Organizational Holiness
Whenever the church reflects on the topic of holiness, it consistently applies it to individuals. From the pulpit to a camp meeting altar to a home Bible study, exhortations to holiness are marked by incitements to a sanctified personal lifestyle. We should not smoke because we are set apart to be holy (1 Cor. 6:20). We should love our neighbor because we are to be conformed to the image of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18). Yet holiness has a corporate aspect within the body of Christ. The new Jerusalem comes as a bride for Christ (Rev. 21:2), who has cleansed her to be “holy and blameless” (Eph. 4:26). Seemingly never preached is a collective and localized holiness that applies to the Christian organization. And the bride does not always seem blameless.
When Christians collect in the workplace with a mission that matches the holiness message—or any Christian mission statement—they combine for a force and example of the kingdom of God at work. Indeed, Christian organizations help to define themselves by their community lifestyle covenants. We don’t smoke here, and we really love one another. Yet Christian organizations often are unable to extend the holiness ideal into daily operations or to monitor the inter-office functional immorality that makes rampant its individually sponsored organizational sins. We might not outwardly lie to our Christian boss or steal from our supply cabinet, but we can thwart the work of the Spirit in our organization when we dawdle, deflect, evade, avoid, block, and frustrate one another. Our coworkers can be on mission for the Kingdom, but the mission stops when mediocre workplace habits invade our offices. Without realizing it, we find ourselves organizationally unholy.
Foundation for Organizational Holiness
The OT holiness code (Lev. 17-26) is not merely a personal guide, but a guide for all of Israel. The community of God’s people participate in a collective holiness by which all individuals are living the same lifestyle standards, practicing the same behaviors—godly, righteous, holy deeds. Their collective contribution makes for a powerful testimony of God’s people and provides a unifying effect around the Law and covenant. Victor Hamilton remarks, “Leviticus is addressed to the members of a believing community… Leviticus summons Israel to a holy life” (Handbook of the Pentateuch, 1992, p. 246).
This same OT collective consciousness finds correspondence in the NT church. We are the Body of Christ, a collective bride by metaphor. Yet the exhortations of Paul in Eph. 4:1-6 to “walk in a worthy manner,” show “all humility and gentleness with patience,” and “maintain the unity of the Spirit” are not only for the individual Christian but for the circuit of churches around Ephesus. After all,
“There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.”
All the individuals make all the whole, and all the whole is united, devoted, and holy. Although we are millions of names and faces across various people groups and cultures, we are also one people. We are one church, breaking one bread, and washed in one baptism—to echo Ephesians even more. The body of Christ is akin to the individual, and both are akin to the Christian organization.
Whether we work in a religious or a secular institution, our work can still be God-honoring. Daniel Doriani describes work as a holy enterprise:
“Work is sacred if it follows God’s law, if the motive is love for neighbor. It is sacred if it reverses godless and immoral practices that have crept into its guild, if it battles the systematic evils that shape the work” (Work: Its Purpose, Dignity, and Transformation, 2019, p. 184).
When we work in Christian organizations, our individual holiness collects into a corporate holiness. Here we work unto the Lord while we earn our wages and salaries. It’s a powerful combination. We glorify God and we get paid for it. We dedicate our best for him at work, including that which helps the Christian organization for his cause, and it sustains our families. When our sacred work is applied to a sacred organization, the potential for holiness is much higher.
Peccadillos in the Camp
Everyday, employees in Christian organizations lie, cheat, steal, and procrastinate in minor ways in their daily tasks when they exasperate one another to frustrate the mission. These are the times that one employee wants to do work well, but another prevents it. The practices seem like little things to us when we commit them; we then manufacture excuses to justify them. Several examples will illustrate this habituation.
First, there is the practice of dereliction. Coworkers and deadlines wait for us to help solve a problem, but we say we are too busy to take time to resolve it. Our peers’ work gets put on hold because it’s too distracting to our own work. An email is too long to type, but we put off visiting another office to solve a problem. Alternatively, we type out a long email rather than dialog with someone we deem worthy of avoiding. When these kinds of things happen, the machine we call organizational mission stops. The brakes lock up and the gospel sits still.
Second, there is the practice of emotional neglect. Reportees and coworkers labor silently, faithfully, and without fanfare, but we don’t always show appreciation. We sometimes ignore them. For parishioners who wait to be visited or students who wait for papers to be returned, we may take weeks. For those who will benefit from our labor in these cases, we miss a formative moment when we procrastinate. This is an un-united body.
Third, there is functional deniability. We are created in the image of the Creator—created to create—but we use the organizational system as an excuse not to address or solve a problem. We choose to make people conform to comfortable systems backed by policy, without providing helpful solutions or entertaining exceptional problems. We say “no” and require all others to fit in the box, rather than assist people in need outside of the box. In all these habits, rather than produce work we engineer excuses. Sometimes we produce personal explanations to justify corporate neglect. We are like the invitees who declined the Master’s banquet offer in Luke 14:16-24: “I’m sorry, I’ve just bought an oxen, so the service provided by my position will stop until next week.”
It surely seemed like a harmless thing as the Israelites kept a few pagan treasures after the walls of Jericho came tumbling down. The divine instruction in Josh. 6:18 probably seemed overstated:
“But you, keep yourselves from the things devoted to destruction, lest when you have devoted them you take any of the devoted things and make the camp of Israel a thing for destruction and bring trouble upon it.”
The divine consequence in Josh. 7:13 probably seemed overstated: “You cannot stand against your enemies until you remove them.” This is the story behind our phrase, “Sin in the camp.” It can characterize an unethical habituation of mediocrity in our Christian workplaces. Our services lack joy, our assistance finds quick limitations, and our urgency to assist or advance the cause is lulled to sleep.
No Willful Organizational Sins
The issue here is not one of mistakes. The issue is not one of genuine busyness or overwork—assuming this is really what compresses our schedules. What is certainly in view are the willful commissions and omissions that plague our organizational service listed above. Like John Wesley in his articulation of holiness, our organizational posture should correlate to our personal posture:
“When he [God] heareth thy prayer, and unveils thy heart…Be abased. Be humbled in the dust. See thyself nothing, less than nothing, and vanity” (“The First Fruits of the Spirit,” III.4).
Our organizational service can often use a rejuvenation of purpose that comes with a recommitment to mission. Rather than excuse ourselves, we can apologize. Rather than let our schedules dominate us, we can sacrifice to deliver for another. After all, Wesley said, “Many may suppose they do not commit sin, when they do” (“On Christian Perfection,” II.2). This might apply to us before we realize that our systems, excuses, or strategies are actually self-centered justifications to comfort our own irresponsibility.
Conclusion
It might seem idealistic to imagine our daily workflow as mission-centered or other-centered. It is. Just as the idealism of perfection with no willful sin and a life characterized by love should depict our personal lives, the same collective dedication can transform an organizational commitment to holiness. Just as our intensity about social sins reflects our hopes for improvement, the collective concentration on laboring well can transform an organizational hope for holiness. The negative habits are not organizational holiness, but usually they are our simple negligence. Our set of excuses can be unholy. When I do my job selfishly or in mediocrity, it contributes to a culture counter to organizational holiness. We must work in doing our part to make our organization that which God idealizes it to be. This is simply a part of Wesley’s advice to a people called Methodist: "Consider, with deep and frequent attention, the peculiar circumstances wherein you stand" (“Advice to A People Called Methodist”). As you stand daily among coworkers, let the labor match the mission that matches the Kingdom.
This ethic requires theology. We need to recognize a theology of vocatio, or calling to serve God in these capacities—classroom, ministry, church, parachurch, office, or administration. We need a theology of work according to which work of any kind is God-honoring. We need an other-person centeredness, where we office-suffer for the sake of coworkers. When I get behind, one thing I often do is make a list of people who are waiting on me for things and prioritize those needs over my own. We need to recognize our powerful, personal contribution to an organization with a mission that we believe in deeply, rather than stifle that mission as we do not set ourselves apart for the tasks that the organization needs. We may call our business Christian, but it’s more—a corner of the Kingdom—and from this corner we have the great privilege of influencing others through a holy work ethic, rather than a mediocre one.
Organizational holiness: we can indeed recognize ourselves as part of a whole, honor God with our labor, and realize everything we do is unto the Lord. Let us take time to pray for one another, give a little more than we want, and beg God to bless our efforts because we need the time it takes to do these other things. May we all be found holy, and may our places of work be found holy because of our dedication.
Dr. W. Brian Shelton is Professor of Theology and Chair of the Department of Christian Studies and Philosophy at Asbury University in Wilmore, Kentucky.