Unbridled captialism and the erosion of civil society

From The Atlantic

An article analysing the destructive effects of long hours combined with unpredictable schedules now commonplace among corportations intent on maximising profit by utilising their workforce most efficiently.

“Why You Never See Your Friends Anymore: Our unpredictable and overburdened schedules are taking a dire toll on American society”

This concluding paragraph

It’s a cliché among political philosophers that if you want to create the conditions for tyranny, you sever the bonds of intimate relationships and local community. “Totalitarian movements are mass organizations of atomized, isolated individuals,” Hannah Arendt famously wrote in The Origins of Totalitarianism. She focused on the role of terror in breaking down social and family ties in Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union under Stalin. But we don’t need a secret police to turn us into atomized, isolated souls. All it takes is for us to stand by while unbridled capitalism rips apart the temporal preserves that used to let us cultivate the seeds of civil society and nurture the sadly fragile shoots of affection, affinity, and solidarity.

How kick back against this on a societal scale for the common good?

And if community is crucial within Christian faith, how does that community flourish and be sustained if significant numbers of people are unable to participate on a weekly basis due to long hours and unpredictable work schedules?

Idolatry today: work

Over at The Altantic staff writer Derek Thompson has an almost theological deconstruction of modern work: ‘Workism is Making Americans Miserable’.

Here’s a proposal and a question.

Proposal: Idolatry is alive and well in the 21st century West.

Question: If so, what would you say are some examples of modern idolatries in Western culture?

Thompson makes a good case, from a non-religious perspective, that much modern work has become idolatrous.

Some clips from his article:

THE GOSPEL OF WORK

The decline of traditional faith in America has coincided with an explosion of new atheisms. Some people worship beauty, some worship political identities, and others worship their children. But everybody worships something. And workism is among the most potent of the new religions competing for congregants.

What is workism? It is the belief that work is not only necessary to economic production, but also the centerpiece of one’s identity and life’s purpose; and the belief that any policy to promote human welfare must always encourage more work.

And more

Perhaps long hours are part of an arms race for status and income among the moneyed elite. Or maybe the logic here isn’t economic at all. It’s emotional—even spiritual. The best-educated and highest-earning Americans, who can have whatever they want, have chosen the office for the same reason that devout Christians attend church on Sundays: It’s where they feel most themselves. “For many of today’s rich there is no such thing as ‘leisure’; in the classic sense—work is their play,” the economist Robert Frank wrote in The Wall Street Journal. “Building wealth to them is a creative process, and the closest thing they have to fun.”

and this

What’s more, in a recent Pew Research report on the epidemic of youth anxiety, 95 percent of teens said “having a job or career they enjoy” would be “extremely or very important” to them as an adult. This ranked higher than any other priority, including “helping other people who are in need” (81 percent) or getting married (47 percent). Finding meaning at work beats family and kindness as the top ambition of today’s young people.

and this

“We’ve created this idea that the meaning of life should be found in work,” says Oren Cass, the author of the book The Once and Future Worker. “We tell young people that their work should be their passion. ‘Don’t give up until you find a job that you love!’ we say. ‘You should be changing the world!’ we tell them. That is the message in commencement addresses, in pop culture, and frankly, in media, including The Atlantic.”

But our desks were never meant to be our altars. The modern labor force evolved to serve the needs of consumers and capitalists, not to satisfy tens of millions of people seeking transcendence at the office.

Thompson draws out important realities. Modern white-collar work has few tangibles. And so modern worker turn to social media to make manifest their accomplishments. It is a world of metrics, of followers, of likes, retweets, friends, viewers, of success, of competitive achievement.

More and more, the competitive market economy reaches into every area of our lives. Work, for many, is ruthlessly competitive – it is fellow workers against whom we compete. Such a world is hard to opt-out of – each of us is pushed towards ‘selling ourselves’ in order to survive and prosper.

Workism offers a perilous trade-off … A culture that worships the pursuit of extreme success will likely produce some of it. But extreme success is a falsifiable god, which rejects the vast majority of its worshippers. Our jobs were never meant to shoulder the burdens of a faith, and they are buckling under the weight.

Thompson suggests, in effect, ‘de-idolising’ work by making it serve our best interests rather than the other way around – making time for relationships, hobbies and basically having a life. He wants to see public policy put in frameworks that reorientate cultural priorities.

Which all raises a further interesting question that will have to take another post ..

What does it look like to de-idolise work from a Christian perspective?

 

 

 

 

 

A tribute to carers

My mother died recently after some years of gradual decline due to dementia, hastened by a bout of pneumonia. She was 92. I happened to be the family member with her in hospital in the early hours of the morning when her life ended. The nurse on night duty was wonderful. She had supplied a mattress, sheets and pillows for me to stay the night. When I told her what had happened, she was kind and compassionate well beyond mere efficiency. Her care that night has prompted these musings.

Over the last few years as a family we have met countless health care professionals – carers, nurses and doctors – the vast majority of them women. I am beyond admiration for every one of them. Carers visiting at home do so under poor rates of pay, working unsocial hours, doing often extremely difficult work under unrealistic time pressures. Yet, they not only do their job but forge genuine relationships of care and love with elderly and often helpless people.

Nothing speaks to me more of the distorted priorities of Western culture than how poorly funded and valued are carers and nurses. They work at the sharp edge of human mortality. While capitalism appeals to self-interest and pursues accumulation of wealth, my mum’s carers do their job out of a sense of vocation. Of course they work for pay, but to a woman, they give of themselves far beyond any contract of employment in order to maintain human dignity and care to some of the weakest and most vulnerable people in our society.

We are embodied beings and our bodies wear out and die. I’m musing here, but it seems to me that much of our culture is effectively gnostic. By that I mean it values the abstract above the physical. We fear death and prize fickle and transient things like respect, image, status, power, beauty and success. Money itself is simply a means to such ends and it is pursued relentlessly. When the capitalist system fails, no price is too high to fix it, regardless of the cost to ‘less important’ and ‘soft’ professions like caring and nursing, mental health provision or disability services.

In saying this, some may retort ‘What’s your alternative?’ Hospitals need funding. Funding comes from taxes. Taxes come from those who work and create wealth. If everyone was a carer the system would collapse. Yes, but I’m pushing back against distorted priorities within recent neo-liberalism (or ‘turbo-capitalism’) and the damage it is wrought globally – and in Ireland particularly. See this excellent article on ‘financialisation’ for more detailed discussion of what has happened.

Nor does a rampant capitalist culture contain any logical impulse towards doing justice, righting wrongs or, dare I say, loving others. It prizes individual happiness, comfort and pleasure, but is largely indifferent to those that fall by the wayside of the capitalist dream.

At the risk of massive generalisation, I wonder if women tend to be less seduced by such gnostic dualisms than men? Is that why it is overwhelmingly women who get their hands dirty in the mess of sacrificially tending and respecting ageing bodies? I honestly do not know the answers to those questions, save to say I want here to pay tribute to all those wonderful carers who contributed to looking after my mum in the last years of her life.

But I do know that the Christian faith is anything but gnostic. The entire Bible values the earthly, physical and material aspects of life. It begins with God willing a good creation into being. It climaxes with the incarnation of God’s Son. He enters human history, born of Mary and is Israel’s promised Messiah. He heals the sick and raises the dead. He is crucified under Pontius Pilate. He sheds real blood and suffers real death. His resurrection means that all in him have hope of a resurrection body in a renewed creation.

You can’t get more committed to the pain, complexity and physicality of the world than that. The cross reveals the true nature of our God. As one theologian puts it, ‘The uttermost depth of human misery has been plumbed by the incarnate Lord.’

And that is very good news indeed.

Chris Wright on the Great Commission

At Belfast Bible College, we had the pleasure and privilege of having Chris Wright speak at our Celebration of Studies last Friday and then at a half day conference on “The GREAT COMMISSION: what does it really include?”

 

Chris was exploring a biblical theology of mission, engaging along the way with contested ideas of mission, and criticisms of his own approach as outlined most fully of course in his magnum opus The Mission of God.

Some notes and observations of the half-day conference: – and these do not therefore represent exactly what Chris said but one person’s interpretation ..

Both terms ‘holistic mission’ and ‘missional’ are useful but both can easily become too anthropocentric – they revolve around ‘us’ and what we must do. They do not in and of themselves resolve the question of what ‘holistic’ and ‘missional’ actually mean – they mean different things to different people.

Based on the Great Commission of Mt 28, Chris unpacked some key themes. The Great Commission if framed within the lordship and presence of God. It is both cosmic (all of creation – See Eph 1:9-10 etc) and  Christocentric (based on the Messiah’s saving work).

Mission is God’s activity, not primarily ours. It has both a global scope and cosmic scope. The mission of the church needs to reflect the scope and size of God’s mission.

As a foundation for understanding mission, Chris went to the 5 marks of mission first articulated by the Anglican Communion in the 1980s / 90s. In brief they are:

1. Evangelism (proclaim the good news of the kingdom)
2. Teaching (teach, baptise and nurture new believers)
3. Compassion (respond to human need by loving service)
4. Justice (transform unjust structures of society, to challenge violence of every kind and pursue peace and reconciliation)
5. Creation care ( strive to safeguard the integrity of creation, and sustain and renew the life of the earth)

All intrinsically flow from the Lordship of Christ

Chris broke these down into 3 themes that he unpacked in turn:

A. BUILDING THE CHURCH

Including 1 and 2: evangelism and teaching

1. Evangelism

Is a call for people to submit to the lordship of jesus. Gospelizing is proclamation of the good news. Mission work is telling the story of Jesus and its call for response of repentance and faith. Christians are to be baptised in the name of Jesus and are to follow him as Lord, not other gods or idols. The gospel of Jesus is at the heart of all Christian mission.

This is in contrast to some understandings of ‘holistic mission’ where it means everything else apart from evangelism. (see photo). Holistic mission should never be shorthand for social justice or other activity divorced from evangelism.

Neither should it be the case where “mission” becomes just one option in the buffet bar of Christian activity: some are into evangelism, others not .. Rather Chris was arguing for the centrality of the gospel as an integrating centre.

2. Teaching

A big obvious reality from Scripture is that teaching is part of the mission of God: Jesus is the Rabbi. Paul the teacher / missionary. The OT is one huge story of theological education (after Andrew Walls). A unravelling teaching programme about God, ethics, identity, holiness, faith, covenant, creation and so on that forms an indispensable platform for understanding the significance of the NT.

[I like to see the whole NT as theological reflection on the OT in light of Jesus]

Chris linked to Paul and Apollos: BOTH were vital in the mission of God. Paul is the evangelist / church planter, Apollos is the teacher. Both are about mission work and extending the lordship of Christ in the world. Therefore both evangelism and teaching are part of the Great Commission

(including theological education – the challenge for theological education is to ask how much is it intrinsically missional?;  how are teaching and modules serving God’s mission in the world?)

For Pastors, weekly preaching is part of the Great Commission. It is not some sort of ‘secondary’ task to mission / evangelism.

This does NOT diminish the necessity of global cross cultural mission .. but traditional ‘mission work’ does not summarise or represent the true scope of the Great Commission.

B. SERVING SOCIETY: COMPASSION AND JUSTICE

Chris put compassion and justice under the heading of ‘Serving Society’.

To the objection that “Is this really part of the Great Commission?” he argued how each is naturally linked to the Lordship of Christ. Jesus commands and actions to show compassion on the poor only echoes texts like Deut.10.12-19 and God’s desire for compassion and justice. When God is “godding’ – he is by default with the weak poor and needy. This is who God is and what he does. Likewise, Jesus’ in Matthew describes what true obedience to God looks like – and it is not to neglect the weighty matters of the Torah – issues like justice (see Micah 6.8). His disciples are to be “the light of the world” – meaning people whose attractive deeds shine with goodness and mercy. Like in Isaiah 58:7-8 where light is good deeds done in the name of the Lord. Just as Israel was to be a nation of light and justice, so Jesus’ new community of the kingdom is to be a renewed community of the King – the light of the world.

Such integration of discipleship and acts of compassion and justice are woven though Acts – there was no needy person among them (Acts 4:32-38)

Chris made the often overlooked point here that Paul & Barnabas’s first missionary journey was, contrary to popular assumptions, actually the famine relief visit to Judea as told in Acts 11. Perhaps overlooked because it did not ‘fit’ the popular understanding of ‘mission’ as overseas evangelistic work.

And in a very strong echo of what Bruce Longenecker has exhaustively researched and I posted about here, Chris argued that the ‘remember the poor’ of Galatians 2 is no side issue within Paul’s theology and life. Actually, it is talked about more by Paul than justification by faith. Economic concern for those in need is an integral part of his mission and therefore the Great Commission.

C. CARING FOR CREATION

The third theme of the Great Commission from Mt 28, Chris proposed, is that Jesus is Lord of heaven on earth. This global / cosmic reign of Christ is seen in Colossians 1 where the death of Christ on the cross has a cosmic dimension:

¹⁹ For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, ²⁰ and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

It’s here, Chris said, that evangelicals above all people should be able to integrate things. They are by definition people passionate about Jesus,  the cross and the atonement – and should be able to affirm how this saving work of God has universal dimensions. Put another way, discipleship talked about in the Great Commission has the context of being worked out within a creation that God is going to redeem. This has implications for how discipleship is understood.

Evangelicals need a better doctrine of creation. And here Chris linked to familiar texts such as Is 65, Revelation 21-22; Romans 8; Colossians 1. God’s agenda is one of redemption, rescue, restoration – not of destruction or obliteration of the earth. The end game is a new heavens and earth; the New Jerusalem and God’s presence coming down to earth. The creation has a future ..

This all means that our best view of creation is as tenants – with temporary stewardship responsibilities. Creation care now is prophetic action foreshadowing God’s restoration of creation to come. Creation care – a career in the sciences, in environmental work etc – is a legitimate and valued calling of the Great Commission.

CONCLUSION

‘Mission’ is not done only by missionaries. All of God’s people are to be involved in the mission of God. There is a profound and damaging dualism in much traditional evangelical theology of mission where there is a dichotomy between those who do mission and those who do not. A better way to see things is the church as a body of people who are all on mission, with some at work overseas.

Just as the mission of God is broad in scope, so not everyone can do everything. Some will be missionaries and evangelists, some in creation care, some teachers and preachers, some working for justice and serving those in need.This is not to revert to the ‘buffet bar’ or ‘bag or marbles’ approach to mission where only some do evangelism and others do justice – the lordship of Jesus must be at the centre of all Christian life and witness.

Chris linked to Lesslie Newbigin here in mission best being understood as dimension of the church not as a specific task of the church. In other words, the church exists in mission; and within that existence are many expressions of mission. Just like within Science there are many expressions of the scientific enterprise; or similarly within the Arts.

So, how does this broad framework for understanding the mission of God help you think about your life and work – whatever it is that you do?

Do you find this liberating from old-style dualisms between the sacred and secular?

What do you see as potential weaknesses or dangers of this broad understanding of the Mission of God?

And, reflecting on this more, I wonder if certain jobs ‘fit’ more easily within the 5 marks of mission than others? Chris argued that those at all sorts of work are routinely engaged in ethics and issues that call for justice, truth and rightness and their calling needs to be seen as vocational within the mission of God, just as much as any missionary or pastor involved in ‘spiritual’ work. I agree with this – but do the 5 marks of mission [summarised under ‘Church work’, ‘serving society’ and ‘caring for creation’] still leave out most types of work that most people do day to day?

Yes, if you are a teacher, nurse, counsellor, carer, religious worker, environmental consultant – your work can fairly easily fit in the 3 themes. But I am not sure they really make space for someone working in IT, or accountancy, or business who are not doing church related stuff, nor caring for others pastorally or focused on looking after creation.  I guess I wonder if ‘serving society’ needs to move beyond a pastoral focus, to include bringing positive benefit to society – like creating jobs, giving the opportunity for the dignity of work, training people to develop in life skills and experience and so on.

Comments, as ever, welcome.

A farewell

After 25 years in the Republic of Ireland – 20 of those in theological education with Irish Bible School and later Irish Bible Institute – I’m moving North across the border to become Principal of Belfast Bible College.

It’s an honour and a challenge – one which is both exciting and daunting at the same time. BBC is one of the larger Bible Colleges in the UK and has a crucial place in broad evangelical theological education and training in Northern Ireland; it is linked with Queen’s University Belfast (post-grad and undergrad) and Cumbria University (undergrad); has earned an excellent reputation for Christian training; has a global missions perspective and has a very strong team, both teaching and support staff with whom I look forward to working and quite a few whom I know already.

The Board and staff have been very welcoming and my prayer (which you are more than welcome to join!) is that I will be a blessing to the college: in leading the team; in strategic direction; in teaching and working with students; and encouraging personal, academic and spiritual development.

That’s ahead. This post is looking back to say farewell.

Saying goodbye to many dear friends in IBI and in Maynooth Community Church is something that I didn’t think I would be doing.  We were married in Tipperary, our children have been born and raised in the Republic, we were settled in work, church and community and I had no plans to return North.

But I am sure that God has been gently pushing, directing and then opening the door to BBC.

So this is a very fond farewell to students, staff, teachers and volunteers at IBI with whom I have had the privilege of working, laughing, praying, hoping, planning and sometimes lamenting with. I will miss you all deeply. It has been quite a journey and I pray for God’s generous provision and blessing on the Institute in the years ahead as it continues to serve a vital function of training and leadership development within the Irish church.

Also farewell, in a more drawn out way as I commute for a while, to fellow elders and members of MCC. You have been and are close family who enrich and bless our lives beyond measure. I am deeply grateful to have been involved in MCC since its inception over 10 years ago under the leadership of Rev Keith McCrory. We’ve gone through a lot together and it’s a place where God’s Spirit is at work doing what he does best – creating self-giving loving relationships.

And, at the risk of getting too verbose (again), this brings to mind how, about 26 years ago at London Bible College (now LST), little notes with a cryptic imperative appeared in the students’ pigeon holes. They said

“Take Care of Tomorrow’s Memories.”

No-one had an idea what they were about until the next chapel service when Dr Peter Cotterell (one of my favourite teachers and supervisor of my undergrad dissertation in missiology) spoke. The notes were his typically creative way of getting people interested and thinking beforehand (must have worked – I still remember it).

His text was Romans 16 and Paul’s long and rich list of people he has worked with. It’s a fascinating glimpse of  the relational network of the apostle. We love to abstract and theologize Paul as if he was some sort of disembodied mind producing finely crafted systematic theology for scholars to write books about. But here he is commending, thanking, greeting and encouraging; talking fondly of numerous ‘dear friends’, co-workers, fellow apostles (including Junia) – as well as Rufus’ mother who had been like a mother to him.

Peter’s theme was the importance of loving, deep relationships at the heart of all Christian ministry. His cryptic imperative was always to keep working at relationships, not as an optional secondary aspect of ministry, but as the actual context in which authentic Christian ministry takes place. For how we relate today soon become tomorrow’s memories.

Thank you to all who have given me good memories to treasure.

The Coldest of Cold Capitalist Hearts

Watched Nightcrawler (2014, directed by Dan Gilroy) the other day.

Spoilers ahead!

Jake Gyllenhaal (Lou Bloom) is a sublimely sinister guy on the make. There is an unnatural stillness in the way he stares and talks; like someone who instinctively knows they scare normal people and has learnt to try to minimise the creep effect.

He’s already ‘fallen’ when the movie begins – he starts bad and gets a lot worse. This is the story of his evolution from petty thief to finding his true ‘calling’ – a descent into the netherworld of ‘first on the scene’ news chasers.

This is a vocation of heartless voyeurism sold to the masses who consume others’ suffering from the comfort of their sofas.

Lou falls into his new career literally by accident. Out of curiosity he stops are a car crash and sees a film crew at work, catching the blood and pain for TV and he’s hooked. The next step is a low budget camcorder and radio and a relentless determination to work long night hours.

Lou is completely free of conscience or remorse, he will do (and does) virtually anything to get the video story.

He blags he way into the local TV news station where Rene Russo is the producer desperate for ratings who will take his material no questions asked – apart from ‘Are we going to get sued if we show this?’

A ‘Viewer Discretion Advised’ tag is added to the graphic stuff just to spark viewer desire.

So develops a symbiotic relationship but one where the power gradually shifts to Lou due to the quality of his ‘product’ and the need of the buyer (Russo).

Never slow to exploit an opportunity, Lou uses his power to coerce Russo into a sexual relationship (the film goes curiously coy here – just was well) as well as negotiating better pay and conditions. She’s outraged, exclaiming that friends don’t force each other to have sex. But of course, Lou doesn’t do friendship or ethics.

While Nightcrawler isn’t a great film, there are echoes of Taxi Driver. But where De Niro’s Travis Bickle raged violently against the world, Lou is consumed with calculating self-interest. He has a business plan and plots a route to profitability while manipulating the violence of others to his own advantage.

Lou is capitalism personified and his is the coldest of cold capitalist hearts.

The ‘virtue’ of ‘pure’ capitalism is that it marginalises and makes irrelevant things like compassion and mercy and social justice.

Lou knows that death, violence, fear, disaster and blood sells – and sells well. He knows how to produce what the market wants and is willing to put in the hours because he believes that “good things come to those who work their asses off”.

He also knows that the key to market success is creating a restless, unquenchable desire for more – and more.

And so the stakes continue to get raised – how can Lou top the last bloody offering to the masses? Without new product both he and Russo are going to be out of work.

And this leads to the climatic set-piece where Lou stage-manages certain death and violence between LA cops and drug dealers all simply for the lens of his (new bigger and better) camera.

It’s not often you see a film that follows capitalism all the way down to its logical end.

Lou has no ethics because ethics get in the way of what the market wants. Any competition – either in the form of other news chasers (Bill Paxton) or his Lou’s expendable partner with an inconvenient conscience – are ruthlessly eliminated.

In capitalism everything can commodified; here it is human suffering that is for sale. Lou’s competitive edge is that he is willing to go further than anyone else to exploit that market opportunity.

Lou’s genius is that he is able to offer the market a new choice – one that consumers willingly select. He can’t force anyone to watch what he films, but he knows the desire is there freely to choose to see real blood, murder, fear and tragedy – and his vocation is to oblige.

I liked how the film kept its nerve to the end. Lou’s aggressive entrepreneurial drive bears fruit. He is in the process of becoming a ‘self-made man’; a ‘success’ in business and ‘respected’ because he knows how to earn money and keep the corporate machine (TV station in this case) and himself in profit.

If ever a movie exposes the ludicrous idea that capitalism is a benign ‘neutral’ force and that markets should just be left to themselves to deliver the best of all possible worlds, this is it.

Comments, as ever, welcome.

Lasting Work

This is the last of a few posts giving a flavour of R Paul Stevens’ book pithy and thought-provoking little book Work Matters: lessons from Scripture

Towards the end he has a reflection on work and the future, when for many work is something to be endured and lacks any telos.

What then is work that carries spiritual significance – even into the new age to come?

He rejects a sacred / secular divide that sees explicitly ‘Christian’ work as that which really matters – stuff like preaching, evangelism, Bible study etc. Behind such a split is a dualism between the ‘spiritual’ (good)  and the ‘material’ (bad).

Jesus’ resurrection from the dead and the outpouring of the eschatological Spirit are both powerful indicators of how the future is already here in the present.  Stevens sees continuity (not annhilation) between this world and the new creation.

Stevens goes to three key Pauline texts on work. The eternal significance of our work lies in relationship with the living resurrected Lord.

1 Cor 3:12-15 ‘if anyone builds on this foundation[Christ] their work will be shown for what it is ..’

1 Cor 13:13 ‘The greatest of these remain: faith, hope and love’

1 Cor 15:58 ‘Always give yourself fully to the work of the Lord for you know that your labour in the Lord is not in vain’

There is, Stevens argues, then hope of redemption of not only our lives or of creation but also our work.  The damage done by negative work – the environmental, social, cultural and political scars left by destructive work – may yet be transfigured in the new creation.

How’s this for a positive vision of daily work in light of future hope to think about next Monday morning?

Clearly, through our daily work we leave our mark on the cosmos and our environment, on government, culture, neighborhoods, families, and even on the principalities and powers. The Bible hints that in some way beyond our imagination our marks are permanent. The theological truth that undergirds this fascinating and challenging line of exploration is the statement that Christ is the firstborn of all creation (Col 1:15) and firstborn from the grave (1:18). If Christ is truly the firstborn of all creation and the firstborn from the grave, then all work has eternal consequences, whether homemaking or being a stockbroker. This brings new meaning to those whose toil is located in so-called secular work – in the arts, education, business, politics, the environment, and the home. Not only are ordinary Christians priests of creation past and present; they, along with missionaries, pastors, and Christian educators, are shaping the future of creation in some significant way. This means that we are invited in Christ to leave beautiful marks on creation, on the environment, family, city, workplace, and nation. (158-9)

The sluggard – the misdirected desire of the lazy person

In his book Work Matters: lessons from Scripture, Paul Stevens turns to reflect on the sluggard. What a great word.

Before we get to what he says, some questions:

We hear a lot these days about overwork and stress, but when was the last time you heard much about its other side – laziness?

Is laziness similar to wasting our time? When we get distracted by useless things? And since we live in an age of terminal distraction, is it fair to say that we have 24/7 opportunity for slothful frittering away of time that could be used constructively?

And if that is the case, do we need seriously to think about laziness in a technological age?

What counts as a waste of time? When is such waste being lazy and when is it rest from work ? When does self-indulgence of spending hours on Facebook (or whatever) become slothful and sinful?

OK – to Stevens:

Proverbs gets stuck into sluggards with a dose of ironic humour:

Sluggards dip their hands in the bowl but are so lazy they can’t bring their hands to their mouths (19:24)

Sluggards are married to their beds, groaning when they turn over it’s like a squeaky door as it rotates in its socket (26:14)

They use the excuse of danger not to get out of bed. (22:13)

They don’t bother to plant seeds in season and then go out to look for a harvest (20:4)

The lazy are restless with unsatisfied desire (13:4; 21:25-6), helpless in the mess of their lives (15:9) and useless to anyone who employs them (18:9, 10:26)!

Stevens locates this in desire – for the wrong things. The lazy person is locked in himself, futilely pursuing emptiness. He lacks a positive theology of work. [just as a workaholic is also destructively locked in himself, pursuing work at the expense of all else].

Work properly understood is a gift and a blessing that leads to all sorts of positive outcomes – harvest, provision, helping others.

A destructive attitude to work is seen when even the thought of work is a drag – a constant physical weariness and lack of energy to complete tasks. Mental laziness in not seeing what needs to be done. A moral laziness in failing to take up the virtuous benefits of work. Spiritual sloth is not caring about God or his purposes.

Quite a bit of what he describes here could be someone who is seriously depressed. But let’s leave depression out of the picture as a cause of an unwillingness to work.

Stevens goes to the desert Fathers and their deadly serious confrontation of destructive inner thoughts through solitude and reflection and prayer. It is only in a willingness to change before God can the heart be renewed.

… those who would be converted must take up the disciplines of responsiveness: waiting on God and confronting self in solitude, cultivating new thoughts about work (both its intrinsic and extrinsic value), taking decisive action even when they don’t feel like it, and reminding themselves continuously for Whom it is they are working

This book grows on you. Stevens has distilled a lot of learning and reflection into pithy and deep meditations.

Work, the providence of God and hyper-Capitalism

R Paul Stevens begins a short chapter on Providential Work with this quote from a classic study, Studs Terkel, Working.

The blue collar blues is no more bitterly sung that the white-collar moan. “I’m a machine,” says the spot-welder. “I’m caged,” says the bank-teller, and echoes the hotel clerk. “I’m a mule,” says the steel worker. “A monkey could do what I do,” says the receptionist. “I’m less than a farm implement,” says the migrant worker. “I’m an object,” says the fashion model.

Which one does not feel sometimes that we are in the wrong place, at the wrong time and doing the wrong thing asks Stevens.

The temptation is to imagine that the key to happiness and fulfillment is in being somewhere else, doing something else. [This may actually be true in some cases which Stevens could acknowledge.] Stevens says the reality is that God has a providential purpose for our lives right where we are. Don’t go aimlessly from job to job hoping that one will be the perfect fit – find a life-giving purpose where you are.

Stevens goes on to talk about Esther and how God providentially placed her, against all appearances, in the right place at the right time. Christians should then look to the providence of God in their work – life is not haphazard chance. Each believer is placed in ‘such a place and time as this’ – we need to discern the significant moments to serve God amidst the daily small opportunities that come our way.

Stevens’s focus is Esther, but this coheres well with Paul’s advice to Christians in Corinth (1 Cor 7) to ‘stay where you are’ – even if you are a slave:

¹⁷ Nevertheless, each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. This is the rule I lay down in all the churches. ¹⁸ Was a man already circumcised when he was called? He should not become uncircumcised. Was a man uncircumcised when he was called? He should not be circumcised. ¹⁹ Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing. Keeping God’s commands is what counts. ²⁰ Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them.

²¹ Were you a slave when you were called? Don’t let it trouble you—although if you can gain your freedom, do so. ²² For the one who was a slave when called to faith in the Lord is the Lord’s freed person; similarly, the one who was free when called is Christ’s slave. ²³ You were bought at a price; do not become slaves of human beings. ²⁴ Brothers and sisters, each person, as responsible to God, should remain in the situation they were in when God called them.

Paul’s context was a long long way from a the contemporary world of work where we ‘sell ourselves’ (packaging our skills and experience) in a hyper competitive capitalist marketplace.

Is such teaching redundant in a modern globalised information economy where the average length of job in the West for millennials is just over 2 years and who therefore might have 15-20 jobs in their working lives? Where ‘staying put’ for a long time in one job can be interpreted as career failure? 

When to say ‘No’ to an ‘upward’ and ‘logical’ career move in order to stay with a sense of calling? God has placed me here and I ain’t going.

When to say ‘Yes’? God is providing a new opportunity.

How to be counter-cultural in our attitude to work?

How to see the providence of God if work cannot be found – about 25% of young people in Ireland are out of work.

These are some of the questions swirling around ‘faith and work’.

Feel welcome to add your own – and some ‘answers’ of course ....

Musings on work (2) Spirit work

R Paul Stevens has done a lot of reflecting and working on work. He’s written a nice wee book called Work Matters: lessons from Scripture, which takes the form of a series of short reflections on work and various biblical characters.

One is on Bezalel and ‘Spirit work’. In it, he rejects the notion that the Spirit gives his gifts solely for ministry in the church. Rather, the Spirit equips and gifts his people to “enter into God’s beautiful work of transforming creation, culture, and people.”

Bezalel is his ‘patron saint’ of Spirit work, a craftsman and artist working to make the tabernacle, the sacred place of meeting with God  of whom Moses says

he has filled him with the Spirit of God, with wisdom, with understanding, with knowledge and with all kinds of skills— to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver and bronze, ³³ to cut and set stones, to work in wood and to engage in all kinds of artistic crafts.(Exodus 35:31-2),

The Spirit gives Bezalel three things

i. Wisdom: practical intelligence and vision

ii. Understanding and knowledge –  clarity in problem solving

iii. Practical ability – work with the hands

And Moses continues:

And he has given both him and Oholiab son of Ahisamak, of the tribe of Dan, the ability to teach others. ³⁵ He has filled them with skill to do all kinds of work as engravers, designers, embroiderers in blue, purple and scarlet yarn and fine linen, and weavers—all of them skilled workers and designers.

The Spirit enables people to teach others how to work to create beauty, as well as the wisdom, understanding and knowledge needed to get a good job done.

Stevens’ argument is that, while this sort of Spirit enabling is rare in the OT, in the new covenant, the Spirit gifts his people for working ‘personally, universally and permanently’.

[This is more a theological position rather than argued textually – he quotes Rom 12:3-8 as an example of work that can be done anywhere, but this seems a push to me given Paul’s strong ecclesial community focus). But it’s a position that makes sense, since “ Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord” (Col 3:23)

Good questions follow:

What is God calling you to work at? Or to put it another way, do you see your work as a calling from God?

What work excites you and you enjoy doing? And if it does, it’s likely that God-given gifts are being used. Frederick Buechner says

The place God calls you is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.

What work have others affirmed you in?

Do you see all work as a place to glorify God? – whether work in communication, business, healthcare, teaching, building, bringing up children etc

How does your work involve serving others as an act of worship and love?

How can we see work as a place to enrich human life and create beauty? – in cooking a meal, in talking with a student, in cutting hair, in creating jobs ..

Comments, as ever, welcome.