What’s the Bottom Line? Personal Profit or the Interest of Others?

Are we Tourists, Businessmen, or Ambassadors? (Part 2)

Last week I began a discussion about our role in the world and how we are to live as Christians in the midst of a foreign culture. Because Western Christians often engage other cultures as tourists, I began by talking about the dangers of the “Tourist” mentality and how it negatively affects others. This week I want to address a second way that our culture interacts with others…as businessmen and businesswomen. Our culture is one of commerce and English is the “official” language of international business. This shapes the way that we as Western Christians engage the world at home and abroad. It also shapes how we are perceived by others.

Despite the pervasive Old Testament teaching against charging interest from fellow Jews (13x), there are positive aspects of commerce found in the parables of Jesus. Conservative principles of investment, personal responsibility, and a strong work ethic are also found in the Scriptures. Yet the financial emphasis in the New Testament seems to be on kingdom-oriented stewardship and generosity rather than personal profit. But when we engage the world primarily as businessmen the bottom line is most often personal profit. Even corporate generosity (apart from accounting for maximum tax advantages) is spun endlessly for the greatest PR/marketing bang for the buck. Gifts come in the form of oversized checks, complete with photo-ops and hidden strings. When this business model is brought home to our families and churches it is a major hindrance to stable personal relationships not to mention relational ministry.

If you are motivated by your own personal interests in the corporate setting you are quick to use co-workers—objectifying them—to reach your own goals…usually an increase in power, pay, and prestige. The goal of profit in the wrong hands can result in poor quality products and poor customer service because individual businesspeople look to their own interests rather than to that of a larger constituency. Finding flaws in the business world doesn’t surprise anyone...it is low-hanging fruit. It should be very different in the Church that follows the example of Jesus Christ. However, in the church today we have too many people seeking their own interests to the place that certain types of ministries have become synonymous with selfishness and greed. This is not a new phenomenon. The Apostle Paul lamented that even he was hard-pressed because (apart from Timothy) many of the other ministers were motivated by their own interests.

“I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you soon, so that I too may be cheered by news of you. For I have no one like him, who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare. For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. (Phil 2:19-21)

If we engage others primarily as businessmen it often introduces a layer of subtle deception and nagging doubt into the relational dynamic found in the phrase "in order to...". The subtle deception is on our part if we:

·       Pay attention to people… only in order to make a sale.

·       Build relationships… to gain trust in order to expand our influence into new markets.

·       Do good things…with an ulterior motive (in order to increase corporate goodwill, brand loyalty, and marketing).

·       Make our own plans…assuming we are in control of our own lives and others..

·       In the name of stewardship…we apply economics to human relationships in order to protect ourselves.

Photo by Christina @ wocintechchat.com
on Unsplash

Those in a relationship with us will then have that terrible nagging doubt in the back of their minds, asking questions like, “Why is he doing this?”, “Is this about us or about him?” and finally,  “When will they cut their losses and reinvest somewhere else?” This is true of our co-workers, ministry partners, and even family members. They all are watching to see whether we are honestly committed to reconciliation, willing to stay at the table to work through differences, or getting ready to "cut and run." It seems all too common that we let a business mindset eat our family and consume the church.

Having thoroughly criticized business' effect on relationships, let's consider what happens when we let true family impact business? Business can be a powerful tool for good in the world when run ethically and used as a vehicle to care for the needs of others. Business can be a profoundly Kingdom mission if personal/corporate profit is not the focus. I have been encouraged by the many stories I have heard in recent years of creative and ethically sourced income streams being used to support kingdom ministry. However, the nature of business is most often to produce personal or corporate gain at the expense of the competition and the customer. We need to be good stewards, skillfully shepherding all the resources that God has entrusted to us. This includes those we would call the competition and the customer.  

“Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others.” (Phil. 2:3-4)

In the end, the business model of engagement is simply a more subtle and nuanced version of the tourist. Everything appears to make an effort at cultural sensitivity and even relational concern, but "the bottom line" is still self-determined and self-focused. As a business person, I may choose to go and live among those I do business with, but such an approach is usually neither relational nor incarnational enough. Jesus, in addressing the latent power-driven self-seeking attitude in his disciples said, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Mark 10:45; Matthew 20:28). Further, Jesus’ half-brother James speaks to the self-determination we see so often in the businessman model of engagement.

“Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” (James 4:13-14)

Can we learn to serve others first and submit to the Lord’s plan and timing before our lives are spent? Can our bottom line become "the interests of others"?

 

[This post will be continued next week..."Lord willing and the creek don't rise!"]