Category Archives: Faith

I have been invited to conduct three one-day seminars on marketplace ministry and business-as-mission (BAM), two in Pakistan and one in India (since I will already be on that side of the world). These conferences will be designed for pastors and other church leaders, business leaders and entrepreneurs. The end goal is to help pastors start developing marketplace Christians into networks then create a groundswell of evangelistic intention to reach out to their cities through businesses.

I will be preaching and teaching at Hujji Ministries International in Pakistan, then Life Light Ministries in India. Both cities are only about 2% Christian. The problems are many including issues with infrastructure, poor public education, and rampant corruption. The Christians in the marketplace have the opportunity to be major contributors to changing their cities practically AND spiritually. I want to be an encourager that business is their Kingdom calling.

This tour, however, needs your support. To facilitate travel, accommodations, food, venue rentals, and other logistical costs, I need to raise about $7,000 very quickly. Would you consider helping? I need just 70 people who will step up with a $100 gift to be able to go and bless those who are asking for help. Eden’s Bridge, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) so all gifts are 100% tax deductible in the U.S.

Please contact me directly at davedoty@edensbridge.org if you have any questions. Shalom, Dave Doty

 How Are We Doing? – Measuring the Impact and Performance of BAM Businesses

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excerpts from the Executive Summary (© BAM Think Tank 2013)

Business as mission is hard.

They need a compass to guide them—something to remind them of their direction and tell them if they are on track. Well designed and implemented metrics can help.

Without some consistently applied metrics it is very hard to know if the business is on track to achieve what it set out to do. That is dangerous for any business. However, since BAM businesses set out to bring glory to God and to expand the Kingdom of Christ, the consequences of being off track have eternal significance!

The Measuring Impact Issue Group … grappled with questions of how and what to measure in a BAM business, as well as why to measure.

Benchmarking and the development of best practice indicators are valuable for the entire BAM community.

There are many pitfalls in metrics and this report attempts to highlight these.

Collecting data is one thing, analyzing and evaluating it is quite another. We need in our evaluations to leave room for the Holy Spirit to work and to guide.

Possibly the most important aspect of metrics is their application—what do you do with the measure after you have prepared it?

Good metrics are a compass that enables good leaders to stay on track.

“Be still and know that I am God.” – Psalm 46:10a

Be still here is the Hebrew term raphah. It has several meanings which we will explore in three installments. I have tried to group twelve different nuances of raphah into subsets of four related meanings.

Raphah: Respite, Relax, Wait, Be Still

The central thrust of the verse above is toward the idea of resting. While it may pertain to both physical and mental activity, perhaps of greater importance is the release of anguish. We often think that a person who is grieving the loss of a loved one should “get some rest,” by which we mean, “go to sleep.” We know that deep rest rejuvenates the body. How often we set aside a problem until the morning and while the problem has not disappeared or diminished, when we are fresh and re-energized, we are more able to deal with it without the same levels of frustration or fear.

We are told of times when Jesus, feeling pressed by the crowds and the depth of their needs, slipped away, into the desert, across the water, or into a garden, to pray. He took a break to be rejuvenated by the Holy Spirit, and strengthened by an angel of God (Luke 22:43).

Western culture, and increasingly global culture, seems always to be speeding up but consistently we hear the sentiment of Psalm 46:10 reflected in Scripture but perhaps most importantly in Matthew 11:28-30:

“Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart; and you shall find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy, and My load is light.”

When I reflect on my surrounding culture here in North Atlanta, which is one of the busiest commercial centers in the U.S., I am reminded of Thomas Gray’s description, in Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, of the busy-ness of modern society, even in 1751, as the madding crowd’s ignoble strife. The frenzy of life easily makes us anxious, harried, and tired but Jesus says “Come away, rest.” It is as if He in himself is a place of escape from the insanity of the striving world, even in its midst.

When we can “get away from it all,” whether to a sunny summer hillside, or an overstuffed chair in a quiet corner, or a favorite secluded chapel, it is there that we can be still, and in our stillness wait to hear the voice of God, not in the rending of the earth, the roaring wind, or raging fire, but coming in the quiet moment, as it did for Elijah (1 Kings 19:11-12).

We often recognize the intense tiredness that comes after a long day of solving work problems or interacting with others in troubled relationships. Our bodies respond to the weariness of our minds. Getting away to clear our heads, especially in prayer or reflecting on ministering passages of the Bible, or perhaps to listen to favorite worship songs, re-sets our agendas, restores weakening faith, encourages the heart and gives us the opportunity to begin again, re-focused on Christ and the importance of pressing “on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus” – Philippians 3:14.

In stillness, forcing ourselves to set aside all the intrusions and worries that life throws our way, we can commune with God, knowing that “those who wait for the LORD will gain new strength” – Isaiah 40:31.

Raphah – Abandon, Cease, Let Go, Fall Limp

The second grouping of meanings we impute to raphah leans toward reaching an end, especially of our own strength to accomplish something, or moving beyond performance expectations. Perhaps it is best summed up when Jesus says, “For whoever wishes to save his life shall lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake shall find it” – Matthew 16:25.

When Adam and Eve fell from grace it was essentially due to the sin of self-determination. But self-determination, which is a product of pride, has a deeper cause. They chose to disobey God because they questioned whether what God had told them about eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil was true. In essence, they removed the authority from God to decide what was best for them, taking upon themselves the mantel of moral authority. But that action was merely symptomatic of their loss of faith in the integrity of God. They distrusted Him. They stopped believing God.

Ever since the Fall and the expulsion of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, humankind, in one way or another, has striven to “re-gain” the lost intimacy with God, or pursued a variety of panaceas to replace His presence, whether through wealth, power, alcohol, drugs, sex, or fame. All those, without a relationship with God, end in the desperation of trying to fill the void left by His absence from our lives. Often those pursuits will bring us to a crash, recognizing enough is never enough, whether it is in the diminishing psychological returns of increasing wealth or the dissatisfaction and emptiness wrought from deeper and deeper addictive behaviors.

Unfortunately, we sometimes also strive after religion, which is nothing more than trying to achieve righteousness by our own actions, as one of those panaceas. We get in our heads that if we can be good enough, to discipline ourselves to perform the right way every day, we will be good enough to go to heaven, good enough to earn God’s love that saves us.

Even if we have turned from overtly sinful behaviors, we often put on religion as a new addiction and find we are drawn toward legalism, following the checklist of God’s commands to justify ourselves. God proved by giving Israel the Ten Commandments that they were a fallen people. We seldom think about the fact that He gave Adam only one law . . . and Adam broke it!

Because we cannot atone for our own sin, that is, to make right the wrongs we have committed against God, our striving after holiness outside of the finished work of Christ on the Cross will fall short. But until we come to the realization that we cannot save ourselves, we strive on and become increasingly anxious wondering if we are yet good enough to please God.

In a word, raphah in Psalm 46:10 speaks to abandoning any notion of our own righteousness or our ability to attain in. Be still tells us to release our agendas or false notions of our own holiness. Here raphah also encourages us to release the anxiety that comes from falling short of the glory of God . . . and we all fall short (Romans 3:23). It is not until we fall limp in our inability, in our weakness, to become holy, that God can manifest and we begin to understand how the power of Christ is “perfected in our weakness” – 2 Corinthians 12:9.

You see, it is not until we come to our own end, recognizing our utter lack of righteousness and ability to save ourselves, that we come to the recognition of our need of a Savior, one other than us who is able to atone for sin, one already holy and willing to sacrifice self completely, in the very character of God, for the sake of the one fallen. Only Christ can take that position in our lives and only as we collapse under the crush of our indebtedness to God and abandon our self-justifying ego. In that moment of our coming to terms with our brokenness, His strength comes into the middle of our relationship to God and is made perfect for our restoration into the Kingdom of God.

Raphah – Become Discouraged, Lose Courage, Fail, Become Helpless

By now, I hope that you are beginning to see the richness of the word raphah, and why I consider the first phrase of Psalm 46:10 as pivotal in our relationship to God. But the meaning is deeper still as we take this last look.

It may seem odd that we can “know that God is God” when we are discouraged, or back away from following Christ, seeing only the pressing and demoralizing circumstances of life or the depth of our weaknesses when we fail, stumbling in sin. Can we “know that God is God” when we become helpless?

In Western thought, we are driven by a sense of self-worth based in our ability to perform. Individualism and our standards of success compel us toward independently striving for success, pulling ourselves up “by the bootstraps,” so to speak, to be recognized by our peers and families as worthy of acclaim and respect. Our economic system is geared toward working harder and smarter to carve out our place in the world. As the saying goes, “Laugh, and the world laughs with you. Weep, and you weep alone” (from Solitude by Ella Wheeler Cox).

When we fail or find ourselves discouraged, we also often find ourselves alone. It is easy to think that we are the only one suffering in such ways, that others in the church are surely more holy than we, or the folk down the street do not have the same depth of financial, career, or marriage struggles we face every day. Isolation deepens the darkness of our despair.

But we are not alone. Foremost, God is with us. When Isaiah prophesied of the coming Messiah, he said that the One would be called Immanuel, meaning God with us (Isaiah 7:14). A major component of the incarnational (in the flesh) presence of God in Jesus Christ was God condescending to share human experience with us. He faced the trials, tribulations, and temptations we all face. Life is hard and God knows it . . . firsthand.

So, when we are discouraged, or failing God, or recognize our helplessness to be holy, how is it we can “know that God is God?” Though Christ ascended back to heaven after the Resurrection, He did not leave us without resources, especially resources for the moments of our deepest spiritual needs. First and foremost is the gift and presence of the Holy Spirit within us. It is by the presence of the Holy Spirit that God helps and teaches us (John 14:26). The literal translation of helper (parakletos) is comforter. When we think of the gentleness of God, it is in the moments that the Holy Spirit invites us to look to God for our salvation and help rather than to self in the midst of our daily madness that we can perceive the comforting voice of God’s presence, calling to us, inviting our return, so “Let us therefore draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and may find grace to help in time of need” – Hebrews 4:16.

God has also given us the Bible. There have been many verses that have been soothing to me over the years of my walk with God. One of my favorites in the times when I am mostly acutely aware of my sinfulness is 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” When I read this verse, I am encouraged to be honest with God and myself about my weakness and my stumbling. There are a lot of promises in the Bible that encourage, such as Philippians 1:6: “being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” It reminds me to not try taking on God’s transformational work in my life and encourages me to reflect on times past when God has demonstrated His faithfulness in my life, and to think about His ability to save me when and where I am unable.

Finally, there is the church which is instructed to “come alongside each other daily for encouragement” (Hebrews 3:13). There have been countless times that I have feared the vulnerability of revealing my true self to others for fear of being rejected. We are created to live in community and fear being put out of fellowship with others. But inevitably, if I confide in those I trust in Christ, I find encouragement, sometimes exhortation, prayer, restoration, and forgiveness, all by the power of God’s grace, present in His church.

When we are hard pressed by the world or our own weakness, we should be still before God and know Him as our loving, Heavenly Father.

Fruitful Practices for Establishing Faith Communities

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Executive Summary (© BAM Think Tank 2013)

Many within the business as mission (BAM) movement, especially those from church planting mission agencies, are hopeful that the BAM concept can become a key strategy in starting new churches and transforming communities. This report will confirm that indeed the potential exists for these goals to be attained. However, while there is a good rationale for integrating business and church planting, to date there has been a relative lack of working examples and resources on best practices.

The objective of the Business as Mission and Church Planting Issue Group has been to research current practices and trends in the BAM movement and to identify fruitful practices that lead to the formation of new churches. We conducted interviews with BAM practitioners to identify foundational principles, key challenges and fruitful practices for BAM and church planting. Real examples from BAM companies are shared to illustrate some of the lessons learned by current practitioners.

Fruitful practices for integrating church planting and business include:

• Make sure that the business provides regular contact with the focus people. 

• Invest substantial time in learning language and culture before attempting to start a

business.

• Make business sustainability and profitability an essential goal.

• Give thoughtful consideration to staff selection.

• Clarify and communicate your strategic mission.

• Build local partnerships.

• Work in a team.

• Incorporate prayer right from the start.

• Incorporate biblical values and teaching.

• Work with a coach or mentor(s).

• Witness by doing business ethically and with care.

• Provide excellent products and services.

• Intentionally invest in relationships.

• Be socially responsible in the wider community.

Most BAM practitioners were able to share illustrations of transformational business practices, discipling conversations, significant relationships and anywhere from one to a handful of new Christ-followers in their company or work community. In some cases the double bottom lines of profitable business and planting churches has been achieved.

Therefore, the results of our research indicate that God has already used business to launch new churches. However church planting alongside operating a viable for-profit business presents significant challenges. Furthermore, we discovered only a handful of examples that have helped initiate a new church that can reproduce itself on its own.

Areas for further consideration and research are suggested, as well as practical recommendations for making greater advances in this area of business as mission. Our hope is that in the future there will be many more companies that do business well and at the same time help establish communities of faith that will be a reflection of God’s glory.

Case Studies and Insights from Business as Ministry at the Base of the Pyramid

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Executive Summary (© BAM Think Tank 2013)

Christians in Haiti have been in business for centuries, yet, within the last decade, have come to see that there is no dichotomy between their vocational calling to business and their Christian faith. According to data and interviews collected from many entrepreneurs in the Partners Worldwide network and other networks, entrepreneurs throughout Haiti now sense an affirmation to allow their Christian faith to guide every part of their lives, including their businesses.

The main difference is in the daily ways business people live out their faith. Business as mission (BAM) practices have tremendous influence in a culture where voodoo, mystics and irrational thinking prevail and negatively affect the workforce. Businesspeople and other stakeholders in a business sector are able to join force to utilize BAM practices that reflect the life of Jesus Christ and can influence societal and individual transformation through the direction and empowerment of the Holy Spirit.

Ralph Edmond, Evelien de Gier and Daniel-Gérard Rouzier are among these inspiring businesspeople living out their faith in Haiti. Although they have practiced Christianity throughout their lives, they have very rarely been affirmed—and oftentimes even been criticized—when they tried to see the direct connection between their Christian faith and their sphere of influence: their business and community. This is all undergoing transformation today, especially as they are now affirmed by other Christian believers to follow their calling from God to be in business.

Through the affirmation of business as ministry in Haiti, the BAM movement is bridging the gap between the church and business, by bringing Christian entrepreneurs and business professionals to a new affirmation and deep understanding of their sphere of influence they have always had, yet never recognized before. As a result, the BAM movement is moving throughout the country and region. This affirmation encourages and equips businesspeople to bridge the gap between business and the global church, and to humbly, faithfully, and practically follow their calling as Christians while serving God with the talents of their business skills. To God be the glory.

I previously wrote about three vocational “E’s” that marketplace Christians can leverage for the sake of advancing God’s mission in the world: education, experience, and expertise (From Milk to Meat: Applying the Three E’s of Marketplace Christians). There are other e-words that we might apply, like energy or effort, to consider the work that marketplace Christians intentionally direct to missional activities and ends. But the Divine E, is the impetus of God as partner in the work of the Holy Spirit working through us: in Hebrew, the `ezer.

We first come across `ezer in the phrase `ezer neged in Genesis 2:18 when Eve is conceived as a “suitable helper” to overcome the inadequacies of Adam’s isolation. The “suitable” – neged – implies “one in front of, visible, present with, or corresponding to.” Eve is Adam’s co-worker but of equal and perfectly paired roles. We find the superiority of Adam’s position in the relationship (to rule over her – Genesis 3:16) comes only in God’s response to Adam and Eve’s sin.

The concept of `ezer recurs in the Old Testament, occurring 21 times in all. Of those, five pertain to human assistance – the two occurrences in Genesis 2, where coupled with neged, and once each in Isaiah 30:5, Ezekiel 12:14, and Daniel 11:34. The other sixteen occurrences refer to God as the `ezer, the help or helper. This occurs most famously in Psalm 121:1 ­– “I Will lift up my eyes to the mountains; From whence shall my help come?”

Perhaps most telling about the relationship between the God of the Old Testament, Yahweh, and Jesus Christ, as the man-God of the New Testament is a similar sounding sentiment between Psalm 124:8 – “Our help (`ezer) is in the name of the LORD, Who made heaven and earth,” – and Romans 10:13 – “for ‘Whoever will call upon the name of the LORD will be saved’” (Paul citing Joel 2:32, emphasis mine).

Seeing the connection between these verses, surrounds the concept of `ezer with salvific overtones. The introduction of Eve, as the `ezer neged, was for the communal working out of Adam’s salvation (Philippians 2:12), to overcome the shortfalls of his isolation. She was his co-worker in the temporal toward his material prosperity. She was his collaborator to deepen his cognitive reach. And she was his partner in the practice of holiness, that is, obedience to God. She was able to help him to some degree, we can be sure, on the first two counts. But on the third, she, as do we all, fell short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). Adam put his trust in her words and leading, turning his back on God’s command, and the rest, as they say, is history.

But when we turn back to God as divine `ezer, we can be assured of wise counsel and positive intervention in our endeavors. The cooperative and collaborative nature of the community of the Triune God is not only the example we follow but puts forth the impetus to move our hearts, compelling us by the power and presence of the Holy Spirit within us each to act according to holiness. It is this helping power, the `ezer of God’s Spirit and presence, that creates in us right thought and, moving outwardly, right action to undertake ministry in every arena of life. Just as God moves us to love and serve our families, to take on charitable causes, to glorify him as readily as we breathe, it is by God’s help that we are moved to embrace our work as the stamp of God’s image (imago Dei) of who and what we are when we carry forth his nature, character, and will into the marketplace.

It is by the `ezer of God that our education, experience, expertise, energy, and efforts (and one might even include our entrepreneurial leanings!) are woven together (Romans 8:28). These, working well together, contribute to the productive wellness of human life, giving households incomes but also supplying the funds to meet every need, whether through charitable gifts, regular purchasing, or the application of taxes to common goods like parks, schools, police and military protection, and transportation corridors.

God’s Spirit has opened our eyes to a great opportunity: to glorify his name by our works (Matthew 5:16). When we pursue economic development and financial security for the poor through the wise use of all those other “e’s,” but most importantly with God’s help – his power and leading – it is truly Good News, a strong proclamation of God’s goodness and grace, divine kindness extended to all humankind. Marketplace ministries, extolling and demonstrating the righteousness of God, and offering our labors sacrificially for the sake of others, have the indwelling power of God infusing our witness. Marketplace Christians, for too long relegated to pew sitting and serving only as checkbooks to Christian churches and missionaries, have the opportunity to carry the Gospel to the world in unprecedented ways.

The lever is the simplest of all tools. By its use, one can create enormous advantage. God has gifted us with a wide variety of education, experience, and expertise. These are levers for our advantage and the advantage of the world. The `ezer, the help, of God is our fulcrum, the pivot point of our ability and productive existence, and by it, with apologies to Archimedes, we can transform the world.

“When Elisha returned to Gilgal, there was a famine in the land. As the sons of the prophets were sitting before him, he said to his servant, ‘Put on the large pot and boil stew for the sons of the prophets.’  Then one went out into the field to gather herbs, and found a wild vine and gathered from it his lap full of wild gourds, and came and sliced them into the pot of stew, for they did not know what they were.  So they poured it out for the men to eat. And it came about as they were eating of the stew, that they cried out and said, ‘O man of God, there is death (poison, NLT) in the pot.’ And they were unable to eat. But he said, ‘Now bring meal.’ And he threw it into the pot, and he said, ‘Pour it out for the people that they may eat.’ Then there was no harm in the pot.’” – 2 Kings 4:38-41

“and if they drink any deadly poison, it shall not hurt them” – from Mark 16:18.

While my ponderings here are not direct exegesis of the passages above, I want to incorporate two themes from them in a broader discussion. I recently attended a Christian conference where I presented a paper. I sat in on the four plenary sessions and attended other sessions during the conference to hear what others had to say on a myriad of topics. Some of the sessions addressed key hot topics in current Church discourse including interfaith dialog, sexual orientation, environmentalism, evolution, and so on. Some of what was shared was, to put it mildly, pushing the envelope of orthodoxy. As I listened, I also prayed that God would give me ears to hear and eyes to see what He was up to in this conference and within me in particular in being present to hear and see the goings on. In the end, I had to walk away clinging to the unity of the Spirit present within each who claim Christ as Lord and Savior no matter where we might disagree on doctrine or praxis. That is a very tall order.

I came away with the impression that God’s intention in my learning by being there was twofold, both requiring self-reflection and Bible reflection.

First, as seems always to be the case, the conference presented an opportunity to rely on God for discernment, that is, for discerning the spirit of the things being shared (1 Corinthians 12:10). That is most often accomplished by “rightly dividing the Word of Truth” (2 Timothy 2:15). This latter is a reliance on the voice of the Holy Spirit, especially as it unfolds the Bible’s meanings for us.

Hebrews 5:14 says “solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” Two questions arose. 1) Am I “mature” in Christ, able to discern good and evil? And, 2) what was I discerning? Mostly, I discerned truth in love, I believe. The heart of compassion of most of the presenters seemed apparent. Their intentions seemed good no matter what I might think of their general approach or methodologies. On the other hand, some presentations left me a bit uneasy. But discernment only works if I can also rightly divide between that which disturbs my flesh (ego) – “I don’t really want to think ‘X’ is acceptable, because I want to cling to what I ‘know’” – or my spirit – “This is something I need to be open to to grow in Christ because, in this, I am falling short.” As should be obvious, any disturbance in one has a corresponding disturbance in the other.

Second, I need to be exposed to ideas that make me uncomfortable, to force me into deeper prayer and study and to allow the Holy Spirit to convict me where my own views are less than holy and to strengthen me where I may have already arrived at Truth. Let us consider the two passages above in this approach.

The stew was made with the fruit of wild plants. Everything from God is good but not everything in creation is now good given the introduction of sin into the world at Adam’s fall. The Bible consistently encourages us that creation reveals the glory of God. We do not know what that fruit (the gourds thrown into the pot in the passage above) was, just that it obviously was not good. But Elisha added meal, some form of ground flour or corn, to the pot, and the stew was made good. He did not eliminate that which we might have equated to sin (death) in the pot . . . he redeemed it, making it good, by the simple addition of one more ingredient, what we call grace, which “removed” (or at least, neutralized) the poisoning effect of the bad fruit.

Consider that in light of my exposure to new ideas or ways of thinking theologically or interpreting biblically. Both knowing God (theology) or the Bible thoroughly are beyond the comprehension of any single mind or lifetime. We all “see as through a glass darkly” (1 Corinthians 13:12). This is simply a function of our finitude in the face of an infinite God. So, I should always be aware of my limitations and understand that in those quarters where I fall short of God’s holiness (many of which I am blind to), exposure to new ideas will disturb the status quo. But in those areas, the introduction of that one new ingredient may well be God’s redemptive stroke to transform me incrementally from glory to glory into the image of Christ (2 Corinthians 3:18), moving me along the path of growing intimacy with God.

On the other hand, what if that one new idea is a deception, either as a come-on by the enemy or a worldly temptation to satisfy my own flesh (ego)? Should I cloister myself behind the walls of a fortress to guard myself from such possibilities? I think not, as the Psalmist wrote: God goes before us (into spiritual battle) and is also our rear guard (139:5). Hence, I can be assured that what may be poisonous (Mark 16:18 above) will not harm me. I believe and can trust in this only insomuch as I believe God is greater than any threat that other influences may represent. Again, as the Psalmist says, “Even though I walk through the valley of shadow of death, I will fear no evil” (23:4). Why? Because perfect love casts out fear, even of judgment if I should stumble (1 John 4:18) and because God is (perfect) love (1 John 4:8). Who (or what) can stand against me? (Romans 8:31). Whom shall I fear? (Psalm 27:1).

But why would we willingly enter into discussion with those we may even think are advancing the enemy’s agenda unawares? For one, we cannot witness to those with whom we have no contact. We cannot find a child lost in the woods if we stay on the safe, beaten path and avoid the risks of entering the treacherous terrain of the wilderness. But we can enter any place with confidence before the roaring lion seeking our destruction (1 Peter 5:8) because we are assured that the gates of Hades will not prevail against God’s Church (Matthew 16:18). That is, the Church, by taking the battle to the enemy and attacking those gates, will triumph over death itself just as Christ has already done. And, entering that battle, we “do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul” (Matthew 10:28a).

God is on the offensive in the spiritual battle for the redemption of all creation. The Incarnation was God walking right into the enemy’s camp, “the ruler of this world” (John 12:31). In those environs we do not have to be offensive and combative . . . we need only be holy and present according to the pattern of Jesus coming to the world in the flesh. Holy presence changes things but only as love / holiness is willing to self-sacrifice. Jesus said “Love your enemies” (Matthew 5:44; Luke 6:27, 35). Demonstrate the living presence of God in your life in sacrificial ways. Embrace them and support them where you can. Show them you mean them no harm. Even allowing their ideas and words to be stirred into your pot, remember all the while that where the stew may be made poisonous, a little meal of the Bread of Life, can make it sweet and nourishing. Only by our own sacrifice, leaving our safe houses and running the risk of being rejected, even killed, may redemption come! Living for God in the face of death (separation from God) in the world is our calling to follow Jesus.

One of the most influential writings in history, The Art of War by Sun Tzu, mandatory reading for any candidate for military leadership, offers sage advice for Christians. Sun Tzu admonishes would-be warriors to “know thy enemy.” He also advises to “know thyself.” This is exactly why sports coaches constantly watch film of their upcoming opponents. Everyone has weakness(es). By close observation, those weaknesses can be perceived in the opponent and in ourselves, the former to serve as the target of our attack, the latter the place of our own shoring up. Even when we fail, the redemptive stroke is in our reflection to understand where our breakdown came.

Judo is another good example where the kinetic energy of the attacker is turned against the attacker. What the attacker perceives as strength – their speed and agility – becomes their downfall. David slew Goliath because Goliath’s ego had convinced the giant that he was so powerful as to be beyond any measure of attack from the puny Israelites. His pride, the ego behind the forehead penetrated by David’s stone, was his downfall.

Two more Bible stories show us that when we enter into the camps of the enemy, God goes before us. When Gideon’s 300 broke their clay pots, confusion reigned in the enemy’s camp and the Midianites were turned against each other, slaying their own comrades and ending in the utter destruction of that army (Judges 6-7). We find also that Jonathan and his armor bearer were able to overcome the Philistines by first putting themselves at risk then, by the boldness of their action, all of Israel, even those cowering in fear in the hills, was rallied to triumph and set the people free (1 Samuel 14:1-23).

In the end, just as Daniel was encouraged and strengthened by God (Daniel 10:19), we need not fear coming under the oppressive power of any enemy. Victory in Christ is already ours. We can eat of whatever is set before us without fear of our own corruption (Acts 10) but by so doing, we may gain access for witness to the unholy, like the smallest lamp dispelling the deep darkness of a place previously without light. Stir the pot of your own thinking. Expose yourself to the ideas that may now offend and the people expressing tem. Let God add the meal, to be the wheat of your consumption, to sweeten the pot and bring whatever seems poisonous to redemption.

(This paper was read at the Re-Imagining Faith: For America & the World conference on Thursday, January 9, 2014 at Georgetown College, Georgetown, Kentucky).

Last April, 535 delegates gathered in Chiang Mai, Thailand for the Global Business-as-Mission Congress, many delegates were from countries closed to Christian evangelism. The global, virtual think tank that preceded that convention has produced thirty issue papers. Topics range from the biblical and theological foundations of the marketplace to business as mission models that combat sex trafficking to mobilizing marketplace Christians in the developed world.

One block from the convention site sits the Zion Café. This small restaurant shares a common wall with a brothel where young women on bar stools line the curb each evening as living advertisements. The Zion Café serves as a place of respite from the streets and a launch point of daily outreach ministry to the hundreds of young prostitutes working in the surrounding neighborhoods.

In October, the Christian Community Development Association held its annual national convention in New Orleans. Among more than one hundred workshops on every aspect of community development, eight of those workshops focused on small business development, social entrepreneurship, and job creation as tools for fighting urban poverty.

In recent years, more than three dozen books have been written on the integration of business and mission, especially as an effective means of holistic witness. Business as mission, or BAM, witnesses to the glory of God by taking an axe to the roots of poverty as it is coupled with preaching the Gospel. Most BAM initiatives to date involve micro-lending and developing microenterprises in developing economies.[i]

I share these things to illustrate some of the variety and the proliferation of market-based ministries springing up around the world.

Henry Blackaby summed up Jesus’ earthly ministry as a call to every Christian to be evangelistic witnesses to the glory of God. He wrote: “Watch to see where God is at work and join Him”(69).[ii]  The growth in number and variety of marketplace ministries around the world the last two decades looks something like the beginnings of an exponential curve. Ken Eldred titled his own book, God is at Work (2005), and many missiologists justifiably argue that it is time for us to join Him.

But what can or should we do? Without theological clarity in answering the call to marketplace ministry, we risk religious disasters that could leave those ministered to worse off than in their beginning, now poor AND disillusioned.

I took part in the Global Business-as-Mission Think Tank and was a contributor to the issue paper on the biblical foundations of business as mission. This came about a year and a half after the publication of my book on marketplace theology, Eden’s Bridge: The Marketplace in Creation and Mission.

As a serial entrepreneur called to seminary to study the integration of Christian faith and economics, my biblical journey began with Deuteronomy 8:18. It reads, in part, “Remember the LORD your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers.” This passages presents a couple of questions: how does God give us the ability to create wealth and how does it confirm His covenant with Israel?

Somewhere along my way, I became convinced the marketplace is a creation of God but could not point to particular Scriptures to validate my thesis. However,t if business is part of God’s created order, it is not unreasonable to expect to find biblical support.

I began to re-read Genesis 1 and 2 through economic lenses. There are three components necessary to facilitate most production – energy, raw materials, and labor. God created a life-supporting, self-sustaining ecosystem, full of energy and raw materials. He then created Adam to work within and manage its further development. In economic perspective, the earth-sun ecosystem is the primary means of production and source of all the amenities of modern life.

Adam’s roles, as laborer and caretaker, are clear in Genesis 2:15. To date, most market related studies have focused on theologies of work and stewardship. But simply combining labor and management, that is, work and stewardship, does not a market make. There is still a missing ingredient: someone with whom to trade goods and services.

“God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.’” But, why is it not good for Adam to be alone?

The Garden was designed to flourish, to increase in abundance to serve humankind’s physical needs. In part, it was not good for Adam to be alone because humankind was also intended to flourish as a critical component of the created order. There are three distinct ways that Adam’s isolation was a hindrance to his prosperity.

First, Adam could not prosper materially. His productive output was limited by his own capacity. The first mention of Eve is as a helpmate, a co-worker. The marketplace needs energy, materials, and labor, but it is ultimately founded upon the division of labor and consumption. Specialization and exchanges between workers increase efficiency and create new wealth. Eve’s role as helpmate was for Adam’s immediate prosperity by improving productivity.  Her role as wife is a projection of future proliferation.

Second, Adam could not prosper intellectually. God could have given Adam unlimited knowledge and wisdom and perhaps Adam could have produced miraculous output. But God, for whatever reason, did not. Together, Adam and Eve could collaborate. Eve’s presence offered an alternative intellectual perspective. And today we can easily identify an abundance of business and leadership literature on the value of collaboration.

Finally, being alone, Adam could not prosper spiritually. I like to say that holiness occupies empty space. Practices of holiness and evil occur only within relationships. Adam could relate to God but God had no need of Adam. Holiness, as opposed to egocentrism, only exists where deference, respect, cooperation, and collaboration take the welfare of others into account. The Trinity perfectly demonstrates mutuality. Adam was created as an individual but an incomplete reflection of the image and likeness of God without Eve. Adam was created a communal being. We are holy only in relationship to peers so even our spiritual needs are best met in community.

These three – material, intellectual, and spiritual prosperity – answer the shortcomings of Adam’s isolation. Exchanges of goods and services between Adam and Eve, and amongst human actors ever since, summarily labeled “the marketplace” or “business,” serve several related functions in creation and God’s redemptive mission in the world.[iii]

Three functions of business emerge from the preceding discussion. First, the marketplace allows us to flourish economically. The marketplace meets (and often exceeds) our temporal needs. By economic participation, whole nations flourish.

Second, the marketplace requires intellectual development in vocational disciplines. Specialization provides opportunity to pursue specific interests, tailored to personalities, gifts, talents, education, experience, and opportunity all toward fulfilling vocational lives and accelerating economic growth.

And third, every exchange is an opportunity to practice holiness. Exchanges can serve as places of spiritual formation and discipline as they reveal and shape both our character and attitudes. Sadly, we have largely subsumed our economic holiness to the self-indulgence of materialism and consumerism. We have taken God’s blessed abundance, the outcomes of organizing complex economies, and enslaved it for our own desires and pleasures. We have lost sight of the transience of holiness, that the blessings we receive must pass through us to be truly effective. It is within the process of giving away that we are most acutely spiritually formed and transformed into the image of Christ (2 Cor 3:18).

There are two more functions of business in God’s created order. The first is apparent throughout Scripture as it reminds us that creation reveals the glory of God. If we accept business as a vital component in the created order, then its practice should reveal the nature, character, and will of God.[iv] According to James 1:17, any good that business does comes from God.

The last function is closely connected to both revelatory grace and to spiritual formation. Good will come of the righteousness of intentional Christian practitioners. In this way, the final function carries over from God’s self-revelatory intent to become our witness in the redemptive mission of God. Our wealth developing works serve as witness to the Gospel and are inherent to it, especially as good news to the poor.

To illuminate the holistic nature of integrated vocation and faith, let’s revisit Genesis 2:15: “Then the LORD God took the man and put him into the garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it.” God did not command Adam to work.[v] To cultivate and keep the Garden are inherent

to defining what it means to be image-bearing humanity. God does command work elsewhere in the Bible but only to correct sinful flesh which prefers sloth to escape the tedium and struggles of work in a fallen creation.

Cultivate in this verse, or otherwise translated as till or work, is from the Hebrew term `abad. This is the same term used when the Levitical priests are appointed to serve, to `abad, in the Temple. It is also used in Exodus 7:16 where Moses entreats Pharaoh to allow the Israelites to worship, to `abad God in the desert.

`Abad is also translated as the imposition of hard labor by the Egyptians in Exodus 1:14, and even as bondage in Exodus 6:5. The intentionality and intensity of `abad come with great expectation, even demand, by authority over workers. And, it is consistent with the use of the term bondslave to characterize our relationship to Christ in the New Testament. To `abad for God is to work, to serve, and to worship simultaneously.

So how does biblical economics work out in Christian life? John Wesley was concerned that Christian transformation, through the abandonment of vice and the adoption of frugality, would lead to increased wealth and the temptations of self-indulgence.

By response, in Sermon 50: The Use of Money, Wesley reduced economic obedience to God to three simple steps. The first was that Christians should earn all they can, so long as the means and the product were righteous. That is, neither is to pose physical, mental, or spiritual harm to the worker or the surrounding culture. Wesley found offense in the production of hard liquor for its direct harm to the drinker, their family, and their community, and for the over use of grains leading to shortages of bread.

Second, Wesley believed Christians should save all they can. Saving was not about storing up treasures on earth but a call to simple living and frugal spending. Wesley taught that once basic needs are met,[vi] greater satisfaction comes in doing good rather than in the accumulation of money or things. By discipline, considerable resources can be put to charitable investment.

Finally, Wesley believed that Christians, compelled by love and obedience to God, should give all they can. Wesley’s fears were confirmed as he noted self-indulgence victimizing charity. And the same holds true today, especially in developed economies. Church parking lots in affluent American suburbs are populated by an abundance of late model, luxury automobiles. Many Christians live in spacious homes filled with expensive gadgetry and fittings. Many of us could be much less selfish and help meet the needs of the indigent and unemployed across town and around the world.

Electronic communication has removed excuse for ignoring the needs of the local and global poor. But even charity has failed by practicing enduring, dependency-creating relief rather than promoting local business development to alleviate global poverty. Between 1990 and 2010, half of the world’s poorest (some 700 million) moved above the United Nation’s measuring line of abject poverty.[vii] This was far more due to business creating new wealth and spreading it across the world than it was due to charity. And most new jobs have been created by small businesses as capital has flowed into developing economies.[viii]

More than ever, the poor can wade into the streams of global wealth. And that process can be accelerated intentionally by investing in small businesses at the lowest economic tiers.

To conclude: Business is a gift of God,[ix] an integral social component of the created order, given to bless humankind and reveal the glory of God, that shalom may prevail among and for all. The marketplace is land ready to be reclaimed for the Kingdom of God. May we, as the Church, move outside our sanctuary walls and get our economics right. Then we will be a powerful witness to God’s glory as a wise and understanding people, living by just statutes, and surely with God in our midst.[x]

Thank you.

Acknowledgement

The notes that follow are largely attributable to comments from and conversations with a dear friend and colleague, Rod St. Hill, Dean of the School of Business, Christian Heritage College (Brisbane area, Australia), lead author of “Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done…In Business: Biblical Foundations for Business as Mission,” Business as Mission Think Tank (2013).

Georgetown College, Georgetown, Kentucky, January 9-10, 2014

I recently had the privilege of attending and presenting a paper, “Church Outside the Walls: The Global Growth and Meaning of Markeplace Ministries,” at the Re-Imagining Faith: For America and the World conference at Georgetown College (January 9-10, 2014). It was a bit (but only a bit) outside the vein of my normal climes but a welcome opportunity.

The tenor of the conference, at least to many of my contacts and acquaintances in the Church, would have sounded decidedly “liberal,” with content some might consider all but blasphemous and dangerous to Christian faith. But it was largely a healthy conversation open to embracing, or at least intellectually considering, alternatives to how we are currently practicing our Christian faith . . . in ways that are too often failing to transform the world or even provide sound witness to the glory of God. There was significant discussion of “hot topics,” including environmentalism, sexual orientation, “re-branding” Christianity, faith in vocation and the marketplace, evolution, inter-faith dialog, and otherwise openly challenging what many of my friends would consider orthodox positions of the Christian faith. There were even invocations of Buddhism in general and Ghandi specifically, frankly, a welcome breath of fresh air for many who seek the wisdom that God has granted to those outside the Church who are (like us Christians!) created in the image of God.

I think what I appreciated most was that this was an environment where one could safely introduce such topics without fear of being shouted down or labeled as a blasphemer or heretic. It was like attending the opening brainstorming session of an organization bent on redefining itself for adaptation to a changing environment and perfectly apropos. I appreciate fully that the idea behind the conference appeared to be considering re-interpretations of the Gospel for ministering in the 21^st century to a globalized, diverse, multi-faith and multicutural world.

I came away from the conference with a plethora of notes. I often capture big picture ideas in pithy statements, almost in article or book title form. Hopefully, in the coming days and weeks, I will be able to re-visit many of these to reflect and offer my own thoughts. But I think the over arching themes in my immediate response to the conference were along the lines of replicating the experience in other places:

• How do we create such a thinking environments in our local contexts?
• How do we create a safe place for such volatile conversations to advance Kingdom relevance and impact in our communities without creating greater alienation?
• How do we overcome the political and ideological divides within the Church itself, especially where we have largely disconnected from any dissenting voices, shunned the questioners, and locked ourselves into narrowly-focused homogenous groups?

I hope, now, given what I have left to say, that no one will think I thought the conference in any way a failure. I do, however, think there is considerable opportunity for expansion and impact.

What I did not see at the conference was diversity. The representation among attendees that I could casually identify was predominantly Protestant (Methodist / Wesleyan, Baptist, Presbyterian, and Episcopal, in particular). I specifically did not see representation of the Roman Catholic or Orthodox traditions, though they may have been present. Even so, if they were in attendance, they must surely have been in such distinct minority to elude the casual eye. Given the title of the conference was “Re-Imagining Faith: For America & the World,” and the theme of inclusivity was very strong throughout, invited speakers could have intentionally included Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish, or adherents of other faith traditions to enhance the interfaith theme.

I also did not see appropriate representation outside middle class whites. As far as I could tell, there was only one African-American (an immigrant from Cameroon, I believe) attendee. There may have been others but their attendance was by no means apparent in simply scanning the crowd during the plenary sessions. The only strong connection to the indigenous black Church in the U.S. was the choir from the First African Baptist Church of Lexington which performed beautifully before and after Walter Brueggemann’s keynote address on Thursday evening. The Asian-American and Hispanic representation at the event was also of such distinct minority as to be, for the most part, lost in the sea of white faces. Leaders of predominantly minority churches must be given their voice at every opportunity, especially considering that, collectively, minorities are now in the majority but are still underrepresented in the halls of the “ruling powers and principalities” (governance, finance, academia, etc.) both domestically and internationally.

As is likely the case still in many academic and ecclesial settings, the male / female divide of the presenters was decidedly male with female presenters being a little more than one third of the total. The plenary presentations were evenly divided (with exceptional speakers, I might add – Drs. Walter Breuggemann, Molly T. Marshall, Stephanie Paulsell, and Miroslov Volf). The crowd appeared to be roughly a 60-40 male-female split, which could have been a balancing of the male domination of the academic and ecclesial disciplines by a strong representation of women in the field of social service agencies, though many female attendees were members of the clergy and academia.

Finally, as mentioned, the progressive leaning of the attendees and many of the presenters in general seemed weighted, even if not intentionally. Granted, one might expect that progressives are typically more open to new ways of thinking and doing Church. However, though I do not recall exactly how I first became aware of the conference, one must wonder how and where the conference was advertised. While it may not have been by any intentional measure, as said, toward progressive inclusion in this conference, advertising may be planned that would be more inviting to the conservative and ethnic strains of the Church to help with healing and collaboration across racial, doctrinal, and ideological divides, and toward Kingdom advancement in general, within the whole Church in the future.

However, again, I would have no one think I am denouncing or was disappointed in the conference given the critique that I offer. I walked away with a dozen pages of notes for further reflection and writing, which I hope to publish in the coming weeks (www.edensbridge.org). Overall, I thought the conference was a great success and worth the time and money to attend and I would do it again if possible.