Work must serve more than the bottom line

Last updated on: August 19, 2014 at 2:19 pm by Patheos Faith and Work Channel

Work must serve more than the bottom line 2014-08-19T14:19:01-05:00 Patheos Faith and Work Channel

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Mark DeVine of Beeson Divinity School has this to say about workaholism on his blog The Other Six Days:

Warnings about the dangers work poses often issue from the mouths of those who have themselves allowed work to take captive their very souls. Oh the regret! Oh the irretrievably lost time with spouse and children syphoned off through decades of fierce ladder-climbing, networking, all-nighters, and relentless travel, while clawing their way to the top of their professions. At that same summit they remain perched only now poised to assure us “underachievers” that the prominent cushy cultural couch in which they now recline came at a too high a cost.

About those idlers the apostle Paul famously condemns in II Thessalonians 3:10, he adds,

But, however despicable are the eating idlers, we must also acknowledge his obverse twin—the workaholic. Though he brings home the bacon and lots of it, his work manages to poison, undermine, and destroy life. “Life” identifies an absolute value; “Work” does not. Work may facilitate life; it may serve life. But it must not be allowed to swallow up life. Work can never be an end in itself. We are all life-aholics aren’t we? We neither need nor want a cure, do we? Even supporters and purveyors of the new politically correct cultures of death usually admit that abortion and euthanasia, while necessary in their view, remain necessary evils.

Read more of his provocative post here. Image: Anne Hornyak, Flickr.

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