Theology at Work and Why Work Matters

Ken Costa walks into a bank in Chelsea and says he wants to borrow £2,000 for three weeks. The loan officer strangely doesn't recognize Ken, and asks him what kind of collateral he has. Ken says, "I've got my executive car parked on the front here (I don't know what kind of car it is Ken.....) -- keep it until the loan is paid off -- here are the keys." The loan officer promptly has the car driven into the bank's underground parking for safe keeping, and gives Ken £2,000.

Three weeks later Ken comes into the bank, pays back the £2,000 loan, plus £10 interest, and regains possession of the car. The loan officer asks him, "Sir, if I may ask, why would a man who drives a car like that needed to borrow two thousand pounds?"

Ken answers, "I had to go to the US for three weeks, and where else could I store my car for that long for ten pounds?"

It is this kind of combination of entrepreneurialism and lateral thinking that has got us here today – as well as a double portion of God's grace.

As a Christian I am interested in business because I believe God is actively engaged in the wider world and the world of business – especially wealth creation soaked in business ethics. God is involved in the whole created order. This is why I am very glad to be here for the launch of your 'God at Work' course.

In case you hadn't noticed, the name of the course is ambiguous. It is about the workplace, and the fact that it is also God's place. It is also about God being at work, active, contemporary, making a difference today in your life and in mine. It is about God at work – even in times of recession.

Just because there is trouble in the world's financial markets, and an economic down-turn, there doesn't have to be a slump in our expectations of God. Let's waken up to the reality of God, with us, here, today, now. We can expect God to be at work among us this afternoon.

All of life is religious and there is a desperate need to reconnect the sacred and the secular. There is no more urgent time than now to break down the compartmentalised thinking that separates trust in God from the world of work.

"We are not humans having spiritual experiences but spiritual beings having human experiences" wrote Teilhard de Chardin. There needn't be a separation between what goes on in church and in our prayers – and what goes on in the office or in the boardroom or on the shop floor. God not only came down to earth in Jesus Christ but he continues to be very down to earth. We sometimes fail to do justice to the down-to-earthness of God. For the God we see in Jesus Christ is get-at-able!

I take some delight in the story of the British woman who spent some months serving God in Kenya. On her final visit to a remote township she attended the clinic of a medical mission. As the Maasai women there began to sing together she found herself deeply moved by their beautiful harmonies. She desperately committed herself to remember this sacred moment always, and was determined to share it with friends when she got home. With tears flowing down her cheeks, she turned to her friend and asked, "Please tell me the words of this song?" Her friend looked at her and solemnly replied:, "If you boil the water, you won't get dysentery"..

What the Gospel gives us, my friends, is the insight that all of life belongs to God. There is no area of practical wisdom that is separate from the wisdom of God. This means that the world of work, the world of business, and the world of finance are all part of God's world, and that the rule of God demands implicit obedience there too.

Do you know what is written above the door to the Bank of England?

'The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof' (Psalm 24.1). You have to wonder if people going by on their way to the city ever look up. The notes to this psalm in the King James Bible call it 'A statement of God's Lordship in the world.'

When something as trusted as the free market shows its cracks, with devastating cost to millions of people worldwide, it is not surprising that we begin to ask questions about what really makes the world go round.

The first week of the God at Work course homes in on the big vision we have as Christians for the world which God has made. God, who created the universe, is Lord of the whole earth.

God as creator makes us in his own image – as creative beings. He sets his creatures to work in the Garden of Eden. He gives humanity stewardship of the world – a responsibility which today is brought home to us all too urgently by climate change as one of care and nurture rather than exploitative dominion.

Even in the humiliation of their exile God speaks to his people through the prophet Jeremiah encouraging them to use their creativity to bless the city and the community where they are living. 'Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.'The Bible affirms the value of ordinary work, of sharing in the pursuit of the common good, a common and shared prosperity. This is not about selfish gain – it is the practical equivalent of praying. 'Give us this day our daily bread'. If you pray that, then you work it too, if you can. And it's 'Give us' because it's bread for sharing, not just bread for me.

What I long to see, whether it is in the workplace, in schools and colleges, in businesses or in local communities, is Jesus' words coming true: 'I am come that they might have life, and have it more abundantly' (John 10:10). Our interest as a church is to enable individuals, communities and corporations to become fully human and fully alive. Jesus comes to give us life to the full. The question we must each of us ask is 'how does my daily work fit into God's purposes for good in the world?'

Jesus came to earth with a job to do, the course reminds us. In taking upon himself our human nature, God in Christ rolled up his sleeves, 'bearing his holy arm' as the Old Testament puts it, to get alongside us in the carpenter's shop, in the farmer's fields and amongst the financial wheelers and dealers – of course he gave them a rough ride knocking, their tables over. The same Jesus said, "My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I, too, am working." (John 5:17). God is at work, and he is at work in Jesus. And he calls us to be co-workers – συνεργοΰντής – with him.

This is exciting. We are "what he made us, created in Jesus Christ for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life" (Ephesians 2:9). We get to work the works of God!

Jesus' greatest and most demanding work was in his suffering and death for us. This 'work' of Christ is expressed as the redemption of his people. Redemption is a term from the financial markets – it is about buying something or somebody back. God was in Christ redeeming the world, and reconciling the world to himself. What Jesus calls us to is the business of reclaiming territory, claiming back for God areas of his creation which have seemed at least to have been lost to him. God is at work. Our job is to join him. It is God's mission, and he loves us to join in.

It is very good news to hear of all the Alpha courses taking place at work, and to hear of Christian fellowships in the workplace. But the God at Work course is not just about increasing the size of the church – it is about breaking new ground for the kingdom of God, making more and more of a difference for good. We increase in numbers so we can make more of a difference.

Just as Jesus physically took on human flesh, just as he physically died and rose, his resurrected body taking on the shape of the world to come, so we are given hope that our very earthbound existence can be transformed by the work of the Holy Spirit in us. This means that our daily work does not need to be our daily grind, it can be our daily vocation, the place in which we pray God's Kingdom will come and his will be done. Our work is a place for God's transforming work.

The Church's work, our work as co-workers with God, is for the increasing realisation of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. Jesus comes to show us how the 'upside down' Kingdom values work out in an earthly context.

He understood the significance of his own ministry as he found them expressed in the words of Isaiah:

The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me,
   because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,
   to bind up the broken-hearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives,
   and release to the prisoners;
²to proclaim the year of the Lord's favour,
   and the day of vengeance of our God;
   to comfort all who mourn;
³to provide for those who mourn in Zion—
   to give them a garland instead of ashes,
the oil of gladness instead of mourning,
   the mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
   the planting of the Lord, to display his glory.
⁴They shall build up the ancient ruins,
   they shall raise up the former devastations;
they shall repair the ruined cities,
   the devastations of many generations.

(Isaiah 61:1-4)

Isaiah had written at a time when Jerusalem was in ruins and everything had collapsed around the people of God. In Jesus' time these words came alive because the Roman Occupation had once again humiliated and enslaved God's people. Today the troubles of our financial crisis are slight, by comparison. A city that survived the Blitz can survive recession, surely!

But just as after the war they had to live through a time of pre-fabs and rationing, I believe we urgently need to rediscover what it is to rebuild the city in our day, and now, in this time of transition, we need to learn how to build it. It is all the more important in these crucial days that Christians take their faith with them to the workplace and put it to work in the business of the Kingdom of God.

I believe that many people embarking on this course, as indeed many beginning Alpha courses just now, will be doing so with half the work already done.

People already see the financial crisis as a crisis of what really matters in life. The systems everyone believed in even a few months ago have let us all down. The market was never going to work as a way of taking responsibility for each other in our local and global economies. In our imagination, addiction to growth, fuelled by over-borrowing (debt), stopped being a bad thing. Instead, it became a means to an end, a route to growth. But then it became a commodity to be traded, and everyone forgot what essentially, it was, until it finally kicked us in the face. The bubble burst, and we found out what had gone wrong too late. The unfettered pursuit of profit was never going to deliver. It is this idolatrous love of money, pursuing profit without regard for ethic, risk or consequence, which led us to our current situation. Money ceased to be a means of exchanging goods and commodities and became, itself, the goods and commodities.

Archbishop William Temple, in his 1943 lecture on Social Witness and Evangelism, argued for the need to see the economy as our servant and not our master. He said, "Maximum output is not a true end of human enterprise; the end is fullness of personality in community; nothing economic is a true end. Consequently all economic methods and structures must be subject to criticism on non-economic as well as economic grounds. On economic grounds they must be tested by the question whether they are fully efficient, or, in common speech, do they work? And this question must be asked of any improvement of them proposed on humanitarian grounds. But the non-economic question must be kept in view: does this economic method or structure either help or hinder the development of persons in community?"[1]

Only when the answer to that latter question is found, will our road to recovery have begun.

We have been encouraged in the past few years to take risks. This was the way to success. Don't be timid. Push the boat out. Put your head above the parapet. We've used the same words in our church life too. But it is only half of the picture. Now we are into a more cautious mindset, will counting the cost be the new catchphrase? There is a place for stepping out in faith, and there is a place for counting the cost, for looking before you leap....

I have just come back from Alexandria where I was meeting with the other Primates from around the Anglican Communion. Ask them what they think about the world of business at this time? Anyone thinking about the world of work, and the work there's waiting to be done in the world, must remember facts like these, and be ready to respond to them:

We live in a world where:

· a child dies every three seconds due to extreme poverty, almost 10 million children a year.

· One person dies from HIV/Aids every 11 seconds.

· Approximately 1 in 7 children in the world – 270 million children – have no access to healthcare

· Every single day unsafe water coupled with a lack of basic sanitation kills 5,000 children

· Poor Governance, in countries such as Zimbabwe, has led to malnutrition, a crumbling health system and the outbreak of avoidable diseases, like cholera claiming thousands of lives in Zimbabwe.

The Church needs to affirm the world of business and commerce as a force for good in the world. It should be a force to be reckoned with in tackling inequalities, in making the life we live more sustainable, and in raising not necessarily the wealth but certainly the wellbeing of all.

Banking is an honourable objective – but not the gambling casino in the basement of banking, for ever stoking the fires of speculation and the invention of illusory products, like sub-prime mortgages (junk mortgages), CDOs (Collateral Debt Obligations), and the parcelling of debt into manageable bundles and spreading them across the piece!

History is littered with the moral bankruptcy of people who were Christian in name but not in behaviour, who were silent or indifferent in the face of dehumanising and destructive power of governments. As Martin Luther King Junior said: "We shall have to repent in this generation, not so much for the evil deeds of the wicked people, but for the appalling silence of the good people."

Business at its best is a powerful force for the transformation of society, for meeting human needs at the place of greatest suffering, building cohesion and understanding between peoples. To do this, Business must have ethics at its heart.

The nature of human living also means that there is also much that seems not to fit with God's vision for the world. Abuse of power, greed, lack of trust, etc. The Church is also caught up in these ambiguities.

Many Christians are living out their lives as the church dispersed in the world of business and commerce every day. They are involved daily in building the Kingdom and have the daily challenge of living by a set of values that the world thinks are mad. Their counter cultural work and calling needs to be recognised, affirmed and supported.

The challenge for us as humans is to find ways of exercising the enormous freedom that God gives us to create for good. Every day we are confronted with difficult choices in a complex and ambiguous world. The course's section on 'Tough decisions' will be really helpful to those having to make choices which will affect people for good or ill. Balancing the success or survival of the company with the welfare of the people involved is a painful business, and needs much prayer as well as careful thought. The course's 'five steps for making wise choices' won't guarantee success, but they will certainly help people to make these decisions in the presence of God. We should be praying for those who are in this situation – even this afternoon.

Please stand. Two people please lift up our brothers and sisters in prayer.

I particularly like the comment in the notes on Luke 20:21-25 – when they asked Jesus whether it was right or wrong to pay taxes to Caesar. The notes say 'we do not have to restrict our answers to the options offered'. Jesus took a coin and asked them whose face was on it. Give to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what belongs to God. That is: Caesar-worship is usurping the place of God. His worth is a coin. God, on the other hand, demands your total life to be surrendered to God.

Paying taxes does not take away your obligation to God. You have bought into the system of money. But you belong to God. Give to God what is God's!

Often it seems we are presented with choices that put us between a rock and a hard place. These may not be the only options available – the infinite creative wisdom of God is bursting with possibilities. Nothing is impossible with God.

Business and commerce is very often at the sharp end of ethical choices. It can be a real struggle to find a balance between competing views of what is good. There are no simple answers. In the current economic and financial crisis it is easy to point the finger of blame – it's more difficult to identify practical solutions. We need to be imaginative about identifying solutions. We bring to the table a particular perspective – the vision of justice and righteousness that comes from a creative and generous God.

It is not as if we are the only ethically minded people on the block – far from it. But what we are called to in Christ often asks of us more, and beckons us to a bigger vision.

We need to be shaped by that vision, and give ourselves to it, whatever it costs and however long it takes.

Reinhold Niebuhr said:

Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime,

Therefore, we are saved by hope.

The writer to the Hebrews in Chapter 11 verses 8-10 speaks of the adventure and patience of faith. Abraham's faith was the faith that was ready for adventure. He went out not knowing where he was going. Abraham's faith was the faith that had patience. When he reached the promised land, he was never allowed to possess it. He had to wander in it, a stranger and a tent-dweller, as his descendants one day were to wander in the wilderness. To Abraham, God's promises never came fully true; and yet he never abandoned his faith. The person who trusts in God implicitly, is the person whose hope is bright and whose effort is intensely strenuous. And that's so even in the days when there is nothing to do but wait. Abraham's faith gave him a big vision.

No-one has done anything great without a vision which enabled him or her to face the difficulties and discouragements of the way. God cannot give us the vision unless we permit him, but if we wait upon him, even in earths desert places – even in the desert places of a global downturn – he will send us the vision. With the vision inspiring us the toil and trouble of our journey becomes worthwhile.

What then of this vision – a vision for business – for God at work in the world of work? What is our calling in business? There are five themes I want to pick up briefly now. They are relevant at all times, but all the more so in the midst of the current economic crisis.

1. Corporate Social Responsibility is a very welcome if now not so new phrase in the dictionary of ethics. It is about how we face up to our responsibility for stewardship of all the earth's resources and about our engagement with local – and international communities.

One law firm I know has set some of its partners free to devote time to offering a pro bono service to local community groups and charities.

In times when some firms will be looking to economise on such things I hope that doing the God at Work course will encourage people to take more seriously the challenge of corporate social responsibility.

2. Sustainable wealth-creation and development. Present circumstances have won the argument now for a new economics based on sustainable, social, and ethical values. The amazing impact of microfinance initiatives in the developing world demonstrates the power of investment to lift people out of poverty and transform communities.

When you see local communities beginning to hope because people have got together to form a credit union, and people have managed to get loans to start small businesses, and small businesses are growing into bigger ones – then you see the huge potential for transforming the prospects of the world's poor. I hope doing the God at Work course will encourage participants to get involved with initiatives like this. Business is about creating wealth – yes – but let that creativity and wealth be shared very widely in our global village.

3. Knowledge and learning

In and age awash with information how do we develop wisdom and really value learning? There is an information surplus – but a wisdom deficit.

If we begin with a Trinitarian understanding of God, we will realise our humanity is essentially social. In the African idiom, 'I am because we are, I am because I participate'. A person is a person through other persons. We learn from being together. There is no more appropriate time for those of us who thought we knew what made the world go round to sit at the feet of the Saviour, and hear his words of wisdom, his words of salvation. 'Come to me, all you who are tired of carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take the yoke I give you. Put it on your shoulders and learn from me. I am gentle and humble, and you will find rest. This yoke is easy to bear, and this burden is light."' (Matthew 11:28-30). A yoke was put on the neck of an animal, so it could pull a plough or wagon. A yoke was a symbol of obedience and hard work. Jesus of Nazareth is inviting diligent seekers who are willing to accept the heavy responsibility (burden) of discipleship, which he makes light. Obedience leads to hard work, which Christ makes light when we are yoked to him.

Remember that the first description of the followers of Jesus is not 'Christians' but 'disciples' - learners – people who haven't got it right yet but who are on the way. It's good to see fresh expressions of church breaking out in the world of work – learning communities – places where new disciples develop and apply their learning to change their world. Knowledge is power. So let us learn from Christ and do it in his way or not do it at all.

4. Fair trade and justice throughout the supply chain

In a market where there will be increasing temptation to look after our own at the expense of justice and wellbeing for others, this will be increasingly important. We have to keep asking how we treat each other as customers and suppliers and learn to work in greater partnership and spirit of trust. I have ruffled a lot of feathers in the chocolate industry by telling them they are being too slow in bringing child labour and child trafficking to an end in their industry.

Isn't it horrifying that you still cannot be sure that your bar of chocolate hasn't been produced with the labour of trafficked children? Children sold into slavery in the 21^st century to make our Easter Eggs? Why is 'fair trade' still a minority business? I believe efforts are being made – but we need to step up these efforts, not let them slip.

5. Global versus Local

Then there is the difficult task of finding the balance between thinking global and acting local. I was involved in supporting the workers in our local York chocolate industry at a time when their jobs were about to be outsourced overseas. But ask a Yorkshire farmer what he thinks about fair trade – 'what's that?' will be his answer – farmers have been struggling in the price war with the supermarkets, and are virtual slaves on their own farmland.

As Christians these issues – and many more – are grist to the mill. They are the outworking, the expression of our faith in the God of the impossible.

But It would be a mistake to think that it was a one way traffic - the church having things to teach the world of business. Actually I know that many in business have helped to shape the mission of the church for the 21^st century – and will continue to do so. The Church needs Entrepreneurs – lay ones and ordained. Enterprise is rooted in the gospel. "God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten Son... the Word became flesh and dwelt among us ... He came to his own people and his own people received him not.... He breathed his last and said, 'It's finished'." Our God is get-at-able!

If you believe in the resurrection – then problems can be solved.

Much of the 'entrepreneurial vision' is in harmony with the values of the Kingdom : Growth, collaboration, creativity, risk taking, community building, responsiveness, serving, connecting and building bridges, learning, a focus on life.

More than anything in these times of fear, worry and anxiety, our country and our world need a big vision of hope – and you and I, in church and in business, are called to catch the vision and go for it.

May God give us his Spirit. For it will not be done by human wisdom, by politics or economics alone. Think of the gifts the church as a community brings to what Stephen Timms MP the other day called this 'broad coalition of hope' which our society needs:

As a church we know about growth

· Growing from a handful to over 2 billion followers – that's our history, that's our future too.

· Continuous process of new planting and renewal – and I thank God for HTB in all you do to help the wider church in this.

We know about innovation and creativity

· History shows the church constantly being renewed and revised by the Holy Spirit.

· And we are always being led by the Holy Spirit to develop new approaches and means of communicating the eternal Gospel of salvation.

We are global

· We are a Global movement with a focus on understanding that Christ is welcome in all cultures but is at home in none, because of culture's tendency to domesticate him.

· We are able to think global and act local. I think of Yorkshire villages teaming up with South African communities to address local and global problems.

We are dreamers and visionaries

· We are inspired by a big vision – the dream and reality of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth.

· We have a vision for the transformation of society and what it means to be fully human.

We are risk takers

· We are willing to work with ambiguity and uncertainty.

· We have pushed the boat out, and will continue to do so, because we have a God who ventured all for us in Christ.

We are committed to hard work

· In the church people commit their lives to the mission and give selflessly – even when there is a recession.

· And even if the results are slow in coming.

We have a great model of leadership

· Following Jesus, we are not afraid to swim against the tide – to take the lead and stand up for truths that are counter-cultural.

· At the same time this is the servant leadership modelled by the One who took the towel and washed his disciples' feet.

I take it you are here today – we are all here because we want to see business changing lives and transforming communities for the better. We want to see industry that makes the world a better place. We want to see an economy that serves humanity and sustains the world we share. We want to see God at work.

Working in business is for many of you here not only a career but also a calling, a vocation. I pray that God will bless your labour – not to make you wealthy at the expense of others, but to enable you to join –as 'co-workers' (συνεργοΰντής) with our gracious, generous, creative, redemptive, entrepreneurial God. The Pilgrim God who always walks ahead of us, beside us, around us and behind us. Constantly telling us, "Do not be afraid."

It takes time and it takes sacrifice and it takes commitment to get to the promised land. It demands that we possess a venturesome faith which looks to that City that is to come.

I am reminded of the old limerick -

Joshua the son of Nun

And Caleb the son of Jephunneh

Were the only two

Who led them through

To the land of milk and honey!

Joshua, if you remember, heard God's call on Moses' death to "be strong and very courageous, and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go". (Joshua 1:9).

When all around us are full of doom and gloom in today's crisis, we need people with Joshua's faith in God: long term thinkers who are willing to keep going, whatever it takes.

Caleb was one of the two that Joshua sent to spy out the land. The Bible says of him that he was wholehearted. That is a wonderful word. I know some great people involved in business, always giving generously, and wholeheartedly seeking justice and serving God in what they do. Making good business. Let us be wholehearted in our response to God today.

As we launch this course today, may God give us the big vision, And may he send down his spirit, to make us able to join him in all he would do, at work in the world, and in the world of work.

As Archbishop William Temple says, at the conclusion of his book, Christianity and the Social Order, "I should give a false impression of my own convictions if I did not here add that there is no hope of establishing a more Christian social order except through the labour and sacrifice of those in whom the spirit of Christ is active, and that the first necessity for progress is more and better Christians taking full responsibility as citizens for the political, social and economic system under which they and their fellows live"[2]

Like Abraham, may the Lord give us a faith which is ready for adventure. A faith which possesses the qualities of love, hope, and patience. A faith which is looking beyond this world.

A faith which believes the incredible, and therefore makes it possible for us to become sojourners and strangers, for our true home is in God. A faith that is prepared to pay the supreme sacrifice because of our loyalty to Christ, and which paradoxically defeats death. Lord, we believe. Help our unbelief.

Amen.