Faith and Work News ~ Links to Interesting Articles

• • Investing Billions for the Common Good: A Conversation with Robin John, CEO of Eventide. How far can our impact investing go? What if we evaluated the impacts of companies and products by examining supply chains, employment practices, and second-order effects on customers, communities, and the world? Meet Robin John, co-founder and CEO of Eventide, a Boston-based investment firm. Robin joins Dan on this episode of Working with Dan Doriani, to talk about why our investment decisions matter, and how they might change our different corners of the world.
  • Work Hard, Be Humble. Paul Tripp writes “Christians ought to be the hardest workers on earth.”
    • • Click on ‘Continue reading’ for:
        • • • More links to interesting articles
            • The Top 10 Faith and Work Quotes of the Week
            • Faith and Work Book Review ~ Working Blessedly Forever Volume 1: The Shape of Marketplace Theology by R. Paul Stevens
            • Quotes from the book Creation Regained: Biblical Basis for a Reformational Worldview by Albert Wolters

• A Leader Worth Following. My new book A Leader Work Following: 40 Key Leadership Attributes and Applications to Masteris available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle editions. Read a sample of the book (found under the book cover in the above link).
• Make Faith and Work Part of Your Church’s Ministry. Andrew Spencer interviews Tom Nelson, author of Why Work Matters: How God Uses Our Everyday Vocations to Transform Us, Our Neighbors, and the World about his book and about how the faith-and-work movement has changed over the years.
• Take This Hymn to Work with You – “Great is Thy Faithfulness”. Russ Gehrlein writes “On one of my walks around the first floor of the large headquarters building where I have had the privilege to work for the past 17 years, I had another idea for a series of articles. What if I found a classic hymn that I’ve sung on many Sundays over the years and tied it to some of the timeless principles from the practical theology of work that might inspire Christian workers on Monday?”
• Called to Lead. My book Called to Lead: Living and Leading for Jesus in the Workplace is available in both a paperback and Kindle edition. Read a free sample (Introduction through Chapter 2).
• Key Biblical Principles for Employees. Russ Gehrlein writes “In my last post, I laid out some basic biblical guidelines for employers and employees to follow at work. Now, I will share a few additional principles that are beneficial specifically for employees.”
• Your Calling Transcends Your Job. Nathan Finn reviews the new book You Have a Calling by Karen Swallow Prior. He writes “You Have a Callingis a superb resource for pastors and church leaders to help equip their people to think vocationally.”
• Flourishing and Fruitfulness in the Third Third of Life. Mark D. Roberts writes “Those of us who are older still have potential for God-honoring fruitfulness. God exhorts us to be fruitful in all seasons of life.”
• What Do I Do When I Hate My Job? In this devotional, Darryl Williamson shares how God can provide for Christians even through jobs we dislike and how we can reframe the way we view our vocations.
• Karen Swallow Prior Has Her Doubts About Your Passion. On this episode of The Habit Podcast, Karen Swallow Prior and Jonathan Rogers talk about following your passion (she has her doubts about that advice), knowing your limitations (she doesn’t think you can be anything you want to be), and listening for your calling (she doesn’t think it has to be all that mystical).
• Seek Wisdom in an Age of Endless Answers. “On this episode of the Faith and Work Podcast, we delve into the profound insights shared by Dr. Uli Chi at the Business for the Common Good annual event. As we navigate an era inundated with information and artificial intelligence, Dr. Chi challenges us to seek wisdom—a rare and invaluable asset. Through personal stories and biblical teachings, he explores the essence of wise leadership, emphasizing that wise leadership is human leadership. He also highlights the surprising spiritual discipline of sleep as essential for wise leaders. Join us as we uncover how to cultivate wisdom in our lives and lead with purpose for the common good.”

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Top 10 Faith and Work Quotes of the Week

• The sabbath is an act of trust. The sabbath, our rest, points to God’s work and rest, which means you’re not God – he is. Tim Keller
• As a philosophy of leadership, servant leadership may be considered one option among many others; but as a theology of leadership, it is a mandate for all who call Jesus Lord. Ken Blanchard and Phil Hodges
• Real Work is a contribution to the good of all and not merely a means to one’s own advancement. Tim Keller
• All honest work is sacred when devoted to the glory of God. Dan Doriani
• Following Christ means viewing our entire life (including our work) as service to God and others rather than as a means of getting something from this world. Jordan Raynor
• When we begin to see that there’s dignity in every vocation, we realize that every job has a purpose of serving others and bringing glory to God. Bryan Chapell
• Work is not simply a means to an income. It is about stewardship, productivity, fruitfulness, relationships, for the good of the world, and for the glory of God. Kate Martin
• Your calling, when you find and embrace it, will result in the merging of your skills, talents, character traits, and experiences. John Maxwell
• God is calling you to a profession. His name is on you. Profess him in all you do. Honor him, and he will use your work for his purposes. Bryan Chapell
• A person’s career or vocation can become an idol. The person becomes so obsessed with getting ahead or making it to the top that both God and family take second place. Jerry Bridges

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FAITH AND WORK BOOK REVIEW:
Working Blessedly Forever Volume 1: The Shape of Marketplace Theology by R. Paul Stevens. Wipf and Stock Publishers. 315 pages. 2024
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I’ve read a number of books by R. Paul Stevens about the integration of our faith and work. This volume, the first of three, explores the shape of marketplace theology, its posture and methodology. The author uses a modified version of William Perkins’s definition of marketplace theology “marketplace theology is the science of working blessedly forever.” The author tells us that marketplace theology is good because it helps us make sense of where we spend most of our waking hours. He tells us that for believers this theology means integration, bringing work and faith together for the glory of God and the benefit of neighbors.
In this first volume, the author gathers his sixty years of working, praying, reflecting, teaching, and writing on the shape of marketplace theology. He uses the Epilogue to summarize the book and that is what I read first, and would recommend to you.
Stevens tells us that positively, marketplace theology engages the whole of biblical theology in the understanding, practicing, and spirituality of work, the worker, and the workplace. The integrating theme of marketplace theology is the kingdom of God.
There is much to glean in this volume about the integration of faith and work in the world from the now eighty-five-year-old author. Here are a few of the most helpful quotes from the book:

• God brings to us the meaning of our work. In God we bring meaning to our work.
• Our work will last, and we will work in the new heaven and new earth.
• Use every work opportunity and every challenge to seek God in prayer.
• The Great Commandment to love our neighbor finds at least partial fulfilment in our daily work.
• Essentially work is a sacrament through which men and women in the workplace are offering their work-service to God and neighbor as a sweet and pleasing gift.
• There is no such thing as secular work for the Christian. They either view their work as a sacrament with themselves as royal priests offering up their work to God or they are defaming their work.
• Doing our work for God is a great thing. But doing our work with God is even greater for it affirms that, bidden or not, God is with us and is working with us.
• Whatever gifts, talents, and personality you have now will be present and exalted in the new heaven and new earth.
• Your calling, which I assume is to help people, does not end with death, or worse still with formal retirement. It continues into eternity.
• Marketplace theology concerns the integration of faith and work in the world.
• Calling tells us why we work, for whom we work, how we are to work, and what our work should be.
• Marketplace theology is never finished, always provisional, always in process, ever being learned and practiced however imperfectly.

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Faith and Work Book Club – Won’t you read along with us?

Creation Regained: Biblical Basis for a Reformational Worldview by Albert Wolters

This book is recommended by the Center for Faith & Work. They write:
“Few contemporary books have been cited as often by those who are writing about taking up callings and vocations faithfully. This serious little book walks us through the key Biblical themes of the goodness of creation, the seriousness of the fall into sin, the decisive redemption gained by Christ, and the implications of working out the promised hope for a creation-wide restoration. With the keen eye of a philosopher and the passion of a Bible scholar, Wolter’s offers one of the definitive, concise books about a Christian worldview.  One of the most important books for those of us in CFW and highly recommended to understand a uniquely Christian view of cultural and vocational engagement.”

As we read through this this book, we now look at Chapter 2: Creation: The Law of Creation. Here are a few helpful quotes from the first section of the chapter:

• God’s daily work of preserving and governing the world cannot be separated from his act of calling the world into existence.
• Nearly all worldviews are united in their belief in a divine world order that lays down the law for both the natural and the human realms.
• Biblical religion is unique in proclaiming a God who is not himself subject to, but as Creator has posited, the world order.
• We have defined creation law as the totality of God’s sovereign activity toward the created cosmos. Included in that sovereign activity is God’s revelation in creation, what has traditionally been called “general revelation.”