"Integrating faith into the marketplace transforms daily work from a mere job into a ministry, focusing on stewardship, integrity, and service rather than just profit. "Be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies." "When you focus on being a blessing, God makes sure that you are always blessed in abundance." "Faith consists in believing when it is beyond the power of reason to believe." "We are twice armed if we fight with faith."
I was reading a wonderful post on pain this evening on one of my marketplace site and I hesitated to share, then I realized that I should and though I do not need to support or justify sharing , I thought it would be good to see what others have said about the matter in some great quote. I pieced together my opening words above. It is about stewardship and our faith is important in all things, so I am reminded that we need to be able to say Well Done with God in mind in the marketplace so that others may become our brothers and sisters and those that are already be encouraged to do so in their fields. - TLR
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith — and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God — not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
The Bible clearly and comprehensively, in both testaments, portrays God as intensely interested in the human marketplace—interested, involved, in charge, and intentional.
He Created It
Work is God’s idea. Genesis 1-2 give us our first picture of the biblical God as a worker—thinking, choosing, planning, executing, evaluating. So when God decided to create humankind in the image and likeness of God, what else could humans be but workers, reflecting in their working lives something of the nature of God? Specifically, God laid upon human beings the task of ruling the earth (Gen. 1) and of serving and keeping it (Gen. 2). This enormous task required not only the complementarity of our male-female gender identities, for mutual help, but also implies some other fundamental economic and ecological dimensions to human life. God has given us a planet with a vast diversity of resources scattered all over its surface. There is, therefore, a natural necessity for trade and exchange between groups living in different places, to meet common needs. That task in turn necessitates economic relationships, and so there is a need for fairness and justice throughout the social and economic realm. There needs to be justice both in the sharing of the raw resources with which we work and in the distribution of the products of our work. The biblical witness is that this great human endeavour is part of God’s intention for human life on earth. Work matters because it was God’s intention for our part in his creation.
He Created It
He Audits It
He Governs It
He Redeems It
We Are Called to Engagement
We Are Called to Distinctiveness
Moral distinctiveness. The distinctiveness of God’s people in the Bible is not merely religious (i.e., that we happen to worship a different god from most other people), but also ethical (i.e., that we are called to live by different standards).
The twin sayings of Jesus about being “salt and light” in the world (Matt. 5:13-16) are still crucial insights into what it means to follow Jesus in the marketplace. At least four implications can be discerned.3
https://www.facebook.com/p/Faith-in-the-marketplace-100064332716192/
https://followerofone.org/the-goal-of-marketplace-ministry-acts-2618/
"Your job becomes your pulpit, your performance becomes your platform, and the marketplace becomes your parish." ~ Bill Winston
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Winston
