The Master Said Engage in Business
Why Jesus prescribed the marketplace as Kingdom preparation.
I didn’t have the most positive outlook on business growing up. I saw it as mostly something people do to take money from each other. According to my younger self, full-time ministry is what good Christians do. Sure, you don’t make much money doing it, but that was kind of the point: you get to prove to yourself and everyone else that you’re doing it for the Lord, not for money. (I never considered that it was the business people who end up paying the ministry people to do that kind of work.)
If I could go back to my younger self, I’d love to mess with him just a bit and point out what Jesus says in Luke 19. Make him squirm a bit, you know?
Jesus could have said anything. He’s about to leave to go His Father. His followers think the Kingdom is coming immediately (Luke 19:11), so He tells a story to correct their expectations and prepare them for the long stretch between his departure and his return.
In the story, the master calls his servants, gives each of them a mina, and says:
“Engage in business until I come.” — Luke 19:13
Engage in business? My younger self would’ve expected, “Pray until I come,” or, “Study the Bible until I come,” or even, “Serve the poor and avoid sin.”
All of those are good and right and important, obviously, but when Jesus chose one instruction to represent what his people should do while they wait for His Kingdom, he said, "Engage in business.”
Why?
What Business Forces That Nothing Else Does
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why Jesus chose this metaphor, and I think it comes down to this:
Business is the only arena that simultaneously pressure-tests every dimension of character that God-fearing men need, and it does it in public, with real consequences, among people who owe you nothing.
I remember a time in my business when we were having a low-revenue quarter. Money was tight, but we had a client who wanted to pay us a lot of money to work with them. Taking them on would’ve solved a lot of problems, but their brand was all about startling little kids. I couldn’t do it. I let the money go and didn’t take the client.
Or another time, early on in my business, I made the hard decision to let go of someone who had worked with me for a while. I had never fired someone before. It was hard! They were an integral part of my business. But I later learned that, in that moment, I had instantly earned the trust of everyone else on the team. They no longer worked for me just for a paycheck. The mission was now real.
Maybe this is why the master said to engage in business. It’s the most comprehensive character formation program available this side of the Kingdom.
Minas, Not Kingdoms
What stands out to me in Luke 19:13 is that the master gave his servants something small. Each person got one mina, which was about three months wages.
The instruction was then, “Take this modest thing and see what you produce by engaging in business.”
So the servants went into the marketplace. They took risks. They made deals, navigated people, solved problems, and created value that didn’t exist before.
I don’t get the idea that the servants knew they would be rewarded for this. They were just obeying their master. But what did the master do when he returned? He rewarded the faithful servants with something much bigger than more money. He gave them authority over cities in his kingdom (Luke 19:17-19).
Business was the test. It was what prepared them for something bigger to come.
Then there’s the third servant. He didn’t steal. Didn’t rebel. Didn’t waste anything. All he did was wrap his mina in a cloth and gave it back exactly as he received it. He maintained it. And the master called him wicked.
Ugh. Faithfulness doesn’t mean just keeping what you’ve been given. It means making what you have more fruitful. Notice, the master didn’t ask for the mina back. He asked what the mina produced. He wanted to know what had been gained by it (Luke 19:15).
What This Means for You
If you’re running a business right now, you’re not doing something separate from your spiritual life. You are in the middle of the formation program Jesus prescribed.
The question the master will ask you one day isn’t, “Did you survive it?” It’s “What did it produce?” Not just in revenue, although revenue matters, but what did your business produce in the men you developed? In the families your company sustained? In the wisdom you gained that you can now pour into younger men in your city who are wrestling with the same pressures you’ve already faced?
Jesus’ directive to engage in business is ultimately about what business produces in you.
So tomorrow morning, when you walk into your office and face the hard conversation, the risky decision, the expensive act of integrity, remember: that's not a distraction from your spiritual life. That's the test. The master is coming back. And he's not going to ask if you kept it safe.
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