Study notes for the course.

Presented by Fletcher L. Tink, Ph.DProfessor

Theology of Work for the STEM Professions:

Offered by City Vision College, Master’s Level in 8 weeks

Instructions:

Please follow these Powerpoint notes along with the accompanying oral lectures that are provided. The lectures vary from 30-45 minutes each with the exception of the final one which is 15 minutes long. However, it is supplemented with a 45 minute documentary.

Session One

An Introduction to “Theology of Work for the STEM Professions”

Outline of Session #1Topics to be Covered

1. Defining the STEM Professions: Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics

2. Causes and Evidences of the Gap between the STEM Professions and Christian attitudes

3. Defining Terms: “Theology”

4. The Fallacies of the Current Understanding of “Ministry”

5. The Current Context of the Discussion

6. The Need for a New Theological Paradigm

Introductory Definitions:

“Theology”: “The study of God and His ways”---We only know about God through His “mighty acts”, in other words, His “Work” in creation, in redemption and in sustaining---bringing all things into Himself. Theology does not merely speculate on who God is, but studies the narrative of how God interacts and works among human beings. That work, in some sense, defines who God is, to humans who themselves “work” to understand Him.

Theology has the purpose not just of mystical reflection on who God is, but

rather, to achieve “God’s glory (honour and praise) and humankind’s good (the

godliness that is true humanness) through every life activity”

(J.I. Packer)In other words, there is no such thing as

unapplied theology!!!!

1. Does STEM work matter to God? Or is it only “church work” that has value?

2. Does all STEM work have intrinsic value?3. Why do we engage in the STEM professions?4. Does our professional work have a part to play in our

spiritual formation?5. Does our professional STEM work have any eternal

significance?6. Is our STEM work defined differently from one culture

to another? 7. Do we have an inherent attitude that our work in the

STEM professions is superior to that other professions or other jobs?

Questions about the STEM Professions

What do each of these words tell us about attitudes about

“Work”?

Examples: Job, Occupation, Career, Living, Profession, Trade, Labor, Employment, Business.

Examples of Attitudes: Drudgery, Travail, Sweat, Toil, Daily Grind, Duty, Obligation, Grunt work

Attitudes/Synonyms for “Work” in the North American culture

“Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance?” ---Edgar Bergen

“I’m a friend of the workingman, I would rather be his friend than be one.” ---Clarence Darrow

“Work is the curse of the drinking classes.” ---Oscar Wilde

“I like work; it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.” --- Jerome K Jerome

“People are still willing to do an honest day’s work. The trouble is they want a week’s pay for it.” ---Joey Adams

Funny Attitudes About Work

“Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is the probable reason why so few engage in it.” ---Henry Ford

“Working gets in the way of living.” ---Omar Sharif

Funny Attitudes, cont’d

Dictionary: “Physical or mental effort or activity directed toward the production or accomplishment of something”

John Stott’s definition: “Energy expended whether manual or mental or both, whether remunerated or not,”

In other works, effort towards accomplishing something whether paid or not.

The STEM professions require both mental and physical labor, i.e. the laboratory. And much of the effort is not calculated in financial personal profit but in intangible rewards.

Definitions of “Work”

“A man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is a visible labor and there is an invisible labor.”

Victor Hugo

Quotation about Mental Work

1. Meaning: Because it brings meaning to that portion of a person’s life that occupies most of his or her waking hours. It is central rather than peripheral. We spend far more time at our workplaces than we do in “Church”.

2. Balance: Because it is essential for putting “work” in its proper place. Work cannot be our “god” (the center of one’s meaning), nor is it simply a curse as many suppose it to be.

3. Freedom: Because work can be a liberation for all Christians in that every Christian lives life in two worlds---in the world of the Church “gathered” and in the world of the Church “scattered”.

Why then, a focus on “Theology of Work, in general?”

4. Accessibility: Because all people are called to serve in “mission” and many of them are placed in STEM worlds where missionaries and professional Christians have little access.

5. Preparation: Because Scripture indicates that our “deeds” (our work) will follow us into eternity where we will have a continuation of work in the new heaven and new earth. Since work is not just an earthly activity, we prepare ourselves for unimaginable creative activity in heaven.

Why a “Theology of Work”, cont’d

1. To earn our daily bread and provide for our necessities.

2. To keep us out of trouble, because laziness is the Devil’s playground. The yearning to create and recreate is the antidote to laziness.

3. To exercise our creative talents and our gifts, or to acquire some new capabilities.

4. To make a positive difference in an institution or a community.

So then, Why do We Engage in the STEM Professions?

5. To serve our neighbor with the results of our creative talents.

6. To socialize ourselves in communities of research and repair so that we don’t become “incestuous”, or totally self-centered

7. To appropriate knowledge and insight from others and to build relationships across communities

8. To advance and enhance the reach of the Kingdom of God

9. To better conditions for the poor and needy

Why do we engage in the STEM professions? (con’t)

10. To experience the euphoria of new discoveries or solutions for the practical problems and challenges of life.

11. To serve God and God’s purposes in discovering and unfolding the potential of creation.

12. To grow in character and Christ-likeness

So which ones of these reasons motivate you in your aspirations within the STEM professions?

Which ones of these motivate your friends in their STEM assignments?

Why do We Work, cont’d

“The experience of the race shows that we get our most important education not through books but through our work. We are developed by our daily task, or else demoralized by it, as by nothing else.” ---Anna Garlin Spencer

“Work is either fun or drudgery. It depends on your attitude. I like fun.” ---Colleen C Barrett

“The secret of joy in work is contained in one work---excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it.” ---Pearl S Buck

Positive Attitudes About Work

“What we do matters to us. Work may not be the most important thing in our lives or the only thing. We may work because we must, but we still want to love, to feel pride in, to respect ourselves for what we do and to make a difference.” ---Sara Ann Friedman

Positive Attitudes Towards Work

1. The understanding that all seven days of the week are holy days, that the goals of Sunday are the same goals of Monday, Tuesday, etc. Indeed worship is a seven-day spiritual act.

2. That the whole people of God, including those in the STEM professions, are empowered for service and ministry in the world (there is no division in vocation between lay and professional Christian workers). Functions may differ, but intent and purpose are the same.

3. That Christian discipleship training needs to be redirected towards equipping all of God’s people for finding transcendent meaning in their assignments.

The Assumptions of this Course: Hopeful Outcomes

4. That the dualism that maintains that “church” work is spiritual and all other work including the STEM professions is, be rejected, thereby producing a higher purpose in work ethics, motivation, witness and meaning.

5. That Christian training embrace more integrated resources intended to equip all the people of God, not just “called preachers” in preparation.

The Assumptions of this Course: Hopeful Outcomes, cont’d

By dividing Sunday from the rest of the week, secular from sacred, lay from professional, we create the following problems:

1. Compartmentalization: We are Christian in Church, but someone else in other contexts.

2. Reductionism: We limit God and His work to “within the walls of the Church” and fail to see God at work outside, including in the STEM professions

3. Depreciation: We lose the effectiveness of the many brilliant and capable people in the Church, by confining their “service” to church tasks and responsibilities.

The Fallacies of the Current Understanding of Ministry

4. Distortion: We diminish the Lordship of God in our STEM worlds, and so do not bring to bear our ethics, our compassion, our creativity, our calling to the world outside. By confining “spirituality” to formal religious exercises, we let Satan run rampant in all the rest.

In the words of Paul Williams, “A faulty theology of vocation and work was a significant contributor to the secularization of Western society. Recovery of a fully biblical theology of vocation and work has the potential to energize a radical new missionary movement in the world today.”

The Fallacies of the Current Understanding of Ministry, cont’d

Ironically, many historians believe that it was Christianity itself with its presuppositions about the sacredness of all, that spurred scientific research especially in the West.

Indeed, many theologians would argue that Christianity is the most “materialistic” of all religions, in that the Bible teaches the reality and value of the material world.

For instance, God came to earth in material form, and Christians are to experience their eternal fate in their renewed “bodies”. God cares for the material condition of His universe and of the humans that populate the earth. The concept of “stewardship” is God’s affirmation of the value of the “material world”

Fallacies of Distorted Theology

Thankfully, we are being forced back to Biblical understanding of “ministry” by the following realities:

1. There are not nearly enough graduates of Seminaries and Bible Colleges to expand the impact of Christian faith the world. Many cultures are leapfrogging from their pre-Christian worldviews into secularized materialistic pursuits, without stopping at Christian premises.

2 Many places in the world no longer welcome “professional ministers”. Indeed, even training centers have changed their nomenclature from “School of World Mission” to “School of Intercultural Studies” due to the hostility shown towards those labeled as missionaries. On the other hand, people of the STEM professions are welcomed almost anywhere.

The Current Context of the Discussion

3. Ministers are becoming increasingly isolated within their religious institutions which absorb all their attentions and energy. Many of them do not understand the STEM professions and discount the value of their contributions to the quality of life, while appropriating their technologies.

4. There is a major cultural backlash against formal religious figures due to scandals and political stereotypes. The scientific world generally requires a scrutiny and accountability rarely found in the religious world.

The Current Context of the Discussion, Cont’d

5. The Church is no longer the initial “point of encounter” for non-believers.

6. Christian lay leaders are usually at the forefront of new Christian initiatives. Interestingly, some missionary strategists bring their engineering skills to their missiological tasks.

7. There is a growing hunger among STEM Christians to be a

“part of the action

8. Sadly, the Church, the ministerial training centers and the traditional denominational programs, are ill equipped to face the challenge of the growing number of highly educated STEM professionals.

The Current Context of the Discussion, Cont’d

Dennis Bakke, author of Joy at Work, offers his own story as a case study of how God reshaped him both theologically and practically to redesign his energy company, AES, to be a transformative force in the lives of his employees, his clients, and their contexts. His company established power plants in over 20 nations.

The Bakke Case Study

In the course of this class, you will hear certain “Bakke” themes repeated many times. These include:

1. We should find “Joy at Work”

2. Our work should empower those around us

3. Failure is not necessarily final or fruitless.

4. The leader serves his followers

The Bakke Case Study, Cont’d

5. The leader works in teamwork and shares decision-making with all. More and more, the “Wikipedia” model of mutual contribution is used.

6. There must be heightened “trust” among employees rather than suspicion and mistrust.

7. There is a need for visionaries who think “outside of the box”. These people should be valued rather discounted. The entrepreneurial spirit of STEM workers is conducive to this.

8. A certain amount of messiness and chaos is permissible because people take priority over program and because experimentation and research presupposes considerable failure.

Bakke Case Study, cont’d

9. Christian influence in the STEM professions is seen at many multi-faceted levels, not just in evangelizing or inviting people to church. It includes:

A. Stirring an environment of freedom and honesty

B. Encouraging people to express their creative gifts and talents in roles that

are appropriate

C. Offering a sense of participatory control

Bakke Case Study, cont’d

D. Finding a role for the business or the institution to be transformative within the communities and among the individuals that it services

E. Fostering a spirit of joy

F. Nurturing true community within the professional field that it serves

The Bakke Case Study Cont’d

1. God want to use the STEM professions for His mission of redeeming the world.

2. The Bible is filled with stories of people who used their STEM talents to make a difference in their worlds.

3. Most parables and examples that Jesus used to teach about the Kingdom of God involved improbable people.

4. God wants to redeem the world in all dimensions not just those who attend church. He is also looking for truly creative expressions that address the human need for transcendence.

The Need for a New Theological Paradigm

5. We are all called to be agents of reconciliation: “For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross” (Col. 1:19). We are all called to be agents of reconciliation. The STEM professions are well-poised to serve this function.

A New Paradigm

Jesus himself did God’s work: “My food is to do the will of Him who sent me and to finish His work” (John 4:34).

Or . . .

“My Father is always at His work to this very day, and I, too, am working.” (John 5:17)

Changing our Attitudes about Work

Was it to . . .

Reshape Society by Being Salt and Light?

Reconcile People to Himself and Each Other?

Usher in the Kingdom of God?

Die on the Cross, offering Salvation from Sin?

What was Jesus’ Work?

It includes all of these tasks. God invites all of us to identify, introduce, proclaim and celebrate the mission of God (“missio dei”).

Jesus invites us to be co-laborers with him in these tasks.

Everyone is called to “preach the Gospel, and if necessary, use words”. Competent, meaningful engagement in the STEM professions can be a way of “preaching the Gospel” in that it offers “good news” to distressed people.

What Was Jesus’ Work?

According to the Dictionary of New Testament Theology:

Greek Terms:

Ergazomai (to labor, be active, work, bring about)Ergon (deed, action, achievement, work, thing, matter)Ergasia (work, practice, business)Ergates (someone who is doing something, workmanEnergeia (working, operation, action)Energeo (to work, be at work, be active, effect somethingEuergesia (kindness, a good deed, well-doing)Euergeteo (to work, benefit, show kindnesses)Energetes (benefactor)Synergos (working together with, a colleague, fellow-worker)Synergeo (to work together, cooperate, aid)

Biblical Words that Express Work

Problem of inadequate language:

“Occupation” can mean to “occupy” or “fill space”, or it can mean “busy-ness”, or “doing for the sake of doing”---there is no necessary “objective” in “occupation”

“Employment” suggests work, or again, just busy-ness, according to the whims of an employer.

“Career” and “Profession” suggest status rather than servanthood.

Language Problems

The term “Vocation” comes from the Latin “vocare”, “to call”, and suggests that our purposes are bigger than just doing a task, or filling space, or busy-ness. It suggests that the God who made us (He was fashioning us for His pleasure, His artifact), wants us to be similarly creative. He made us with gifts, and uses families and friends to develop our talents, so that we may work with Him in tandem with His creative process. This we call “ministry” [we will define this term in the third session].

In other words, we are all “called” to work alongside of God for His purposes and our fulfillment.

An Alternative Language: “Vocation” or “Calling”

When God fashioned the world, He did so in two ways, as understood by the verbs used in Genesis 1. He was the ultimate “engineer”.

1. “Bara” to form, fashion, create. Usually this word represents the miracle of creating something out of nothing (“ex nihilo”) A. Gen 1:1, “God created the heaven and the earth” (the creation of energy and matter)B. Gen 1:21, “God created great whales and every living thing” (the creation of biological life)C. Gen 1:27, “So God created man in his own image” (the creation of humankind)

A Lesson from Genesis 1

However, on the other “days” of creation, specialization and diversity was produced out of what already existed. In other words, God’s work both operates in a “vacuum” and also in the context of what already exists. God creates “ex nihilo”, “out of nothing” and out of what is. We, being made in His image, have the similar desire and capacity to create both that which is imagined (first in the mind of God), and that which is yet to be imagined.

A Lesson from Genesis 1, cont’d

Please read the sermon-poem of James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938), given as a resource piece in this session, that so vividly describe one dramatic expression of the “Work of God” at Creation. It is entitled, “The Creation” published in 1922 as a Negro Sermon.

This can be found on the following address: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIkNypTXdHE

A Sermon-Poem on the “Work” of God

As God found joy in his creative efforts, we too were intended to find joy in His creation and in the act of creating.

God created us to be partners with Him in stewarding His creation. Therefore our work is important in God’s Kingdom.

Every believer is engaged in “sacred” work, or ought to be.

Conclusions

By seeking to understand our “calling” and fulfilling it faithfully, STEM believers find purpose and fulfillment in life.

Humankind will be held accountable for how we steward God’s creation.

Conclusions, Cont’d

Feel free in insert below your questions and feedback on what you have learned in this powerpoint:

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Your Questions and Feedback

This is the end of the PowerPoint

of Session One