional belief systems that

constituted the foundations of their lives

shattered by the often novel alterations of

the spiritual, ethical, and social land-

scapes. Churches that have defined and

sustained core values and worldview are

shaken by the contemporary transitions.

The vision of families who pass revered

truths across generations has been buried

in the rubble of a world in turbulence.

Educational philosophies and sys-

tems seem to have been blinded in the

dust of upheaval, and lost their way. The

principles that have secured governments

have been shattered. Businesses and the

workplace have rocked with the turmoil.

Employees are struck with new tensions

including concerns over job security and

career longevity, as well as balancing the

demands of their total lives with the need

to cling to their employment.

The velocity and scope of change

impact people in at least three ways. First

is the increasing sense of insecurity.

Many people are haunted by vague, un-

identifiable anxiety, manufactured within

their own turbulent souls. Both the real

and imagined threats of the turbulence

around us drive us deeply into ourselves

in the effort to fend off the gremlins of

fear and anxiety. The outcome is what we

experience presently: self-absorption

resulting in what Harvard sociologist

Pitirim Sorokin called the “sensate” stage

of a culture, when feelings and emotions

govern.5 The more we view the world

through the lens of our own emotions, the

greater loom the threats to our security.

If we live in a state of insecurity long

enough, after a while we drift into the

second phenomenon threatening life

balance, insanity. This problem is at ep-

idemic proportions, concluded E. Fuller

Torrey and Judy Miller in their 2002

book, The Invisible Plague.6 From 1955

into the 21st century, many medications

had become available, but the number of

people diagnosed with mental illness had

increased six-fold!7

Insanity is “reason used without root,

or reason in the void,” wrote G.K. Ches-

terton.8 “The man who begins to think

without the proper first principles goes

mad; he begins to think at the wrong

end.” Cultural, societal, and national in-

sanity occurs when people destroy their

roots and forget their first principles. The

velocity and scope of change in our time

tears out the root-system and brings down

Change

Insecurity

Insanity

Instability

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the edifice of first principles. That’s why

whole societies as well as individuals

lose their balance, lapse into insanity and

lose their stability.

Instability is the third impact of con-

temporary upheaval threatening the bal-

ance of the human psyche. The devas-

tating destabilization of global redefini-

tion is its impact on the foundations on

which all strength and order rest. Ches-

terton was reflecting the theme asserted

in Proverbs that the fear of the Lord is the

beginning of wisdom, and yet the tremors

of the present age seek to destabilize the

very idea of God. This leads to decon-

struction of the concept of humans hav-

ing inherent dignity because of being

made in God’s image. What follows is

the loss of the confidence that arises from

belief in a transcendent God to whom all

are accountable, but also the God who is

immanent in space and time, and engaged

with His image-bearers and their world.

How, then, does one maintain balance

midst the upheaval? The question is es-

pecially pertinent as it relates to business

and the workplace. According to the

United States Bureau of Labor Statistics,

the average American spends 16.4 hours

of every 24 working or sleeping.9 The

rest of the available hours must be allot-

ted to many other tasks—caring for oth-

ers, household activities, leisure and

sports, eating and drinking. Imbalance

arises as the demands of the urgent dis-

place the essentials for equilibrium in the

individual’s life.

We can group these essentials into

three categories:

1. the need for the “otherness” of tran-

scendence;

2. the need for linking transcendence on

the immanent scale of the self;

3. the need for a clear philosophy of

time and its use.

Understood and applied properly these

three elements comprise a proverbial

“three-legged stool” on which one can

rest in confidence because of its balance

and stability.

One of the distortions of contempo-

rary culture is blurring the boundaries

between the transcendent and the imma-

nent. In an age of self-absorption people

increasingly worship on the horizontal

level. They lose the sense of a God who is

wholly other, external to themselves and

their worlds. Such an attitude cuts off two

legs from the stool, which becomes in-

capable of offering balance and rest.

“If the foundations are destroyed,

what can the righteous do?” asks the

Psalmist, rhetorically (Psalm 11:3

(NASB)). His thought is drawn imme-

diately to transcendence, and the writer

answers his own question through

awareness and focus on the Most High

God: “The LORD is in His holy temple;

the LORD’S throne is in heaven…”

(Psalm 11:4). God’s throne symbolizes

His serene steadiness, His immovable

authority, and the potential for all under

the rule and protection of that throne to

enter its peace, even midst thundering

upheaval. Balance begins by resting

oneself on the immutability of God.

This requires linking transcendent

reality with immanent experience. Thus

the Psalmist also writes,

My soul waits in silence for God

only;

From Him is my salvation.

He only is my rock and my salvation,

My stronghold; I shall not be greatly

shaken.

(Psalm 62:1-2)

One of the characteristics of our time

is an aversion to waiting and silence,

especially in the West. Many are under

compulsion to push ahead in lines, to

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dash under changing traffic lights, to

speed toward destinations. We have been

conditioned to be uncomfortable with

silence in a culture that has gone from

static-charged radio music to elevator

music, to blaring television in doctor’s

and dentist’s waiting rooms, to boom

boxes, I-Pods, and scores of other media

delivering a constancy of noise.

Our penchant for noise has come at a

great cost. It has robbed us of the beauty

of silence in which we can hear the “still,

small voice” of God. The disappearance

of silence has taken away the connection

on the immanent scale of the soul with

the transcendent. The loss of that con-

nection impairs our balance, and its re-

covery is essential for the restoration of

our personal equilibrium.

This requires an understanding of the

nature of time and managing it effec-

tively. The Greek New Testament

presents two levels of time:

Chronos expresses time on the

existential plane. It is the ticking

of the clock, the passing of the

calendar. It is wholly linear, with

a point of beginning and termina-

tion. It is a metric, enabling us to

measure the segments of our days

and lifetimes.

Kairos is the “opportune time,”

the content of chronos. If linear

chronos is the track, then kairos is

the train, moving along the track

on his spinning wheels. There-

fore, kairos has a cyclical motion.

The biblical view of time there-

fore synthesizes Western linearity

with Oriental cyclical movement.

Kairos are opportune moments that unveil the

eternal, disclosing God’s ultimate purposes

within the long sweep of time

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Life balance requires us to engage in a rhythm that allows for inward evaluation, and outward and upward focus

Life-balance requires that one get

time in balance. There must be opportu-

nity along the linear sequence for the

recognition of the presence and impact of

the kairotic. One must reflect and con-

sider the events and circumstances trav-

eling along the “tracks” and their deeper

meanings, significance, lessons, and

principles. This

calls for a rhythm

of time sequencing

that allows for

regular meditation,

inward evaluation,

and outward and

upward focus.

Such balance

comes as we con-

template our own

nature as God’s

image-bearers. He

is triune—Father, Son, Holy Spirit—and

we are triune—spirit, soul, body. Paul

prays that “the God of peace Himself

sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit

and soul and body be preserved com-

plete, without blame at the coming of our

Lord Jesus Christ.” (1 Thessalonians

5:23)

The body is that dimension of our

being created for interaction with the

external world, on the horizontal plane.

The soul—the psuche, from which we get

“psyche” and its family of words—is the

facet of our whole person capable of in-

trospection and self-awareness. Our spirit

is made for interaction with transcendent

Being. We are “preserved complete”

when there is a balance in our personal

lives between spirit, soul, and body. Im-

balance occurs when we lop off “legs”

from the “stool” and try to stand on the

“body” alone, or cast all our weight on

the “soul,” or fail to link the “spirit” with

the other parts of our being.

And we lose our equilibrium when

we neglect the wholeness of time, ex-

pressed in the chronos-kairos linkage. It

is the recognition of and participation in

the rhythm of time that can bring our

whole being into balance. “Remember

the Sabbath day, to keep it holy,” says the

Commandment. That is, there must be

specific regularity in

the linear flow of our

routines when we

pause, and engage

with God, the tran-

scendent One. We

must thrust our souls

outward from the

self and the hori-

zontal, and open

ourselves to the

kairos of God that

gives us meaning

and purpose.

Ben Young says he was impacted by

insights from Lauren Winner, an Ortho-

dox Jew who became an evangelical

Christian. She said that what she missed

from her routine as a practicing Jew was

the Sabbath observance, “a cessation

from the rhythm of work and world, a

time wholly set apart, and, perhaps above

all, a sense that the point of Shabbat, the

orientation of Shabbat, is toward God.”

Young agrees. Modern humanity is

missing something through its loss of the

Sabbath concept, and “we are missing it

because we don’t understand what we

have lost.”10

The promise attached to the Sabbath

Command is that we will find “rest”

precisely because of the balance, and

resulting peace and confidence that

comes from living in the wholeness for

which God designed us. Jesus Christ

freed us from a rigid conformity to the

Law as the means of salvation, but He did

not set aside the overarching principles

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God’s “way” provides for healthy, ba-

lanced living.

Balancing the demands of life and

work necessitates, as Chesterton said,

beginning with “first principles,” and that

means recognizing how we are made and

how we relate to the time God has given

us.

Notes

1 Peter Drucker, Management Challenges for the

21st Century, New York: Harper Business, 1999.

2Material used here relating to velocity, scope,

and magnitude is drawn from the author’s book:

Wallace Henley, Globequake: Living in the Un-

shakeable Kingdom while the world falls apart,

Nashville: Thomas Nelson, July, 2012.

3 “The Speed of Information,” The Technium,

2006. Retrieved from: http://www.kk.org/

thetechnium/archives/2006/02/

the_speed_of_in.php. 4 Ibid.

5 Pitirim Sorokin, Social and Cultural Dynamics,

Transaction Publishers, 1985, 622-623. 6 E. Torrey Fuller and Judy Miller, The Invisible

Plague, New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University

Press, 2002. 7 “Anatomy of an Epidemic,” Robert Whitaker,

Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry, Vol.

7, Number 1, Spring, 2005. 8 G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy. Published origi-

nally in 1908, with numerous subsequent edi-

tions. 9 “Time use on an average workday for employed

persons ages 25 to 54 with children.” Retrieved

from http://www.bls.gov/tus/charts. 10

Ben Young & Dr. Samuel Adams, Out of

Control: Finding Peace for Physically Exhausted

and Spiritually Strung Out, Nashville: Nelson

Books/Thomas Nelson, 2006, 65.

http://www.bls.gov/tus/charts

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Transferrable Skills

Dru Stevenson is professor of

law and Helen and Harry

Hutchins Research Professor

at the South Texas College of

Law in Houston, Texas. A graduate of Wheaton College (B.A., Biblical

Studies), the University of Connecticut (J.D.),

and Yale University (LL.M.), he served in

full-time ministry before becoming an Assis-

tant Attorney General for the State of Con-

necticut. His writings cover criminal law to

civil procedure, with an emphasis on the in-

tersection of law with economics and linguis-

tic theory.

uch of the discussion of “Chris-

tianity in Business” focuses,

quite naturally, on how a Chris-

tian businessperson’s faith can influence

one’s secular work – in the way we treat

others, the ways we conceive and execute

our business mission, and the way we

make our faith known to others. Less

attention goes to the intricate relationship

between the successful businessperson’s

secular work and involvement in spiritual

activities and events, like church. Our

secular enterprise is part of who we are,

part of the person God loves, redeems,

sanctifies, and uses to do His work. Not

only should our faith impact our work life,

but our work identity can positively im-

pact our spiritual pursuits.

Transferrable Skills and the Body of

Christ

Most evangelical Christians in business

are members of a church. For many,

unfortunately, their involvement stops

there – successful people are usually busy

people, and often feel too busy to be

“involved” in their church. Even those

who are devout enough to attend, give,

and appreciate the services often leave

the work of organizing and leading to the

church staff and leadership.

This essay presents a dual challenge

to Christian businesspersons and to the

leadership of their churches, as both have

M

How believers’ pro-

fessional skills and

knowledge can be

used to build up the

church and their own

spiritual lives.

By Dru Stevenson

CBR Articles



a role to play in helping professionals in

the congregation better integrate their

spiritual and secular lives. For the Chris-

tian in business, it may require a greater

commitment of time – and perhaps a

more proactive approach to one’s faith –

in order to achieve the goal described

below. For the leaders, there may be a

need to break from the norm and take an

innovative approach to utilizing the skills

and talents of the

believers in their

flocks.

Yet the New

Testament

presents a very

different model

for the church.

All the members

integrate and

synergize as

“living stones”

comprising a

“spiritual house”

(1 Peter 2:5

(NIV)). Each bu-

sinessperson in a

congregation

brings a unique

set of expe-

riences, talents,

perspectives, and skills related to their

secular employment outside of church.

Many of these traits and abilities are

transferrable skills that are incredibly

useful in furthering the work of the min-

istry.

Transferrable skills are a common

topic in the secular workforce. Workers

and prospective employers are very

aware that skills, knowledge, and expe-

rience acquired in one job can be useful

in the next job, even in another industry.

Experience as a delivery driver can make

one a better dispatcher; experience in

procurements can make a salesperson or

marketer more effective, and vice-versa.

The best managers often are those who

know how to do the jobs of the workers

they supervise.

The same is true when we enter a

church. Churches and religious organi-

zations desperately need input from

people who understand accounting, or

who are experienced builders, or who

grasp insurance concepts, or who under-

stand liability and

risk management.

Every skill, ability,

or talent of a

member is part of

the intangible

wealth of a church,

just as the aggre-

gate skills, know-

ledge, and expe-

rience of em-

ployees are part of

the assets or

wealth of a corpo-

ration.

Pastors and

ministry staff often

have little training

in finance, insur-

ance, IT, risk

management, or

legal issues. They rely on advice for these

matters either from minimally educated

support staff, or from expensive outside

consultants and contractors (who know

they are dealing with unsophisticated

clients). Overlooked are the people in the

pews who have relevant knowledge or

skills.

The modern model of the church

tends to ignore this fact, instead imposing

an unhealthy dichotomy between “God’s

work” and secular work. This dualistic

thinking results in leaders who view

members as clients/customers – people

who come to receive what the church

“Instead of thinking of

church members as a

walking coupon for profes-

sional services, church

leaders should include

them in the affairs and de-

cisions in the church so

that each individual can

positively influence the in-

stitutional culture and

practices.”

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offers, and who tithe in exchange for

what they receive.

Worse, the instances where ministers

approach professionals in the congrega-

tion for help often border on inappro-

priateness, such as trying to squeeze free

legal advice from a lawyer in the con-

gregation, either for the church’s litiga-

tion or for another member’s legal prob-

lems, or imposing on a mechanic in the

congregation to work on the pastors’

son’s car. For free.

Instead of thinking of church mem-

bers as a walking coupon for professional

services, church leaders should include

them in the affairs and decisions in the

church so that each individual can posi-

tively influence the institutional culture

and practices. Unfortunately, church

leaders may not grasp the concept of

transferrable skills. They expect the

lawyer-member to be useful when there

is a legal problem, but are unaware that

lawyers usually have a sophisticated un-

derstanding of insurance concepts, nego-

tiation practices, mediating disputes, or

that lawyers are highly trained in ex-

temporaneous public speaking and for-

mal writing.

Ministers may not fully understand

that insurance agents in their church

know a lot about social and family net-

works, how people make major decisions,

the best time of day to contact people,

and what types of consequences result

from making exceptions to established

policies – all of which are very important

for the tasks that churches and ministries

undertake. Instead, they naively hope that

a computer network specialist will be

able to fix the bugs in the PowerPoint

presentations used on Sunday – because

the member “works with computers.”

Overlooked is the network specialist’s

unique ability to plan and schedule in

advance for staggered upgrades,

phased-in purchases, and ever-changing

norms about privacy, accessibility, and

security; again, issues that come up in

seemingly unrelated domains of ministry

work.

Change must come from the ground

up. It is incumbent on the businessperson

in the pew, therefore, to step forward, to

take initiative, to sacrifice the time it

takes to get involved. A major asset of

religious organizations currently goes

unused, essentially dormant.

As mentioned in the introduction to

this essay, the challenge here is twofold.

Church leaders may need to change the

way they think about the businesspersons

and professionals who attend their

churches, to foster better integration of

their members’ lives and skills. At the

same time, members will often need to be

proactive in offering their services and

finding ways to serve. It could revolu-

tionize many ministries, churches, and

denominations if we could release the

treasure-trove of knowledge capital

among the membership.

These traits must operate in tandem

with the member’s spirituality. Many

intangible spiritual characteristics affect

how “effective and productive” we are in

our faith activities (2 Peter 1:8): spiritual

gifts, anointing, Christian charac-

ter/virtue, prayer life, depth of faith, and

knowledge of the Bible are all factors that

contribute to our spiritual fruitfulness.

Yet most Christians hear plenty of

teaching on these points, without any

word about how to integrate the rest of

our personality and identity with our spi-

rituality. Many believers simply dicho-

tomize in their minds, and assume that

nothing from their life outside of church

is relevant once they enter the sanctuary.

Peter and Paul provide examples of

this integration of life within the com-

munity of Christ, and the “outside” world.

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Peter was, of course, a fisherman –

probably with little formal education –

before he found himself thrust into the

top leadership of the early church. Most

believers have heard the oft-repeated idea

that Peter illustrates God’s sense of irony,

in that Jesus picked seemingly unquali-

fied (unsophisticated) people to groom as

Apostles. Acts 4:13 recounts the religious

leaders of the day making a similar ob-

servation about them. Many believers

today see Peter as an illustration of the

promise, “God’s power is made perfect in

weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9).

The reality is more complicated. We

glean from the gospel narratives glimpses

of Peter’s work life. He and his brother

Andrew were not anglers – they caught

tilapia and other lake fish in nets cast

from the side of small boats. It was in-

credibly uneven work, with long fru-

strating periods of catching nothing,

punctuated by large catches of hundreds

of fish at once. The unpredictable large

catches required Peter and his three

partners to spring into action quickly, to

coordinate their motions, to exert full

physical strength in a frenzy, then to get

the fish ashore and to market while still

fresh. Along the way, they had to sort the

fish. During lulls, they attended to the

tedious work of mending the nets. This

was a lifestyle that spanned decades. Ga-

lilean fishers grew accustomed to spurts

and lulls in activity, doing well in emer-

gency/crisis situations (a full net) and

making effective use of the downtime to

prepare for the next round of catching,

hauling, and sorting fish. Month after

month, year after year.

Now consider the first ten years of the

church in Jerusalem. In one day, it ex-

ploded from 120 members huddled in an

all-night prayer meeting to 3,000 new

adherents (see Acts 2:38-47). Then there

seems to have been a respite, then another

surge that brings the number to 5,000

(Acts 4:4). There was no professional

staff, no church facilities, no Christian

curriculum for small groups or Sunday

School. Somehow, the Apostles managed

to sort people overnight into small, ma-

nageable meetings in homes, organize

large public teaching events for full au-

diences, arrange for meals to be provided

to (apparently dozens of) widows, and

accommodate hundreds of people re-

questing prayer for their infirmities and

other personal problems. Then there

would be a lull, then another round of

crisis mode. Retention of new converts

seems to have been much higher than we

see today.

Assuming that Jesus foresaw this

rollercoaster phase of the early church,

his selection of the launch team now

seems strategic instead of ironic. The first

church leaders had to be able to respond

rapidly, had to stay focused on not losing

anyone from the latest “catch,” had to

work together well, and had to make ef-

fective use of downtime between the

waves of influx. The religious culture of

first-century Jerusalem would instead

have picked leaders based on seniority,

sagacity, family name, and patronage.

Yet the apostles succeeded at rap-

id-response ministry work, crowd man-

agement, and retention. They success-

fully managed a mega church without

buildings, staff, sound systems, media, or

spreadsheets. This gives deeper meaning

to Jesus’ prediction to Peter, Andrew,

James, and John that He could turn them

into “fishers of men.” Lake fishers were

perfect for the job in Jerusalem, it turned

out.

Phase Two of the early church was

the shift from being an obscure localized

phenomenon to being an international

organization. This meant jumping a cul-

tural barrier – from Aramaic-speaking

CBR Articles



Jewish converts to Greek-speaking pa-

gans throughout the Roman Empire.

Someone would need to cover huge dis-

tances, pitch the message to polytheistic

Gentiles (instead of Jews already ex-

pecting a Messiah), and organize cells

that would be self-replicating and

self-sustaining. The task fell to Saul

(Paul), an ultra-orthodox Rabbi who had

led a vigilante effort against the first

Christians in and around Jerusalem. This

choice seems as ironic as Peter running

things in Jerusalem: a super-strict rabbi is

going to remove the Jewishness from the

faith enough to have pagans embrace it.

Again, there was a strategic advantage

beneath the apparent irony.

Paul, though tutored for years under

premier rabbis in Jerusalem, had been

born in a Roman colonial city called

Tarsus (in modern Turkey). Anyone born

there had Roman citizenship – as if they

had been born in the city of Rome itself –

analogous to American citizenship con-

ferred on babies born on U.S. military

bases overseas. Paul was probably the

only rabbi in Jerusalem who could travel

freely throughout the Roman Empire

with special legal rights and protections.

Childhood in Tarsus would have made

Paul fluent in Greek and some local di-

alects. Paul had first-hand experience in

Jewish synagogues functioning far from

the homeland, as branches in remote lo-

cations. His reputation as a stickler for

kosher rules and traditions gave him

gravitas when insisting that those rules

and rituals were unnecessary for Gentile

converts. He was single, which made

constant travel much more feasible. Fi-

nally, Paul had a purely secular skill –

tent-making – that enabled him to support

himself in any urban center he visited

while he planted a church there; he did

not need to depend on the members of the

new church for his livelihood. These

traits turned out to be incredibly helpful.

Ending the Compartmentalization of

Our Spiritual Lives

Unfortunately, many believers tend to

separate their spiritual lives from their

secular routines. Helping believers bring

their faith into their work is essential in

breaking down this mental compartmen-

talization – we must be actively Christian

everywhere we go, in everything we do.

Many other writers have made this point.

Less common, however, is the ob-

servation that bringing our secular lives

into our spiritual activities also breaks

down the unhealthy compartmentaliza-

tion. Our “secular” abilities and talents

are resources within the local and global

church. Learning to deploy our skills and

abilities in faith-based endeavors makes

it easier for us to “walk in the Spirit” even

when we are using those skills at our

workplace. Believers become integrated

individuals who see God permeating

every area of their lives, rather than

churchgoers who have a spiritual side and

a worldly side.

The concept of transferrable skills

may prompt some Christian business-

persons to rethink the question of where

to attend church. We can think strategi-

cally about advancing God’s purposes.

Many factors weigh into the decision

about which local church to join: geo-

graphic proximity, doctrinal beliefs,

worship style, preaching quality, etc.

These are valid considerations, but an

additional dimension merits discussion.

Conclusion

It is wonderful to see so many Christians

today thinking about how to bring their

faith into their work. They are learning to

live out their Christianity in practical

ways by treating coworkers honorably,

CBR Articles



being exemplary in integrity and trans-

parency, and trying to be more altruistic,

“doing good while doing well.”

The other side of the equation, how-

ever, is to bring more of our work into our

faith activities. Instead of dichotomizing

our spiritual and secular pursuits, we

should recognize that God sees us as an

integrated person, a person whose career

gives us special insights into Christian

faith, practice, and outreach. We all ac-

quire transferrable skills in our jobs, and

these are useful not only for our future

career, but for our efforts to serve God

and spread His Word as well.

In John 17:6, as Jesus prays in the

Garden of Gethsemane, he thanks the

Father for his disciples:

I have revealed you to those

whom you gave me out of the

world. They were yours; you gave

them to me and they have obeyed

your word.

There is a deep mystery contained in

these words – disciples are a gift that the

Father gives to his Son. Salvation as

God’s free gift to us should be perfectly

familiar to believers; but perhapswe need

to add to that belief the idea that each of

us is a gift from the Father to Jesus, in-

tended to be an asset to his work. In verse

4, Jesus says that the Father entrusted the

Son with a mission, a “work to do” in this

world – the project of salvation. Toward

this end, the Father gives the Son a gift,

dedicated followers who will serve him

and further the work.

Suppose that as an expression of the

perfect, eternal love between the Father

and the Son, the Father gave His Son a

gift. We would assume that such a gift

would be wonderful, eternally valuable,

and quite significant. That gift was you

and me.

It may be appropriate to think of

ourselves as helpless, and even passive,

when we contemplate the forgiveness we

receive for our sins. Yet in terms of the

“other” gift involved in our salvation –

the gift from the Father to the Son – we

are the handpicked members of his dream

team, a task force carefully selected to

bring the work of Jesus toward the ful-

fillment of its goals and objectives.

CBR Articles


Resilience

Ernest P. Liang is Director of the Center for Christianity in Business and Associate Professor of Finance at

Houston Baptist University. Prior to his academic career, he spent 25 years as a finance executive in firms

ranging from technology start-ups to Fortune 500 companies, as chief economist of an economic consultancy,

and as a principal of an advisory for middle market transactions and executive recruitment. Trained as an

economist but practiced as a finance professional, he holds a Ph.D. and an MBA from the University of Chicago.

“In the day of prosperity be happy, but in

the day of adversity consider — God has

made the one as well as the other, so that

man will not discover anything that will

be after him.” - Ecclesiastes 7:14 (NASB)

dversity is a fact of life. While

occasional mishaps in the course

of life or business are usually

well tolerated by the afflicted, severe and

unpredicted perturbations could threaten

the very sustainability of the productive

functioning of organizations or individu-

als (Christians included) on otherwise

smooth paths of success.

Given the random nature of severe

disturbances, preparedness is often inef-

fective and costly to implement. Rather

the ability to return expeditiously to a

functioning state of equilibrium is

strongly related to the notion of balance

or stability. Individuals exhibiting bal-

ance, physically, psychologically, and

spiritually, define stable families,

organizations, and communities in the

face of shock and turbulence. They build

resilient entities.1

Resilience is a concept that has re-

ceived much attention from researchers

in a wide variety of disciplines since the

turn of the new millennium. At the indi-

vidual level, the concept refers to the

human capacity to deal with and over-

come the adversities of life.2 A broader

interpretation that applies to entire insti-

tutions and organization systems is of-

fered by the U.S. Department of Ho-

meland Security, which defines resilience

as “the ability of systems, infrastructures,

government, business and citizenry to

resist, absorb, recover from, or adapt to

an adverse occurrence ... of national sig-

nificance.”3

The ability to deal with and triumph

over unexpected disturbances in life is

obviously important in maintaining the

mental and physical health of anyone

who experiences life’s inevitable adver-

sities. Similarly an organization’s or a

corporate entity’s ability to adjust and

thrive in the face of serious challenges

A

CBR Articles


Resilience

defines its financial health or survivabil-

ity in the competitive marketplace. In

addition, since actions and interactions

among organizational members underpin

the entity’s collective capacity for effec-

tive response, the resilience of an organ-

ization or a firm is characterized by that

of its individual members.

The surge in interest in the concept

of resilience has been a response to a

cascade of events that are by nature rare,

unpredictable, yet cataclysmically con-

sequential. “Black swans,” as mathema-

tician Nassim Taleb would refer

to these unpleasant, hugely dis-

ruptive surprises.4

The AIDS

epidemic, 9/11 attack, SARS

outbreak, subprime financial cri-

sis, Haiti earthquake, Japan tsu-

nami, and the ongoing European

sovereign debt crisis are all ex-

amples of sudden, intractable

turbulences that test the resi-

lience of individuals, families, entire

communities, and indeed, the global

economy because of their contagious

nature in an integrated, complexly net-

worked new world order.

The exposure to risks, particularly

low probability but high consequence

risks (what statisticians call “tail risks”),

is necessary in determining the capacity

for resilience. Risks that recur with suf-

ficient frequency are better managed.

Risks that are rare and cause certainty of

significant loss could induce irrational

responses.

The works of Nobel laureate Daniel

Kahneman and Amos Tversky suggest

that, when faced with the prospect of

certain loss, people will choose to gamble

on the slight probability of gain and not

focus on the greater probability of loss,

often exacerbating the adverse outcome

when disruptions strike.5

Resilience

therefore not only requires the capacity to

react positively to mishaps, but also the

wisdom to make principled choices that

transform accepted practices and beha-

viors. Indeed the capability to self-renew

over time through innovation is a key

aspect of resilience in organizational

strategic management.6

Under challenging and desperate

conditions, the animal spirits in us would

render impotent the self-will to persist

and adapt, let alone to thrive and renew.

Therefore it is not surprising to learn that

researchers across disciplines have iden-

tified faith and spirituality as a key con-

tributor to resilience.7 For the Christian,

the transcendent purpose of life is not

anchored in the transient and the de-

structible, but in the eternal promise of

Creator God who is our refuge and

strength (Psalm 46:1), and from whom

we receive the strength to overcome

(Philippians 4:13) all sufferings that pale

in comparison with the future glory

awaiting believers (Romans 8:18). Jesus

himself assures his followers that “in the

world you have tribulation, but take

courage, I have overcome the world”

(John 16:33).

The Apostle Paul reminds believers

that the secret to triumphant living under

these promises is to be transformed by

the constant renewing of our mind (Ro-

mans 12:2), giving the Holy Spirit the

dominion over our will and action instead

of the animal spirit. Pastor and leadership

expert Wallace Henley, commenting on

the global turbulences that engulfed

Research shows faith and

spirituality to be a key

contributor to resilience

CBR Articles


Resilience

Psychological Safety

Accept-ance

Respect

Deep Social Capital

Integrity

Loyalty

Diffused Power and

Accountability

Account-ability

Interde-pendence

Accessibility of Resource

Network

Brother-hood

Love / Share

How Christian Virtues Support Contextual Conditions

for Organizational Resilience

much of the world in recent years, writes,

“there is much travail and panic as people

look at the devastation the turbulence has

brought to individuals, homes…and

businesses. But men and women who

have a biblically based worldview know

there is immense opportunity for trans-

forming all these spheres by reestablish-

ing them on the rock-solid truths and

principles of the kingdom of God.”8

Christians who believe in God’s

trustworthiness live a life suffused with a

strong sense of moral purpose, core val-

ue, and vision. At the organizational lev-

el, especially for small and medium size

businesses where individual leadership

and small group dynamics strongly in-

fluence enterprise adaptiveness and

flexibility, these become the critical

success factors for the creation of orga-

nizational resilience.9

Researchers have also identified

several contextual conditions that support

resilience with particular implications at

the group and organization levels.10

These conditions include:

psychological safety, where

people perceive their personal or

work environments as conducive

to taking interpersonal risks –

risks of being ignored, rejected,

or ridiculed;

deep social capital, where inte-

ractions are rooted in trust, ho-

nesty, and self-respect;

diffused power and accountabil-

ity, where a strong sense of in-

terdependence, individual and

group accountability, and shared

goal governs the deci-

sion-making process; and

accessibility of broad resource

network, where relationships

with external sources of re-

sources can be readily and stra-

CBR Articles


Resilience

A balanced individ-

ual or community of

individuals is the

mooring of organi-

zation, institution

and system resi-

lience.

tegically deployed to support

adaptive initiatives.

While secular entities work hard to

design and cultivate these infrastructures

and modes of behavior, it appears the

community of genuine Christ followers is

naturally positioned to function within

these contexts. Whether in the family unit

or within a community, the psychological

aspects of relational Christianity are

rooted in the virtues of humility, gentle-

ness and patience (Ephesians 4:2). The

dictates of Christian conduct, in harmony

with God’s will, are vividly illustrated by

Romans 12,11

where acceptance

(v. 16), respect

(v.10), integrity (v.

9), loyalty (v.10),

accountability (v.

6), and interde-

pendence (v. 5) are

the requisites of

healthful relations.

In such a ge-

nuine community

of brotherly love,

where the believer

is to serve the

community before

his/her own inter-

est, a trusted network of external re-

sources is readily available to the des-

pondent when disasters strike. Gene

Getz, writing in Building Up One

Another, summarizes Paul’s teaching

about unity this way: “Not one of us can

function effectively by ourselves; we

need each other. Not one of us is more

important than any other Christian, even

though one of us may have a more ob-

vious or more significant position in the

body. We are to be clothed with humility,

remembering that even the one who has

the greatest responsibility is to be the

greatest servant.”12

In all these there is a

shared purpose, to build up the body of

Christ so that all become mature and at-

tain the fullness in the knowledge of God

(Ephesians 4:12-16).

A balanced life for a Christian is a

life in harmony with God’s will, knowing

that the one who has created us will al-

ways answer and revive us when in

trouble (Psalms 86:7, 138:7), and that we

can do all things through Him who

strengthens us (Philippians 4:13). A ba-

lanced individual or community of indi-

viduals trusting in the same divine source

of strength and striving toward the same

moral purpose is

the mooring of or-

ganization, institu-

tion and system

resilience.

Entities under

Christian leader-

ship or amenable to

the influence of

Christian beliefs

should nurture

values, cultivate

networks, and build

infrastructures that

harness the strength

of biblical ethics in

every layer of the

local community. Even in entities that are

not, the Christ follower needs to be the

salt and light, influencing the larger

community by being a true testimony for

resilience in a world that would despe-

rately search for balance and stability

when maelstrom strikes.

CBR Articles


Resilience

1Denis Smith and Moira Fischbacher, “Changing

nature of risk and risk management,” Risk

Management 11 (2009), 1-12. 2 Suniya S. Luthar and Laurel Bidwell Zelazo,

“Research on resilience: An integrative review,”

in Resilience and Vulnerability: Adaptation in the

Context of Childhood Adversities, by Suniyar S.

Luthar (ed.) (Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 2003), 513. 3 U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Risk

Steering Committee, Risk Lexicon (2008), 23. 4 Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: The

Impact of the Highly Improbable (New York:

Random House, 2007). 5

Kahneman and Tversky’s work (“Prospect

theory: An analysis of decision under risk,”

Econometrica 47 (1979), 263-291), has wide

applications in business and finance. It explains

why investors have loss aversion (i.e., hanging

onto loss positions in hope of a recovery which

may never come, thus ending up with un-

der-diversified portfolios) and why firms or pol-

icy makers have myopic focus when dealing with

failed products, projects, or policies. The mis-

guided response often results in prolonging the

adverse outcome and seeding more pronounced

future risks. A good case in point is the ongoing

European credit crisis which exploded as a result

of the long neglect by national leaders of desta-

bilizing fiscal deficits and public sector indeb-

tedness. 6 Patrick Reinmoeller and Nicole van Baardwijk,

“The link between diversity and resilience,” MIT

Sloan Management Review 46(4) (summer 2005),

61.

7 See, for example, David Bosworth, “Faith and

resilience: King David’s reaction to the death of

Bathsheba’s firstborn,” Catholic Biblical Quar-

terly 73 (2011), 691-707; Helen Herrman et al.,

“What is resilience,” Canadian Journal of Psy-

chiatry 56(5) (2011), 258-65; Cynthia A. Leng-

nick-Hall, Tammy E. Beck, and Mark L. Leng-

nick-Hall, “Developing a capacity for organiza-

tional resilience through strategic human resource

management,” Human Resources Management

Review 21 (2011), 243-55; and Kenneth I. Par-

gament and Jeremy P. Cummings, “Anchored by

faith: Religion as a resilience factor,” in J.W.

Reich et.al., Handbook of Adult Resilience (New

York: Guilford Press, 2010), 193-210. 8

Wallace Henley, Globequake: Living in the

Unshakeable Kingdom While the World Falls

Apart (Nashville, TN.: Thomas Nelson, 2012),

69. 9 Steven F. Freeman, L. Hirschhorn, and M. Maltz,

“Organizational resilience and moral purpose:

Sandler O’Neill & Partners, L.P. in the aftermath

of September 11, 2001,” University of Pennsyl-

vania Center for Organizational Dynamics

Working Paper (2004). 10

Lengnick-Hall et. al., “Organizational resi-

lience,” 247. 11

See also related themes in 1 Corinthians

12:12-37 and Ephesians 4. 12

Gene A. Getz, Building Up One Another

(Wheaton, IL.: Victor Books, 1976), 11-12.

Notes


Contributor Guidelines

CBR Guidelines for Authors

Review Process

Each proposal or paper is reviewed by one of CBR’s editors and, if it is judged suitable for

this publication, is then further evaluated: experience-based papers by the Editorial Board;

and research-based papers by at least one independent referee for double-blind peer review

in addition to the Editorial Board. Based on their recommendation, the editors then decide

whether the paper should be accepted as is, revised or rejected.

General Purpose and Style

As an academic journal the CBR adheres to high scholarly standards. As a publication for

business professionals, the CBR emphasizes the practicality of ideas in the real world of

business. In either case, however, the core message must convey biblical perspectives

based on a proper interpretation of the Scripture with due regard for exegetical and her-

meneutic principles.

The CBR covers a wide range of topics and is open to many approaches. For

full-length articles the contributors must indicate thorough research of existing academic

literature on the subject matter and offer a clear advance on the understanding of biblical

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christian business review: inaugural issue - july 2012

Documents

business school of business

business ccb

business communities

christian business review

future business leaders

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