How do we do the right thing at work? Part 3 of a series

 In our last two posts in this series, we talked about what ethics (“doing the right thing”) is and different approaches Christians (and others) have taken over the years to navigating the difficulties of doing the right thing. Today we want to check in with some of what the Bible actually says on the topic.

We talked last time about three ways people have approached ethics: commands, consequences, and character. There’s a lot in the Bible that has to do with the principle of divine commands, and we’ll unpack it here.

1) The Bible has plenty of specific commands….

….not least about work. These include God’s institution of the Sabbath, commands to work hard and honestly, condemnations of the “idle rich,” and encouragements to view work as worship. Click the link above for a whole list: here are some of them:

• We don’t just work to please our human bosses. We work for God (Col. 3:23; Eph. 6:5-8). Work is to be approached wholeheartedly and done well (Eccl. 9:10; Col. 3:22-24).
• God intends that people should be adequately paid for the work they do and enjoy food, shelter and clothing as part of the fruit of that work (Luke 10:7; 2 Thess. 3:10; Psalm 128:1-2).
• Employers are told to treat their employees justly and fairly, knowing that they themselves also have a master that they will ultimately answer to (Col. 4:1).
• They are to recognize that “workers deserve their wages” (Luke 10:7; 1 Tim. 5:18).
• Employees are reminded of their responsibilities towards their employers (1 Tim. 6:1; Titus 2:9).

But all the same, the Bible is not merely a rulebook:

Nonetheless, the attempt to formulate a complete book of rules based on Scripture that will speak to every conceivable ethical dilemma would seem to be a hopeless quest. No set of commands can be vast enough to cover every issue that arises. And there are situations in today’s workplace that have no precedent in Biblical times. Is it ethical to award stock options based on performance? Is it ethical to advertise a product to entice people to buy more of it? Is it ethical to have hiring preferences for under-represented ethnic groups? Is it ethical to buy a competing company?

2) The Bible also teaches some overall guiding principles.

A number of attempts have been made to systematize the many commands in the Bible into a short list we can carry with us in our minds and hearts into our daily work. Here’s one:

• Reflect Christ in your business practices.
• Be accountable.
• Provide a quality product at a fair price.
• Honor your creditors.
• Treat your employees fairly.
• Treat your customers fairly.

While these are helpful, some feel that they don’t go far enough, and many people have tried to see if all of these commands can be brought together.

3) At least some folks have tried to see if all these commands can be expressed in ONE principle.

Both the Golden Rule and Jesus’ injunction to love our neighbor as ourselves have been suggested here. But do these run the risk of being too simplistic?

4) …and others have recommended a union of three principles:

The most common recurring descriptions of God’s character in the Bible are holiness, justice and love. Our laws, rules and practices should bring about holiness, justice and love. Hill maintains that Christian ethics requires that all three principles be taken into account all the time. Each, like a leg on a three-legged stool, balances the other two. Overemphasizing the importance of one at the expense of the others always leads to a distortion in ethical thinking. For example, an overemphasis on holiness can easily lead to rules that require Christians to withdraw from the world into a kind of impotent isolationism. An overemphasis on justice can easily produce excessively harsh penalties for breaking the rules. An overemphasis on love can sometimes lead to vagueness and lack of accountability.

This is a balanced approach. But it still may not help us in every situation. In our next posts, we’ll explore what the Bible says about consequences and character.

Image: God and Mammon III by Steve Shupe, used under a Creative Commons license.