Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God's Work

by Timothy J. Keller

What wisdom, then, would the Bible give us in choosing our work?

we would want to choose work that we can do well.

It should fit our gifts and our...

We have to ask whether our work or organization or industry makes people better or appeals to the worst aspects of their characters. The answer will not always be black and white; in fact, the answer could differ from person to person.

Rather, it illustrates the need for everyone to work out in clear personal terms how their work serves the world.

we also want to benefit our field of work

itself.

our goal should not simply be to do work, but to increase the human race’s capacity to cultivate the created world.

Dorothy Sayers explores this point in her famous essay “Why Work?”

The work takes all and gives nothing but itself; and to serve the work is a labor of pure love.

However, you may no longer be serving the community—you may be using it for the way its approval makes you feel.

Tranquility without toil will not bring us satisfaction; neither will toil without tranquility.

it means recognizing and renouncing our tendency to make idols of money and power

it means putting relationships in their proper place

even though it probably means making less money

Without the gospel of Jesus, we will have to toil not for the joy of serving others, nor the satisfaction of a job well done, but to make a name for ourselves.

One of the reasons work is both fruitless and pointless is the powerful inclination of the human heart to make work, and its attendant benefits, the main basis of one’s meaning and identity.

serving the basic needs of our neighbor,

distinguish myself from my neighbor, to show the world and prove to myself that I’m special.

I saw that all labor and achievement spring from man’s envy of his neighbor. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind” (Ecclesiastes 4:4).

Ever since then, the people with the most creative new ideas continue to seek out cities to find a fertile environment for experimentation and implementation of their dreams.

“To make a name” in the language of the Bible is to construct an identity for ourselves.

We either get our name—our defining essence, security, worth, and uniqueness—from what God has done

for us and in us (Revelation 2:17), or we make a name through what we...

Part of their sense of power and security comes from the size and wealth of their city.

the second kind comes from making an idol of one’s group. This leads, of course, to snobbery, imperialism, colonialism, and various other forms of racism.

Sin has natural consequences.

world that always lead to breakdown. Our pride and need for personal significance necessarily lead to competition, disunity, and strife.

a life of self-glorification makes unity and love between...

it is grounded beyond itself, in God. Every other society will have to make an idol out of something that will ultimately disappoint.

Lewis shows us that we can either build a better mousetrap (taller building, faster computer, cheaper airline, more luxurious hotel) out of interest in excellence and service to human beings, or we can do so in a race to move our organization and ourselves into a position to look down on others. The latter leads to ethical shortcuts and the oppression of those who get in our way.

Even the most loving, morally beautiful people fall prey to motives of self-interest, fear, and glory seeking.

The DNA of self-centeredness and competitive pride are at work deep in each of us.

In such morally, culturally, and spiritually ambiguous situations, does God still work with us and through us? The answer of the book is yes.

“Who knows,” Mordecai says to her, “but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?” (Esther 4:14).

He points out that what you have in the story of Joseph is a highly successful secular official.

It is often hard to get Christians to see that God is willing not just to use men and women in ministry, but in law, in medicine, in business, in the arts. This is the great shortfall today.”117

Don’t just get into the palace and bend every rule you can to stay there. Serve. You have come to your royal position for such a time as this.

Do you think Esther’s conscience was clear? Is anyone’s ever completely clear? It is never too late. God urges you to think about where you are and why you are there, to realize the importance of being in the palace. It’s

Mordecai, in effect, appeals to the idea of vocation.

has called you to put it into play. It is natural to root your identity in your position in the palace; to rest your security in the fact that you have a certain measure of control over the variables in your life; to find your significance in having clout in certain circles.

Instead of looking at your influence as a means to move yourself ahead, you are going to use it to serve people; you are going to take more risk to see that justice is done.

your resolve won’t last.

If you are merely inspired by an example—

then your basic motivation is probably guilt.

But if guilt is the extent of your motivation, you can be sure it will wear off before long because living in a new way will be hard.

reasons, but they all agree on something: There is a gap—or a chasm—between the divine and us.

But somehow we need something to bridge that gap between God and ourselves. How will we find it?

answer of the Bible, right from this story. Esther saved her people through identification and mediation.

Saving people through identification and mediation—does that remind you of anyone? Jesus Christ, the Son of God,