“Christians should be known to be generous, and in the workplace this expresses itself in many ways. As business managers, they can be generous with their time and investment in their employees and customers. As small business owners, they can take less personal profit in order to give customers better value and employees better pay. As citizens they can be discernibly generous with their time and money, giving away more of their income than others in their economic position. They can consider living modestly, below their potential lifestyle level, in order to be financially generous with others.”
Timothy Keller in Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God’s Work (New York: Penguin, 2012) 219.
While preparing for today’s book discussions on faith and work with pastors and lay leaders at EFCA Camp Spofford, I came across this quote by Keller. Essentially he posits that at every turn our Christian faith causes us to be generous and others-centered rather than greedy and self-centered. Literally, the Scriptures warn us not to be “greedy for selfish gain” (cf. Psalm 119:36). This does not mean that businesspersons don’t pursue making a profit. It means they live and work differently with the people around them and they use profit they make to have something to return to God, care for their family, and reflect God’s love and kindness to the world.