Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

R. Paul Stevens is professor emeritus of marketplace theology and leadership at Regent College, Vancouver, British Columbia.

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Work Matters

William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company

Contents

Foreword by Don Flow...................................................................viiIntroduction...........................................................................1PART ONE God-Given Work An Introduction to the First Five Books.......................91. Good Work—Adam and Eve........................................................162. Degraded Work—Cain............................................................213. Virtuous Work—Jacob...........................................................274. Vocational Work—Joseph........................................................335. Spirit Work—Bezalel...........................................................40PART TWO Stewardship Work An Introduction to the Historical Books.....................496. Survival Work—Ruth............................................................547. Royal Work—David..............................................................598. Shrewd Work—Nehemiah..........................................................669. Providential Work—Esther......................................................72PART THREE Soul Work An Introduction to the Wisdom Books..............................8110. Wild Work—God and Job........................................................8611. Slothful Work—The Sluggard...................................................9212. Entrepreneurial Work—The Businessperson......................................9713. Enigmatic Work—The Professor.................................................102PART FOUR Just Work An Introduction to the Prophets...................................10914. Imaginative Work—Ezekiel.....................................................11415. Exilic Work—Daniel...........................................................12016. Missionary Work—Jonah........................................................125PART FIVE Kingdom Work An Introduction to the New Testament...........................13317. Contemplative Work—Martha....................................................14018. Tent-making Work—Paul, Aquila, and Priscilla.................................14719. Lasting Work—Paul............................................................15420. Heavenly Work—John...........................................................161Epilogue: How Then Shall We Work?......................................................169Selected Bibliography: Theology of Work................................................172

Chapter One

When does a job feel meaningful? Whenever it allows us to generate delight or reduce suffering in others. Though we are often taught to think of ourselves as inherently selfish, the longing to act meaningfully in our work seems just as stubborn a part of our make-up as our appetite for status or money. Alain de Bottom, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work

As we have seen, the Bible opens with God at work making things —both separating and filling. For instance, God separated light and darkness and then filled them with meaning, calling them night and day. This is a story about something that really happened. It is not myth or parable, but it is written in such a way that the simplest Bedouin nomad and today's most sophisticated nuclear physicist could grasp the point that God is the Creator, that God makes everything beautiful (the meaning of "it is good") and that he himself is the author of work.

Work as an Expression of Covenant

The first chapter of Genesis, however, is placed within the larger story of God's covenant relationship with creation, with people in general, and with God's promised people in particular. Covenant is a relationship of belonging, expressed in the covenant formula, "You will be my people, and I will be your God" (Jer. 30:22). It is like the promises made in the marriage ceremony: "You are mine. I am yours." Covenant contrasts with contract. A contract is an agreement to exchange goods and services upon some predetermined terms. A covenant is essentially relational. So the meaning of God's superlative creativity is that God belongs to what he has made and what he has made belongs to God. The whole of the created order, and of humankind in particular, is an expression of the imagination of God. This is especially true of the climax of God's creativity—a creature that resembles himself (Gen. 1:26) —with the result that humans are an external expression of an internal image. Paraphrasing a statement by the theologian Karl Barth, covenant fidelity is "the inner meaning and purpose of our creation as human beings in the divine image." Instead of work being, as is so often said, part of the "creation mandate" to take care of the earth, work is part of the covenant mandate. It is part of what it means to belong to God, to honor God, and to invest in God's purposes. Work is not a human invention. It is a divine calling and a way of imitating and resembling our Creator. To be made in the image of God means that we are created like God as relational beings and that we are made like God in that we work.

Work is not easily defined. Some have defined it as energy expended purposively, whether manual, mental, or both, but nonetheless it is purposeful energy that brings glory to God and serves our neighbor. This is not a bad definition of "good" work. But unfortunately a lot of bad work in the world deconstructs creation, abuses our neighbor, and does not bring glory to God. But what God had in mind when he called and commissioned his creatures, both Adam and Eve, was certainly for them to engage in good work: "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground" (Gen. 1:28). God said this to human beings in the context of blessing: "God blessed them and said...." And afterwards his first offer of something good to the mandated human beings was the gift of food. God saw everything that he had made and said, "Beautiful."

Filling the Earth and World-Making

The human calling in Genesis is not merely to work but that calling has three dimensions: to commune with God—the sanctuary garden; to build community—"male and female he made them"; and to co-create with God. This is the covenant mandate. Adam and Eve soon messed this up but not irrevocably, as we shall see. Even though human beings have fallen, even though the "image" has been distorted, and even though, from the perspective of the New Testament, substantial redemption has come in Christ—though it will not completely come until the new heaven and new earth—nonetheless, work can be good. So what does all this mean for our understanding and practice of good work?

First, good work is a means of spiritual growth. People often think that work is a hindrance to spiritual growth. But work is itself a spiritual discipline. The first challenge to Adam and Eve's spiritual growth, in this case the test to see whether they would eat from the tree of autonomy (called "the tree of the knowledge of good and evil" in the Bible), took place in the context of work—harvesting fruit. In a rare volume on the biblical doctrine of work, Alan...