Business For The Glory Of God
Just came back from Floorball tryouts at the old Bukit Timah Campus. Was quite fun and extremely fast paced man! I hit more floor than ball though. I'm more of a destructive player than a creative one I guess, destroying the opponents chances more than creating any for the team. We see how it goes, I'm more interested in Ultimate Frisbee though.Anyways, I feel really prompted to share this. After the Ravi Zacharias talk last Thursday, Eric spotted this book and brought it to my attention. 'Business For The Glory Of God' by Wayne Grudem.
It's been something I've been struggling with, coming into SMU and all. I suppose I should be joining the corporate world upon graduation, something which I resent initially. When I think about the corporate/business world, the first things that come into my mind are greed, corruption, shrewdness, and unsavoury characters that will do anything to maximise profits. This book however has made me rethink whether business is really all that bad. Let me give you the sypnosis:
'CAN BUSINESS GLORIFY GOD? We normally think of worship, faith, evangelism and other 'spiritual' activities as glorifying to God, but business? Business seems synonymous with greed and corruption, not something that would imitate a holy God. But Wayne Grudem believes that by engaging in work and business we glorify God becuase we are emulating God's own creative work.
This biblically based book is a thoughtful guide to imitating God during interactions with customers, coworkers, employees and other businesses. See how your business, and your life in business, can be dedicated to God's glory.'
One premise that keeps coming up in the book is, many things are created with fundamentally good intentions, but due to the sinful nature of Man, these things are misused and as such, evil results from it.
For example, the Internet is something that is fundamentally good in that it's such a rich source of information and has given us so much convenience that it has forever changed our lives. However, Man abuses the internet but introducing pornography, violence and spreading messages of hate over the internet. Can we then say that the internet is totally evil then? No, because the original intentions were good. It's the same for business.
The book is divided into chapters that talk about the various aspects of business, namely: Ownership, Productivity, Employment, Commercial Transactions, Profit, Money, Inequality of possesions, Competition, Borrowing and lending, Attitudes of heart, and Effects on world poverty.
This entry really doesn't do the book justice. I really think that anyone who wants to get into business or enter the corporate world should read it before you go on to read Donald Trump's biography or other business books. Go pick it up guys!
It's been really enlightening and such a great reminder that we can glorify God in all aspects of our lives, not just in church. It's such a joy to know that we can glorify God by doing business, but we should also be aware of the pitfalls and avoid them. When it comes to money, there are just so many ways we can fall into temptation and hurt others. Is money evil then? Is it a necessary evil? I'll leave with a quote from the book.
Money is NOT the root of all evil. The LOVE of money is.
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