I haven't posted in a while. I've been wandering a bit spiritually and honestly, didn't want to share too much of that here. I've left my church of eight years...it was hard, but necessary in sparing myself the bitterness that comes from being an outsider in an insider congregation. I've tasted that before in staying too long in the church I was raised. I know not to make that mistake of fear again.
That said, things are quite bright! My job has degraded from bad to saddeningly ludicrous. I've had to question and revisit my sense of self, my identity as a "worker" and an organizational participant to survive. Through all these years, I've been blessed not only with the drive, idea, resources and emotional motivation (I'm kinda done with the word "passion"...it's a bit played isn't it?) to start, and sustain a teeny-tiny business. That is what I'm going to write on, at least for a while.
Christian entrepreneurship is strange. I'd prefer to call myself an Entrepreneurial Christian because honestly, I see what the Church does with business. I see how it, and religious groups have picked up the very Western attitude of businessman-as-savior and dislike it. I dislike it precisely because I know it. My MBA studies were warmer and fuzzier than most, but business is the applied science of people, and science is inherently cold and calculated.
My business is also in the world. There is nothing inherently "churched" about it. I deal with Buddhists and Atheists and pan-theists on a daily basis...getting in their heads, talking their ideas of community and watching how they deal with people. Somehow, I've found encouragement in my faith as a Christian, not just as a "good person", but as a Christian, in working with them. I've also met believers so amazing it makes my heart sing.
It's been hard...and amazing. I see more difficult decisions, more scary steps, more emotional ups and downs coming...but that's part of the deal...and I cannot thank God enough for that moment, when, in a moment of panicked threat to my health (spurred on by my doctors warning that a bacterial infection I had could kill me in a few days), he reached it, blew away the fog of my fears, and reminded me, how scary my own good can sometimes be.
That said, things are quite bright! My job has degraded from bad to saddeningly ludicrous. I've had to question and revisit my sense of self, my identity as a "worker" and an organizational participant to survive. Through all these years, I've been blessed not only with the drive, idea, resources and emotional motivation (I'm kinda done with the word "passion"...it's a bit played isn't it?) to start, and sustain a teeny-tiny business. That is what I'm going to write on, at least for a while.
Christian entrepreneurship is strange. I'd prefer to call myself an Entrepreneurial Christian because honestly, I see what the Church does with business. I see how it, and religious groups have picked up the very Western attitude of businessman-as-savior and dislike it. I dislike it precisely because I know it. My MBA studies were warmer and fuzzier than most, but business is the applied science of people, and science is inherently cold and calculated.
My business is also in the world. There is nothing inherently "churched" about it. I deal with Buddhists and Atheists and pan-theists on a daily basis...getting in their heads, talking their ideas of community and watching how they deal with people. Somehow, I've found encouragement in my faith as a Christian, not just as a "good person", but as a Christian, in working with them. I've also met believers so amazing it makes my heart sing.
It's been hard...and amazing. I see more difficult decisions, more scary steps, more emotional ups and downs coming...but that's part of the deal...and I cannot thank God enough for that moment, when, in a moment of panicked threat to my health (spurred on by my doctors warning that a bacterial infection I had could kill me in a few days), he reached it, blew away the fog of my fears, and reminded me, how scary my own good can sometimes be.
