Merchant banker and philanthropist Ken Costa kicks off our special ‘God At Work’ issue by challenging the secular/spiritual divide
Many p eople do not see God as a 24/7 God, but as a withdrawn actor confined to a Sunday show with a declining audience. I have lost count of the number of times that I have heard people speak in such a way as to betray their belief that there is a divide between what is sacred and what is secular. Often, people por tray church workers as being involved in sacred work, while I, as a banker, am seen to be involved in secular work. Nothing could be further from the truth: in God’s eyes there is no such divide.
It was Hudson Taylor who often declared, “Jesus Christ is either Lord of all, or he is not Lord at all.” Jesus is Lord over work in the financial world and in other sectors just as much as he is in the church world. In the 40 years I have lived in London, nothing has struck me so starkly as the false division of the sacred and the secular featured in the Millennium Dome, now known as the 02 Arena, when it was built to commemorate the millennium.
In this giant dome, a year-long exhibition on life in the United Kingdom attempted to divide life into various spheres of activity, including a faith zone, a money zone, and a work zone. The clear message was that the faith zone was distinct from any other part of our lives. This distinction is a disastrous message. One cannot say that church is a ‘God zone’ while the workplace is a ‘God-
free zone’. Christianity, in fact, involves our whole lives.
Read the full article in Direction Magazine
‘People often portray church workers as being involved in sacred work, while I, as a banker, am seen to be involved in secular work. Nothing could be further from the truth
This article is from the September 2017 issue of Direction Magazine. Order your copy today…
