The Unpacking: Whole-Life Discipleship, Part 2

Open the original episode on Substack for the synchronized transcript.

0:00 I'm your host, Michael Langer,

0:01 an ordained minister and founder of Faithful Presence, a ministry in Washington, D.C., equipping servants and leaders. working in government to flourish in their faith and work. It is definitely summer in Northern Virginia, and the DMV, it is about 92 degrees outside. Man, oh man, it is hot,

0:34 but it is absolutely time to enjoy the blend of summer that combines our work with our rest. For me, living in rural Virginia a little bit outside of Washington, D.C., I have been fortunate enough to have about one and a half acres, very wooded land,

0:52 affords me an opportunity to spend a lot of time splitting wood, raise chickens. We have seven chickens that produce seven eggs a day. So give a lot of them to my neighbors, gave some this past week to one of our interns. And then we also spend a lot of time at wineries, distilleries, breweries.

1:09 Just enjoying the outside of Northern Virginia and balancing that with the massive amounts of work that's going on right now in my life. Preparing tomorrow to leave, to head to Birmingham, Alabama for our denomination's General Assembly, where 1,500 pastors will gather together to discuss the business of our

1:29 denomination and to show how much they know or believe they know about Robert's Rules of Order. which is, let me just say, it is definitely a skill set that is to be revered. Sometimes, I think, I'm not really completely sure of that, but I am thankful for rules and order.

1:48 And I'm also just thankful to see and connect with brothers and ministry partners that I've been doing ministry with for over 15 years. And so in addition to getting ready and creating all the content and all the printing, everything that's necessary for General Assembly, I've also been doing quite a bit of writing, leading some Bible studies,

2:06 getting some stuff ready for publication, and then printing some articles. So that's what my summer has been like so far. I hope you're enjoying yours as well. What we want to do on this podcast is pick up where we left off on our last episode— And that was, we were beginning to unpack whole life discipleship.

2:26 And in our last episode, we looked at spiritual, emotional, and relational discipleship, those first three facets. And what we're going to do over the course of the next two episodes is we're going to look at the next four. We're going to do vocational and ideological today,

2:42 and then we're going to do cultural and missional in the next episode. And I know I had intended to do all of these at once, but But I've been preaching long enough to know that when my notes exceed a certain limit, I have more words to say than I have adequate time to say it.

2:59 And so it just made a lot of sense to me to kind of just split these right where they were. So what we're going to do again is we're going to take vocational and ideological today. And in our next episode, we're going to take cultural and missional.

3:11 That way we can spend the appropriate amount of time on each topic. Okay, so let's just hop right in this week and start with vocational discipleship. One of the things that we do see in each of these facets of whole life discipleship—spiritual, emotional, relational, vocational, ideological, cultural, and missional—is that they are interconnected.

3:34 that each one does matter to the other. And so when we start with vocational discipleship, one of the things that we're going to notice right away is that vocational discipleship is very related to emotional and relational discipleship. We have all been in workplaces where we have known people who have needed some emotional or relational work,

3:58 who were not, shall we say, fully mature emotionally or relationally. And so all of these are interconnected. But what we want to do in this episode is just speak directly to vocational discipleship. I've had the real privilege to work alongside and just enjoy the company of some very, very smart folks.

4:20 And one of them is Dr. Stephen Garber, who lives here in Northern Virginia. He wrote a book a number of years ago called Visions of Vocation. It's just a fantastic read. I would highly commend it to you. And in that book, he writes this. vocation is integral, not incidental to the mission of God. One more time.

4:38 Vocation is integral, not incidental to the mission of God. And here's what he's saying. He's basically rephrasing what we read in Genesis 1.28. And God blessed them, and God said to them, be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of

5:03 This is called the creation mandate, right? And in the creation mandate, one of the things that we see made clear is that the mandate is for us to serve and worship God through our work. That's what the creation mandate is saying. And that is exactly what Dr. Stephen Garber means when he writes, vocation is integral,

5:26 not incidental to the mission of God. He goes right back here to Genesis 1, verse 28. And one of the things that we see here also is that this is given before the fall, but it is also true after the fall. After the fall, Adam and Eve are still told to be fruitful and multiply,

5:47 fill the earth and subdue it. After the flood, Noah is told, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. So even after our sin kind of distorts the way that we interact with each other and with God, it does not change the fact that we were intended to serve and worship God through our work.

6:09 And this point is made especially clear in Exodus. And for those of you who are familiar with Scripture, you know it's Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. These are called the books of Moses. It is commonly held that Moses wrote these and assembled them.

6:25 And the book of Genesis comes to us as a record of what it was like for God's people to be rescued out of Egypt, where they had been slaves for 430 years. They end up in Egypt because Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery,

6:42 and he was able to use his position in such a way as to actually provide safety and cover for the people of God later in when there was a famine. And as the people came to Egypt, they ended up staying there for a number of years.

6:56 And then Exodus begins by saying there came a time when people didn't know who Joseph was, and eventually the Egyptians enslaved all of the Israelites. And so Exodus is the story of the Exodus. It's the story of God's people being rescued. And here's one of the things that it says.

7:15 So as God makes himself known to Moses and says, hey, Moses, here's what you're going to do for me. He tells him this. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain. That's Exodus 3.12. In Exodus 34, after they have been rescued out of Egypt, we have this.

7:38 So now the people of God are actually at the mountain that God promised Moses that he would bring them to where they would worship him. And so we go from, when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain, to Moses.

7:59 Six days you shall labor, but on the seventh day you shall rest. And here's what's amazing. The word for worship in Exodus 3 is the same word that is used for work in Exodus 34. In one place, the Hebrew word avodah is translated worship. In another, it is translated work.

8:22 So this Hebrew word helps us to understand the connection between work and worship that has always existed for God's people. And so one of the things that we need to know is that work is not a curse. It is the primary means by which mankind brings glory to God. And this is great news.

8:44 This is great news to people who are on the downside of a power differential, which we talked a lot about in our last episode. Paul writes in Colossians chapter 3, he says this, Whatever you do, work heartily as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward.

9:05 You are serving the Lord Christ. Now, here's who Paul's audience was. Slaves. He's speaking to slaves. He's saying effectively the same thing that Moses was communicating to people who had just finished being slaves. Paul is saying, listen, even though you are disregarded, even though you are considered property of someone else,

9:30 Your work is considered worship, even if it is disregarded by the society in which you live. And that is so redemptive. That is so rescuing of futility. And we see this all over Scripture. You know, as we've already talked, Joseph is sold by his brothers into slavery and rises to power.

9:52 through the pharaohs of Egypt in giving them wise counsel. After the exile, after the people are returned to the promised land, set up in the promised land, the promised land falls, the people are then sent into exile, and while they are there, Daniel serves King Nebuchadnezzar, and Daniel helps Nebuchadnezzar make wise decisions.

10:16 So the people of God have been used over and over again in settings where they were at the downhill side of a power differential, but God used them to bless the people that they were interacting with. And this is true in Washington. We see it. There are interns, chiefs of staff, career politicians, career workers, civil servants,

10:40 People in the military, appointees, there are lobbyists, all of whom are working and all of whom are offering their work as worship. And I want to use two examples here. One of the things I just want to say is I am eternally indebted to the Kern Family Foundation, who started an organization called Made to Flourish.

11:01 And when I was transferring my pastorate, when I moved from planting the church that I had planted in Iowa City and moved to Chicago, the Kern Family Foundation reached out to me and asked me if I would be interested, in addition to planting a church in Chicago,

11:17 in working alongside pastors and helping to resource them to think more about vocational discipleship as part of their regular discipleship efforts of their church. And it was there that I met Dr. Stephen Garber, Dr. Amy Sherman, a number of other people that you'll get to meet over the course of these episodes.

11:38 But one of the things that I learned was the importance of all kinds of work. And I want to just use two examples. First of all, let's just look at the example of a hostess at a restaurant. So this job maybe is not that well revered. The host or hostess is kind of a gender neutral position.

11:55 But imagine what happens if that host or hostess does not do their job well. People get seated way too fast. They get seated all at once. They get seated in one section. They overwhelm the section. It overwhelms the kitchen. The orders come out all at once,

12:12 so the orders don't get delivered to the tables at the right time. They sit in the window. They get cold sometimes. People give bad Google reviews. The restaurant doesn't do well. They have to lay staff off. The wait staff don't have the tips that they need to pay for the services that they need to pay for.

12:28 Cable, gas, and when a gas is $5, a gallon, man, tipping matters. Tip your server as well, please, everybody. Tip your server as well. Their work absolutely matters. So the host or hostess matters in this condition. And if they don't do their job well, if they don't take it seriously,

12:47 then a lot of negative things happen that impact a lot of people. But if they take their job seriously, and even though there may be four tables available in the section, they say to the next family that comes in, you know, I can't seat you for 20 minutes. I've just sat four groups in that server's area.

13:04 It's going to take a while for her to catch up. We don't want to overwhelm the kitchen. The wait's going to be 15 minutes. And as frustrating as that is to hear, I want you to think about the implications of what is happening there. The server's not being overwhelmed. The kitchen's not being overwhelmed.

13:19 The orders can come out at the right time, at the right temperature, be delivered to the tables because the servers aren't just completely flustered beyond belief. Servers are tipped well. So the role of the host or hostess matters. It is integral to the flourishing of that restaurant. And then you have lobbyists.

13:41 And I understand that lobbyists are maybe not held in high esteem in Washington or maybe even outside of Washington, and I would have to admit that I am. unfortunately, have been one of the people who felt that way. I do not feel that way anymore because I have met a number of lobbyists and I

13:59 understand how important their work is, especially for somebody like my friend Jim, who is a compounding pharmacist in the Midwest. He works with doctors and patients to come up with delivery vehicles, delivery mechanisms for patients who maybe can't swallow. anymore because of a cancer treatment. Or perhaps they are in need of a dosage that's not readily available.

14:24 And Jim can make these in tablet forms, in capsule forms, in injectable forms, in lotions and things that you can put on. And he is a true blessing to those around him. He hires all kinds of people. He's been doing this for over 25 years. He's just a wonderful guy. But unfortunately, what'll happen is every couple years,

14:45 somebody in somewhere who decided they wanted to get into the compounding business will not take the same measures that Jim takes to be hygienically clean. He won't autoclave all of his equipment. He doesn't sterilize everything. He doesn't work in a positive pressure room that keeps out all the bad bacteria. And so

15:06 What they are doing is actually harmful. And so the big drug companies, of course, they don't like this. They want to get that shut down. And so they lobby. They go to Washington and they say, hey, compounding pharmacies, not necessarily a good thing, doing a bad thing. You should probably, you know, get rid of those.

15:23 And of course, my friend Jim, they also, these groups of independent pharmacies, compounding pharmacists, have a lobbyist. And his job is to go in and say, hey, yes, absolutely, we want to shut down the people who aren't doing well. But there are people over here who have spent a lot of money,

15:41 who are employing large numbers of people who are actually doing a service. So let's make sure that this bill gets written the right way so that it does the most benefit for the most people. And so again, we can see whether it's a host or hostess or a lobbyist or an intern, a career or appointee,

16:00 everyone's work matters to what God is doing in the world. We are not just here to work blindly. We are here to work as worship and offer foretastes of the kingdom of God to everyone that we come in contact with. And think just in the last two years,

16:19 think about some of the work that's been happening in Washington. Two and a half years ago, when the economy imploded because of COVID, People on the Hill that I know were working day and night trying to come up with a rescue package, with a bailout package, while basically shooting in the dark because something was happening to the

16:40 American economy that had never happened before. It was being impacted by a pandemic that shut down the entire country almost immediately, and the unemployment rate went from like 3% to 25%. The markets were in free fall. Nobody knew what was going to happen. And so these staff members are tasked with coming up with policies that will bless

17:05 the economy and not sink it when there is all chaos breaking loose. And that was tremendously stressful. Then you have people who are working at the labor department, again, when the unemployment rate was around three and a half percent, and they're working on various projects to encourage businesses and encourage flourishing.

17:23 And then basically overnight, half the businesses in the United States had to shut down. And their responsibility was then, how do we figure out how long this is going to last? How do we keep those businesses afloat? What do we do with all of the unemployment claims that are coming in faster than they've ever come in, ever?

17:41 Think about situations like what HUD deals with. HUD is the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and they do wonderful work there. I used to lead a Bible study there, and one of the things that they were working on, and they continue to work on, is helping people get off the streets. I have known two of very,

17:59 very close friends of mine who have been impacted directly by the benefits of Section 8 housing. And Section 8 housing matters. And we want that housing to be clean to help people actually move forward in their lives. And then you've got the tension that a career worker feels in a various cabinet

18:19 agency when they're told by one administration, what you're doing is great, keep doing it. And the next administration comes in and says, I don't know why you're doing that. It's horrible. I want you to do this instead. And then four to eight years later, somebody else comes in and says, I don't know why you're doing that.

18:33 I want you to do this instead. And that's happened for 25 years, and they're still there. And thankfully, their work is received as worship. Then you have people who maybe work in the Pentagon whose job it is to pick up a phone to tell somebody somewhere to put a drone in the air,

18:50 a drone that's not going to come back because it's loaded with explosive ordnance. And so this person's job is to review all of the information and to make a decision. and to do everything they can do to mitigate collateral damage. And then they go home and they see on the news what they learned at work that day

19:07 was despite their best efforts, two children were in that building that entered through the rear and they didn't see them. And now the world knows the two children died. And so just think for a moment about how important the work that happens in Washington is, the varied nature of it,

19:27 the varied nature of the people who are doing it, and think about what it would mean for them to know that their work is being received as worship. Here's the problem. The Barna study, one that we've referred to again and again, has shown that less than 25% of Christians who use their Bible believe that the

19:48 Bible helps them to navigate decisions made in the workplace. And if that is the case, then how in the world are they going to answer the four questions of faithful presence? What is good that requires support and protection? What is broken that is awaiting restoration? What is missing that is awaiting creation?

20:09 And what is evil that requires opposition and elimination? And these questions matter because the people that are asking them are in a place to do something about it. And if they don't believe faith, or understand how the Bible informs what they're doing, then we are really in trouble.

20:28 I want to just commend two resources for you on vocational discipleship before we move on. The first one is the Theology of Work Project. You can just Google that and go right to their website. One of my dear friends, and again,

20:41 a person I've worked with for a number of years in the faith and work kind of conversations, Will Messenger and his team over there run that, and it is effectively an online Bible and commentary and articles where everything is focused on vocational discipleship. So I would strongly commend the Theology of Work project to you.

21:04 And then what I'd like to do is commend to you a book by a person that I just truly, truly enjoy, Amy Sherman. And Amy Sherman has written this book called Kingdom Calling. And one of the things that she talks in here about is just the importance of our work, of what we're doing, of why it matters.

21:25 She says, faithful vocational stewardship is not only about doing, it is about being. To deploy their vocational power for the common good, believers must possess a character that handles this power humbly and eschews its misuse. This is why discipling for vocational stewardship involves not only the work of inspiration and discovery, but also an emphasis on formation.

21:52 This aspect of preparing parishioners for vocational stewardship is less about how-to mechanics and more about the heart. Equipping is not complete until church leaders provide the teaching, exhortation, and nurture needed to shape the member's character appropriately. And here she's making a point that I think is absolutely necessary, and that is vocational discipleship,

22:20 this one-on-one vocational discipleship that Faithful Presence is doing here in Washington is critical. But equally critical, and maybe even more critical, is that this work also takes place in the local church, that churches are doing this work. The ideal situation is that faithful presence is coming alongside people who are serving here at a 201 and 301 level,

22:45 not a 101 level, explaining the basics of faith and work. And so we need to resource our churches. We need our churches to understand the importance of vocational discipleship. And one of the things that we will see is that vocational discipleship matters because it informs ideological discipleship, which is so important in Washington, D.C. And of course,

23:08 this brings us to the next aspect of whole life discipleship we're going to talk about today, ideological discipleship. And I should just mention that many ministries in Washington, D.C., just avoid talking about ideologies and policies because they're just very divisive. It's kind of seen as problematic. And then on the other hand,

23:28 you've got others that are very clearly connected to a particular political belief system. And as I've said in a previous episode, that is just patently unhelpful. And quite frankly, I would say it's just unchristian. Because Christian values do not find themselves played out in any particular political party.

23:45 They find themselves lived out in a life devoted to serving and following Christ. And so for servants and leaders in Washington, this concept of ideological discipleship is absolutely critical. And it is also critical for anyone wanting to engage in political conversations. And again, study after study after study shows that Christians today do not know how to

24:16 connect their theology to their ideology. And if you have any questions about that, all you need to do is go to Twitter. And on Twitter, you can see uninformed hot takes by the thousands on a daily basis on any number of very important topics. like guns, abortion, LGBTQIA.

24:38 And, you know, let me just say this, saying woke is not an answer. Saying woke is basically cancel culture on ideological engagement, which is important. A couple of weeks ago, I saw a tweet on Twitter, which is where you see tweets. I saw a tweet that basically said, hey, listen up, everybody.

24:57 Cars kill more people every year than guns. And no one is having a conversation about outlawing cars. And I messaged the person because I do kind of do kind of knew him. And I said, hey, you know what? That's a really bad take. It doesn't even make logical sense.

25:12 You either have to compare the number of people who were killed in accidental gun deaths with the number of people who were killed accidentally by cars, or you have to compare the people who were killed in vehicular homicides and DUI accidents with the people who were killed by gun violence. But you can't just lump them all together,

25:35 because if you were to walk into anybody's office on the hill and make that argument, they're going to stop listening and dismiss you. And so as a pastor, if that's the message that you're putting out there, if that's the level of thought you're giving to ideological engagement, it's not helpful. And we can do better.

25:52 We are called to do better. We can think clearly and seriously about guns. We can think clearly and seriously about abortion. We can think clearly and seriously about LGBTQIA. And we can come to biblically informed decisions about it without just saying woke. A number of years ago, back before the pandemic, so probably three years ago,

26:18 I attended a forum that was sponsored by the Heritage Foundation. And yes, I know that it is a right-leaning, not even right-leaning, it's definitely standing on the right side, political think tank. But what they were doing there is they were hosting a group, a panel of lesbian women who were looking for somewhere to be heard about their

26:38 views on transgenderism. specifically the way that transgenderism and surgery and hormone blocking was impacting youth. And let me just say, they were not happy. And one of the things that one of them said is, I can't believe we're at the Heritage Foundation because we can't find anyone to

26:59 give us a forum to listen to what we are saying. And you can Google that. You use the right keywords. I'm sure you'll find it. It was wonderful. It was an informative hour and a half for me listening to people who, you know, quite frankly, have an experience that I don't have,

27:17 many of whom far more educated than I am. And I'm glad to have had an opportunity to listen to help inform my decisions. And so what all this does is this actually exposes this reality of incomplete discipleship, right? And this is one of the reasons why faithful presence is doing what we're doing,

27:36 is we believe that incomplete discipleship really does need to be corrected. So under this idea of ideological discipleship, you have terms like liberalism, conservatism, socialism, nationalism, libertarianism, All of these are various ideologies, and there are a number of really great books on kind of how to navigate political ideologies from a Christian perspective.

28:00 One of my favorites is by David Koisis. It is called Political Visions and Delusions. It's a wonderful work. It's not that difficult of a read. I'd encourage you to pick it up. But here's what he says. He's talking about the difference between kind of a theologically driven, gospel-centered ideology and any of these other ideologies of liberalism, conservatism,

28:25 socialism, nationalism, libertarianism, etc. And he says this. He says, first of all, we need to remember that sin is is not to be located in creation but in rebellion against God and his purposes for creation. That's how we as Christians understand sin. He says, So this is key,

28:51 that the concept of where sin is in the equation matters to how we interact with a particular ideology. And then he continues, he says this, because the followers of ideology see the world as not belonging to God, but to humanity, they misunderstand the character of the world in rather basic fashion.

29:13 Perhaps they see it as a chance combination of atoms and molecules capable of being shaped to their liking, or they may see the state as the source of order in the world and effectively make it totalitarian, as, for example, in Nazism and Marxism-Leninism. If modern ideologies have their own soteriology, their own idea of salvation,

29:39 of what makes us whole and what redeems us, it should not surprise us to discover that they have their own eschatology. And here he just means their own endgame. As we discussed in a previous episode, what does it mean for our future? What are we hoping for in the future? He continues, he says,

29:57 "...that is a doctrine of the last things, insofar as their followers tell a redemptive story, the final chapter postulates an end state in which all will be well, brought about, of course, by heroic human efforts." Which is, of course, contrary to the idea that it is Christ who is making all things new.

30:19 That to kind of sell ourselves out to these ideologies as being the thing that is going to save everybody, in thinking that conservatism or liberalism or libertarianism or socialism or communism is the solution to everything, is to miss the heart of what God is saying about how we flourish. Here's the implication. Here's why this matters.

30:45 On the policy side, inefficiencies brought on by personal and relational brokenness because of the fall, coupled with ideologies that are out of accord with gospel-centered theology often result in policies that actually discourage justice, mercy, and flourishing as we were created to enjoy them. Thankfully, Christian scripture has a lot to say about ideology.

31:13 There are three terms that are important throughout scripture. The first one is akoinomia, which is a Greek term that simply means economy or the administration of things, the way things are purposed to go together, the scheme or the plan. And we see this played out in the four-chapter gospel, which we've talked about before, that in creation,

31:34 everything worked the way it was supposed to work. In the fall, we have sin introduced and everything breaks down. But in the process of redemption and Christ making all things new— We see the work that God is doing to restore order to the world that eventually, in the consummation in the new heavens and the new earth,

31:55 goes back to exactly the way that God had intended it to work. That is what oikonomia means. Another term is makarios, which means happiness or blessedness, and that is effectively the Greek word for the Hebrew word that is used in Psalm 1 that means blessed or happy, and Psalm 1 is blessed is the man.

32:18 You can go and look at it now, and it's basically like this is the key to the good life, to the happy life, is walking with God. And so when Jesus sits down with his followers and gives them the Sermon on the Mount and tells them the Beatitudes,

32:34 he is talking about what does it mean to be blessed? What does it mean to be happy? Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. And here's the thing. Jesus is interacting with, believe it or not, Greek philosophy. In Nicomachean ethics, Aristotle lays out this concept of what is called eudaimonia,

32:55 which is a Greek word which effectively means the end of good, the seeking of good. It's not a word that appears in Scripture, but it is a very well-known term as far as first century Greek and Roman thought, this idea of eudaimonia of well-being. And then Thomas Aquinas builds on this later.

33:18 He uses a term that was used by Augustine, beatitudo, from where we get the word beatitudes, which is directly from blessedness, from Macarion. What happens here is that both Augustine and Aquinas are connecting that blessedness and happiness to God, that they can't be achieved without a sense of God and who he is.

33:42 And then we have this term, shalom, which is basically the flourishing, the peace, the welfare, the wholeness of a society. Again, a term that we see throughout Scripture. And so all of these, administration, happiness, happiness, and shalom are not only the goals of government, because in documents that we have that say things like the pursuit of happiness,

34:07 the Constitution is an entire document about proper administration. So these terms, Aquinamia, Makarion, and shalom, are all goals of government, but they are the fruit of whole life discipleship. And I am very thankful to one of my seminary professors, Dr. Anthony Bradley. who, upon finding me asking all kinds of questions about work in economics and political

34:32 theology in seminary, said, you know what, I need to connect you to the Acton Institute. And the Acton Institute is a think tank, and the things that they think about are political philosophy and economic theory through a Christian lens. It is basically a division of kind of half Catholics,

34:50 half Dutch Reformed thinkers with a mix of other folks thrown in there. But through my interactions over the past 15 years with the Acton Institute, I have come to appreciate the deep wealth of Christian tradition. on political philosophy through people like Luther, Calvin, Bovink, Kuyper, many others, Rawls, de Tocqueville, David Ricardo,

35:13 the wealth of information on economic theory, whether it's shareholder versus stakeholder capitalism. And the difference there is simply Milton Friedman once said that the only real job of a business owner is to generate a profit for his investors. That's what shareholder capitalism is. I need to make a profit for my shareholders.

35:35 And that is very different than stakeholder capitalism, which is kind of the buzzword right now among folks that are going to the Davos Summit that are thinking about what does it mean for us to function and to make money and to engage economically economically. and to care for the constituents in the place where we are.

35:55 And we see this playing out in Leviticus and Ruth, where God actually gave the people of God instructions on what it was like to worship him. And that worship in Leviticus 19 says, is depicted as, hey, make sure that when you hire somebody, you pay them the same day.

36:12 Don't hold their wages back because they need that money to eat. Don't use two sets of scales to try to rob people who are tourists, who are sojourners, who don't understand the trade systems. Don't do that. Don't overharvest your fields. You've got to leave something for the poor and for the people who don't have land.

36:28 Because that's your responsibility. God's given you your wealth to steward it well, not so that you have to give all of your money away, but so that you can bless the people that you come in contact with. And this is exactly what you see in the book of Ruth, where Boaz is very wealthy. He owns land.

36:45 He uses that land to make money. He harvests it. He sells it. He makes money. He uses it to pay his employees and to buy more land. And he's engaged in the economics of just accumulating and generating wealth. But what he's not doing is harvesting his crops three and four times. And because he doesn't do that,

37:09 because he realizes that there is a community aspect of this, Ruth and Naomi are able to live. And so when we think about how do Christians think ideologically about economics, about the free market, about shareholder and stakeholder capitalism, instead of seeing things as black and white, as either or, as very binary,

37:27 maybe one of the things we need to do is actually think about what Scripture is saying about perhaps a middle road. How do we think about Austrian versus Keynesian economics? How do we think about profits during the pandemic? I listened a few weeks ago. Molly Kidner was doing a Brookings Institute lecture on the amount of money that

37:47 was spent by companies in buying back stock during the pandemic. And one of the things she found was that companies during the pandemic spent five times more money on stock buybacks. And again, think about the context here. Prices were very low, so companies could buy back their stock for a lot less than it had been worth maybe

38:09 three months ago, and then use that to basically generate wealth to their higher stakeholders, their higher shareholders, so to speak. And what she found is that what this did is it had a net effect on widening the wage gap. The distance between the wealthiest and those who maybe have less.

38:32 And what they could have done was increased salaries by 40%, which might have avoided this crazy labor crisis we have right now. But then she added this comment. Therefore, we cannot wait for business to do the right thing. Now, as you're listening to this, you're saying, oh, that information is really interesting.

38:51 But what do you mean when you say we cannot wait for business to do the right thing? Do you mean that government should step in and take money away from business owners? What do you mean? What does it mean for us as a church to talk about virtue? to talk about wealth accumulation,

39:06 to talk about what it means to be a steward, to steward the resources that God has given us. Is our default position always to just look to the government to correct the failure of virtue in our society, or do we have a role to play? How do we think about social justice, mercy, statecraft, foreign policy, sphere sovereignty,

39:27 creation care, relational and gender issues? All of these things matter. And they matter a lot. And they're not just ideological issues. They are cultural issues. And culture is something we are going to discuss next time. So we're going to put a lot of these resources on the website. I mentioned a whole lot of books.

39:48 I want you to be able to have access to them, so we'll make sure those are in the notes. Here's what we're going to be exploring in future episodes. In our next episode, we're going to talk about cultural and missional discipleship. And in the episode after that, we're going to have my very good friend, Reverend Patrick Allen,

40:04 talking with us about spiritual discipleship in the local church. If you liked what you heard today, give us a review. Help us out with those algorithms that help more people find us. We'd love to hear from you. You can drop us a line on our website, faithfulpresence.org.

40:18 Until next time, this is Michael Langer saying, may the love of God be with you. May he protect you. May he make you flourish.