In the late 90s, a pastor friend visiting Kansas City from Bogota was invited to share a word with the executive team of a large local business.
Dust motes drifted in the low autumn sun streaming across the board room, ice settled into cut crystal glasses, and a faint smoky tang of BBQ from lunch hung in the air. He thanked God for the success and influence the business enjoyed, the wonderful meal, and the health of everyone present. He looked around and commented on the beautiful Plaza view, their building, the elegant decor, and the magnificent table between them. Then he said, “It’s too bad it’s all going to burn.” There was a slight gasp, then silence.
His message was simple and compassionate. Their surroundings were temporary, and the energies and revenue invested in them would yield better returns in the Kingdom. He encouraged them to channel some of those resources into ministry, maybe even leave the business world to serve a church or join him in Colombia.
I applauded his words then. Today, I would say the same thing to pastors and invite them to join me in business.
Brick, mortar, wood, and metal are temporary. So are church buildings.
The only eternal investment is in the Kingdom. But the Kingdom consists of people who work in offices like the one he said will burn.
His words were rooted in a stunted frame of ministry, well-intentioned but blind to something bigger. That perspective says the best, if not only, way to invest in the Kingdom is through activities tied to and run by a local church. I’m embarrassed to say I held that same view for far too long. It sounds good, but I don’t see it in scripture.
Instead, I see God praising wise business owners just as much as faithful priests in the Old Testament and see the Kingdom launched by businesspeople like Lydia in the New Testament.
I used to preach about Paul planting churches while I did the same. I noticed the churches he planted started in the homes of businessmen and entrepreneurial women like those around the table my friend addressed.
What if we’ve come full circle? Today, the church is on the edge of society, not the heart. The businesses employing the people who make up the Kingdom own that real estate now. And there are few leaders more equipped to model flesh and blood examples of Jesus than the pastors who currently invest more and more time into funding lovely buildings with beautiful views, full of furniture and carpet and stuff that’s all gonna burn.
The business of the church far too often is church business. Pastors and leaders are employed and tasked with organizing events, managing staff, motivating groups, balancing budgets, finding ways to increase organizational revenue, and working on ad campaigns to get a few more “customers” in the doors.
Many pastors and leaders eternally impact their church communities, driven by a deep calling, knowing they are exactly where God wants them to be and never want to stop. If that’s you, you’re not who I’m writing to.
I want to speak to the men and women who feel like they’re going through the motions, stuck driving a church desk. They know there has to be something more, but they haven’t seen the rest of the picture. Many invested time and money in a seminary degree or walked away from a profession to answer the call to ministry. After all, if you want to serve God, the BEST way, the REAL way, is in professional ministry.
Right?
No. Not by a long shot. Lydia never worked at a church. Simon the tanner never got a ministry paycheck. The diligent worker in Proverbs 22:29 stands before kings, not a priest. That doesn’t mean priests didn’t have an audience or the king’s respect, but when you look, it’s amazing how many times God calls out workers.
Consider Proverbs 11:26; God blesses the man who SELLS his produce. In today’s context, he has a farm or a small business, grows or makes something of value to his community, and profits from his actions. The only difference between his small biz and the large one in KC is scale.
The work is blessed, as is the worker, whether in ministry or not. His ministry may be the people in his business or, like the verse above, the workers on his farm.
What if we flipped it all upside down? Let’s say a successful business owner from Bogota visited your church and had a chance to speak to your staff and elder board. After a nice potluck lunch and some coffee from a big silver urn, he thanked God for the health and faithfulness of everyone present and commented on the great location and modern graphics and decor. Then, looking over the folding tables gathered in the fellowship hall said. "It’s too bad it’s all going to burn."
After a moment of uncomfortable silence, he continues. “How much time and expense goes into maintaining this campus when it sits empty much of the week? I want to challenge some of you to leave this work running a site that sees the same few hundred or even the same few thousand show up weekly and make a bigger impact on the world. God may be calling some of you to replace yourselves with volunteers and join me in the fields where hundreds of thousands of people desperately need the things you talk about and study here all week. If we’re the salt of the earth and the church is the shaker, the saltiest bits stay inside.”
Professional ministry is a noble calling in every sense. But it is no MORE noble than any job or trade in any office or worksite when the worker is focused on the Kingdom.
Kingdom-minded leaders in business can harness resources many churches could only dream of and have access to minds and talents that may never think of attending church.
I attended a business conference with around 2,500 entrepreneurs. The organizers invited everyone to attend an informal talk that evening. They shared a video about an organization rescuing children from human trafficking and then held a panel discussion with its leader. They issued a simple challenge to the 800 or so present to help support that mission and added that they would match every dollar donated. Three days later, they presented a giant check, the kind you see lottery winners get, for a little over $1.7 million.
It wasn’t a Christian event, though the leaders were believers. The vast majority of attendees wouldn’t consider themselves religious. But they were captivated by the Kingdom-born vision of leaders who were business people, not pastors or church staff.
There are few churches anywhere that can match that level of impact from within their walls. Fewer still could deliver those results with an audience not already invested in the church’s vision.
What could YOU do in the workplace with all God has taught you in ministry? Imagine the lives you could touch and the change you could make.
How many boardrooms could start to see the world beyond the bottom line? How many peers and collaborators could learn that there’s a different way to live, not by consuming another self-help book or podcast, but by seeing a living, breathing example?
You’ve probably preached or taught about living like Christ in a quickly darkening world. What if the most significant catalyst for their change is not a sermon from a pulpit but a living example in the very places they spend most of their time?
Churches, buildings, and campuses are essential parts of the Kingdom. But they’re not everything, not even close. I’ve met with pastors in the Andes and Africa who meet anywhere there’s a roof and in China, where locations change weekly. A friend in Malta showed me a first-century grotto hidden from Roman eyes. Somehow they survived with a simple space and symbols drawn on the rock walls (and without Powerpoint or full-time staff).
There’s a vast world utterly untouched by the work pastors, leaders, and staff do inside the church. Leaving your ministry may be the most significant move you could ever make to impact the Kingdom outside of that environment.
If you do, it will be one of the hardest things you have ever done. I know that has been the case for me.
But it may also be where everything that first drove you into ministry finally comes alive.
And that’s an investment that will never burn.
