As leaders of missional enterprises, we are called to fulfill the Great Commission by living out the Creation Mandate in enterprise while following the Great Commandment.

But our commitment to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbors as ourselves must be lived out in practical ways in the context of the particular challenges of enterprise leadership.

A very unique resource, A Rule of Life for Redemptive Entrepreneurs by Praxis Labs, provides an invitation to a set of shared commitments that are intended to guide us to lead with excellence and integrity.

Praxis Labs describes itself as a “venture-building ecosystem advancing redemptive entrepreneurship, supporting founders, funders, and innovators motivated by their faith to address the major issues of our time.” The authors of A Rule of Life for Redemptive Entrepreneurs point out that, while entrepreneurs are fundamentally no different than any other person:

At the same time, the gifts and traits that draw us toward entrepreneurship, and the social context that surrounds us as entrepreneurs, pose particular temptations. They also offer us unusual and visible opportunities to live joyfully distinct lives of faith, hope, and love.

They describe a “rule of life” as “a set of practices to guard our habits and guide our lives.” At only a few dozen pages, this resource is really more of a booklet than a book, but it packs a lot of helpful and challenging content into those few pages.

The book is divided into six short sections, each presenting an invitation to a specific set of committed practices in a certain area of the life of an entrepreneur:

• Time
• Money
• Imagination
• Decision-Making
• Power
• Community

Each section first introduces the reality that Christian entrepreneurs face in that particular area of life, followed by the “Baseline Practice” that the reader is invited to commit to. For instance, in the section on “Power” the “Baseline Practice” is a commitment to practice “gleaning — frequently sacrificing opportunities for our own advancement to intentionally create pathways for others.” Each section also includes several suggested “Reach Practices,” habits beyond the baseline that many entrepreneurs may feel led to embrace, and describes some “Creative Approaches” to implementing these various practices.

Finally, each section ends with words of “Hope for Abundance” to inspire the reader to engage in these practices in a way that, rather than limiting us, prepares us to be launched into abundant life and leadership.

We’ve all probably read books that could have been compressed into a TED Talk but had been padded with fluff to fill 300 pages. This little booklet is exactly the opposite. One can easily read the entire resource in an hour, but it would be better to allow much more time to process and consider the content deeply and prayerfully.

While the term “Rule of Life” could sound limiting or legalistic, the purpose of this resource is to invite the reader into a deeper partnership with the Holy Spirit and the community of like-minded creators to “give us creative capacities and a creative community that we would not have on our own.” We highly recommend it.1

If you enjoy podcasts and want to hear more about A Rule of Life for Redemptive Entrepreneurs, consider listening to the episode of the Faith-Driven Entrepreneur Podcast featuring Praxis partner Andy Crouch:

• https://www.faithdrivenentrepreneur.org/podcast-inventory/2019/3/25/episode-49-a-rule-of-life-for-redemptive-entrepreneurs-andy-crouch-author-journalist-and-partner-at-praxis

Verse of the Week:

Just as Daniel, living and working in a challenging environment, committed to certain daily practices, let’s ask God this week to lead us into habits of the heart through which he might deepen our roots in him.