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The Church has always been in a challenging position between its religious backdrop and the secular world. The chasm between “Sunday church” and “Monday work” is, first of all, a fatal division in the understanding of religious liberty and secular liberty. Biblically speaking, every day is the Day of the Lord where the glory of God is displayed in the daily conduct of mankind be it in the marketplaces for example. Today, Church needs to pay more attention to the competitive and uneven playing fields of the business world for all kinds of reasons, such as biased political policy, unequal business treatment, business quotas system for protectionism and so forth. Hence, entrepreneurship is no longer being perceived as only “of” the world, it is also “in” the world system. All things operate and happen in the world. There are both Christian and non-Christian business people in an entrepreneurial profession. It comes as no surprise that there are many Christian business people with leadership skills that make up a big bulk of congregational members of churches. Sometimes, when these people become bold in their entrepreneurship, others may criticize them for being arrogant or in it just for themselves. Well, this may be true to a certain extent, but the reverse could also be true. There are some who faithfully exercise God’s given gift for God’s purpose in their entrepreneurship endeavours. Apostle Paul, after all, was no stranger to that criticism in his days of ministry. God needs the boldness of entrepreneurs to move the cause of Christ forward in a remarkable way, changing millions of lives in the marketplaces which generally lack the consciousness of godly conduct.
For many conservative churches, they see and conceive that Christian ethics and ethos in entrepreneurship have been compromised in one way or the other. Christian entrepreneurship may flow along the way of the world for their business to thrive and take a larger share of the marketplace despite a Biblical fallout. Therefore, the entrepreneurs, more often than not, are perceived as evil men/women not worthy of the loving God and should be condemned! This is well understood in perspective. In the same argument, the Church needs to engage and teach more openly about wealth and money, but without presenting a prosperity gospel. Absolutely not!
Churches are built on the essential ingredients of missional character. As described in the book of Acts, Aquila and Priscilla, were the co-founders of the church in Corinth, along with Apostle Paul. Like Paul, they were also operating a tent-making business in the marketplace while they were serving the church ministry. Aquila and Priscilla were both equal with Paul with mission-focused hearts to serve God and they were able to make an impact on many lives through the in-depth understanding of Scripture while at the same time being engaged in their tent-making enterprise. They recognised that their business is Kingdom-based, and for providing self-sustenance, and so they used the tent-making platform to share the gospel and provide ministry support. Through this, the Church must see that the marketplace is a potential mission field ripe for harvest, where there is so much lacking in biblical principles and practices in today’s commercial world of competition.
Knowingly or not, people will cast aside ethics to chase after as much wealth as possible for lifestyles centred around comfort, high living, gratification and pride. The Church should see Christian entrepreneurs as ambassadors for Christ who have great potential to influence the marketplace in many aspects. From the casting vision to empowerment through mentoring and disciple-making, all can be done in name of the Lord, God the Father for His glory. William Carey (1761 – 1834) said, “Expecting great things from God, attempting great things for God.” The Church must have the heartbeat of the relevant parables that Jesus has spoken and used to encourage Kingdom Entrepreneurship as a change maker in the marketplace.
The Church will then play an influential, positive and Biblical role on an entrepreneurial mission. There are churches now which will often choose to take the easy way out just to meet their obligation to the Commission of Christ by just giving handouts to support the mission cause. They do not have proper sense of engagement nor a full understanding of the communities’ needs when it comes to the mission fields of another culture. Any annual visitation to their so-called adopted mission field is nothing more than a holiday trip because an integrated engagement is lacking. How much understanding can the church acquire by spending only a few days in that community by the different groups of people from the church? The visited community will put up their best decorations to welcome the church donors staying for just few days. After that everything will return to the normal way of life with no conviction whatsoever.
Sound teaching of Biblical entrepreneurship must be imparted to those who have hearts for a real transformation in the targeted mission field. Turn from the free and easy handouts into meaningful and constructive discipleship of the local community. Dr. Sun Yet Sen (1866 -1925) said, “If we want the Republic to be solid, we must first build its foundation. We need not look abroad; we should seek it in the hearts of all the people of the nation.” In this case, not only the church will provide solid foundation to enhance the once poverty-stricken community, but it will also see real transformation from the conviction in people’s lives for the betterment of their future generations to come.
The church needs to have a radical change in mind-set and challenge the congregation member-entrepreneurs, potential entrepreneurs and/or entrepreneur-oriented individuals, providing them with sound teaching on Biblical entrepreneurship in the right forum. Through exchanging of entrepreneurial experiences among members, real-life business issues in the marketplace can be addressed effectively. Practical workshop forums should be organised with the active participation of the Church leadership who are passionate to see communities rising up to their opportunities. For the rural marketplace, providing training and teaching on proper skillsets to the locals will help to transform their once waste land into a productive farmland that will bring to about not only better incomes to improve their livelihoods, but also show the provision of God in their conviction.
Many people say pastors are the most over-looked change agents in the marketplace! How is this possible? Perhaps pastors are not the experts in entrepreneurship matters and hardly preach about it explicitly. Perhaps pastors should have a new mind-set and consciousness of people’s conduct in many grey areas in the business environment. Ethics in business conduct is like a delicate overhanging cliff and decision making can sometimes be very tough. Pastors need to consciously engage and interact with stories and daily news about business conducts in the commercial arena.
It is a very real possibility that a person in “Sunday church” and “Monday work” could conduct in opposite side of the world. News about unethical misconduct of Christian business people can sometimes be shocking and unbelievable. Using well-versed Scripture, pastors can put on new sight and understanding aids, and will be surprised to see the revelations of God’s Spirit working out in the vast continent of the marketplace. The people of “Monday work” need the Lord too. They also struggle like others who bring their burdens to “Sunday church”.
As a pastor, it is important that he / she needs to recognise that the marketplace of a commercial nature is also a mission target for the gospel of Jesus Christ. The fertile mission targets of the church ministry are not necessarily just the traditionally-referred people groups and remote communities. Within the marketplace, there are both believers and non-believers in the same boat of religious freedom and they can see many aspects of conduct through their own lens. There are people struggling with the practicing true and false ethics under pressure in marketplace. Most people are only interested in engaging in the thinking of “what works”, rather than “what is true”.
By and large, engaging the Church in the social teaching of human physiological needs and aspirations will be important. Pastors do not need to be an expert in the knowledge of modus operandi of the vocational entrepreneurship. However, he / she must engage to reduce the chasm between “business” and “churchy things” and understand that business has the same status as religious liberty. He / she can provide a counselling and prayer support role in providing a Biblical perspective of discipleship, socio-relational and money matters. This is even more so in this highly globalized and digitalized world, where face-to-face business deals are becoming a thing of the past. Instances of corporate-to-corporate and employer-to-employee physical interaction will decrease. That window of the physical social touch and communication can be expected to be reduced. What will be the chances of the gospel of Jesus Christ being transmitted cogently in this digitalised world?
Just as a Pastor is always sensitive and discerning about any individual in the congregation that he / she is called to serve, it makes no difference that he / she should be discerning about any other congregation member who is called to serve in the marketplace, may be in an entrepreneurship. While shepherding the church, the pastor needs to be discerning to spot the natural entrepreneurial gifts of member(s) who have the talent, temperament and skillset. He / she then counsels, nurtures, prays and understands that purpose under the lordship of his / her parish, recognising that the marketplace is a more authentic showroom of Christianity.
Hence discipleship can still happen in the marketplace. Christian entrepreneurs could be made like the farmer who sow the seeds like the parable spoken by Jesus in Matt. 13:3-9; Mark 4:3-9; Luke 8:5-8. The pastor may also be able to effectively equip spirited-Christian entrepreneurs to function as the salt and light in the relevant culture of their marketplace. Therefore, as parishioners have a church Pastor in the church, employees / workers can also have an entrepreneur Pastor in the marketplace as double edge-sword.
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