Love at Work
The “Greatest of These” in Missional Enterprise
The Greatest of These
“God is teaching us that the only metric for success in the business world, or any other sphere, is love. We take the time to treat each person as valued and deeply loved by God.”
Last week, we introduced a series on the Fruit of the Spirit in missional enterprise. Today, we explore love, the first of the nine qualities2 mentioned in Paul’s list in Galatians 5:22-23.
This preeminent position should be no surprise to us. Jesus tells us not only that loving God “with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” is the first and greatest commandment, but that “all the Law and the Prophets” depend upon this commandment and the one to “love your neighbor as yourself.”3
The Apostle Paul, in his great exposition on love in the first letter to the Corinthians, also describes the exalted status of love:
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:13 (ESV)
Love at Work
First, we must remember that love is defined by, and exemplified by God. As the Apostle John writes in his first letter:
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us . . . 1 John 4:10 (ESV)
Second, while loving neighbors is a grand calling and opportunity for those engaged in missional enterprise, our response to God’s love for us is first reflected in obedience to the first commandment to love God himself. As the authors of the BAM Global Report, “Your Kingdom Come, Your Will Be Done… In Business” point out:
“. . . it is all too easy to become immersed in the work of evangelism (Matt 28:18–20) and neighbor-love (Matt 22:39; Rom 13:9) and to neglect the relationship demanded by ‘the first and great commandment’, ‘You shall love the Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind’ (Matt 19:37)”
Your Neighbor as Yourself
Starting from a strong foundation of a loving relationship with God, we are well-positioned to share that love in various ways with the “neighbors” of our missional enterprise. Ron Johnson, a follower of Jesus, led the design of the Apple retail stores when he served as Senior Vice President of Retail Operations. He explains that the design for these stores was driven by the question of what the biblical command to “love your neighbor” might look like at a secular retail store. In a video from the Seattle Pacific University Faith & Co. series, he calls the positive relational interactions engendered by the store design “love made visual.”
Returning to the example described at the beginning of this article, Elizabeth and her team felt challenged to display love through an extensive commitment to focused prayer for their employees. They conclude:
God’s mercy and love expressed in practical and miraculous ways in our business give us hope for gospel transformation in individuals and society.
(You can read more of their story in the article from the Navigators, entitled “When God is in Charge of a Business: Sharing the Love of Jesus.”)
Verse of the Week:
And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Colossians 3:14 (NIV)
Let’s commit this week to look for practical ways to abide in, respond to, and express to others the love of God in our missional enterprises.