Integrity in the Marketplace

Integrity in the marketplace is a key to good business. When people know you can be trusted; that you will keep your word and honor your commitments, they will come back to deal with you again and again. Just yesterday I was talking by phone with a potential business associate who complained about the many fly-by-night businesses he had found on the internet. Most had no name, no phone number for making contact and not even an e-mail address. He was tired of dealing with phonies.

That just reinforced to me how important it is that especially those of us in marketplace ministry treat every client, relationship and transaction with integrity. We who are attempting to bring Christ and biblical principles into the marketplace must seek to be beyond reproach. We must go the second mile and demonstrate both by actions and words that we are who we say we are and that we will do what we say we will do. Honesty, integrity, dependability - all crucial in the marketplace.

I just read an article by Daryl R. Gibson on Integrity in the Workplace. He ended his article with this summary:

Why should we have integrity in our business life? Because it's good business -- for our company, for ourselves, and for our soul.

Enough said!

The Time Has Come

"For years, Christians involved in business thought their only usefulness was at church. Leaders now say most ministry will soon be happening on the job."

This quote from an article in Charisma Magazine June 2003 comes from Ken Walker. Four and a half years later we are seeing this become more and more a reality. Walker's article goes on to say the following:

"This movement is going to a much higher level," says Marshall, who devotes one week a month to starting advice centers in Houston. "But, we're still at the front edge of this. It's an ongoing thing of people stepping out to do things."

Still, the move is pronounced enough that Ed Silvoso--one of the leaders of the renowned Argentinean revival and a banker and hospital administrator before he became an evangelist--has redirected his ministry toward the marketplace.

His new focus includes a book titled Anointed for Business. Silvoso credits the inspiration for writing it to a divine revelation that his theology was incomplete--because it failed to apply Scripture to the workplace."

Applying Scripture to the marketplace (or workplace) isn't new to us. Back in the '80's in Brazil, we encountered a whole new variety of businessmen/pastors. It was a new breed.

I believe we still have much to learn from leaders such as Ed Silvoso and many others. One such person is Tim Darnell who has brought new meaning to the concept of marketplace ministry through the Christ centered company he founded several years ago - Advantage Conferences.