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Worth Doing: Fallenness, Finitude, and Work in the Real World | David Buschart and Ryan Tafilowski

• Upper House • Episode 167

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In this episode of The UpWords Podcast, host John Terrill sits down with theologians David Buschart and Ryan Tafilowski, co-authors of Worth Doing: Fallenness, Finitude, and Work in the Real World. Together, they explore a more universal theology of work that speaks to all professions—not just those with high agency or prestige.

The conversation dives into:

  • Why most faith-and-work discourse overlooks the realities of fallenness and finitude.
  • How embracing our created limits can be liberating rather than frustrating.
  • How gaining a theology of work that moves beyond only ideas of productivity or calling can help us in the trenches of our jobs.
  • How a more robust theology of work can provide spiritual wisdom for navigating seasons of toil and unmet expectations.

If you’ve ever wondered how your daily labor—whether in the boardroom, classroom, or trades—fits into God’s story, this episode offers clarity and hope.

About our guests:

W. David Buschart (PhD, Drew University) is professor of theology and historical studies at Denver Seminary. He is the author of Exploring Protestant Traditions and coauthor of Theology as Retrieval. He is a ruling elder and member of the theology committee of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.

Ryan Tafilowski (PhD, Edinburgh) is an assistant professor of theology at Denver Seminary and the lead pastor of Foothills Fellowship Church in Littleton, Colorado. He is the coauthor, with Ross Chapman, of Faithful Work: In the Daily Grind with God and for Others. He previously served as theologian-in-residence for the Denver Institute for Faith and Work.

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Subscribe to The UpWords Podcast wherever you listen to podcasts and visit slbf.org/studio to learn more about our work at the intersection of faith, the academy, and the marketplace.

This episode was created by the SLBF STUDIO at Upper House.

Produced by Daniel Johnson and Dave Conour

Edited by Dave Conour

SPEAKER_01

And so that agency dignity power narrative that is a good theology of work, but it can't speak to all workers. So we wanted to say, well, is there a theology that's more capable of speaking universally to the human experience in all kinds of work? And unfortunately, it's kind of a bummer, but fallenness and finitude are really, I think, the only ways into a universal theology of work because those are the only universal experiences.

SPEAKER_00

Welcome to the Upwards Podcast, where we explore the intersection of Christian faith, the academy, church, and marketplace. I'm your host, John Terrell, and today we dive into a topic that touches every one of us: our work. What makes work worth doing? How do we think about our jobs, whether in the boardroom, the classroom, or the trades, in view of God's story and creational design? Joining me are David Bushart and Ryan Tefilowski, co-authors of the book Worth Doing: Fallenness, Finitude, and Work in the Real World. This conversation serves as a guide for those grappling with questions about vocation, purpose, and the limits and brokenness we experience in the workplace. Work in the middle between the Garden of Eden and the New Jerusalem or the Garden City is challenging, but there are theological and practical reasons to make peace with our sometimes toil. If you've ever wondered how your daily labor fits into God's plan, this episode is for you. Now on to the conversation. I'd love it if you just kind of tell us about that relationship and how did you decide to write this book together?

SPEAKER_02

Well, thanks, uh John, for having us. We're we're glad to be here. Both Ryan and I have been involved in in various ways in uh faith and work circles for for quite a few years. In my case, I was involved years ago in the Kern Foundation, some of their work, and then more recently with something called the Keram Forum. Sure. Uh and Ryan was actually the theologian in residence at the Denver Institute for Faith and Work. So I had had kind of the seed thought for this book some years ago, and uh started working out with a couple of colleagues. They had professional career changes that that caused them to step away. And when Ryan joined the faculty full time, and we've known each other for quite a few years, but when he joined the faculty full time, I thought, aha. Now's the time. Yeah. Now's the time. So, you know, he took a look at what I had drafted with these other two scholars, and um, I was just thrilled that he was willing, because you know, it's not always easy to come in on a project that somebody else has cooked up. Scholars tend to like to do their own thing, but he so he came on, and the two of us very much uh I think it's fair to say it's really is a 50-50 effort. Although having said that, I'll just say the book is much better with Ryan having given uh his part to it than it would have been if if I had tried to tackle it on my own. So um it's just been a pleasure and privilege to work together. Yeah, that's at least my side of it. Now I don't know what Ryan will have to say.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, Ryan, what would you like to add?

SPEAKER_01

Oh, I I was delighted to come in on the project. I had worked for a number of years at the Denver Institute for Faith and Work, which, you know, for my money is doing some of the most thoughtful, I think, sophisticated faith and work discourse and theology out there. So it was really a great gift to get to work there. But this question kept nagging at me. Is there a sort of more expansive theology of work that would be encompassing of a greater uh number of professions and domains of work? And this is a nut we could never quite crack. And we had lots of good conversations about it. And so then when I came onto the faculty, I saw this work was already underway, this early prototype of the book. I was delighted to see that that it was sort of pursuing a similar line of inquiry. So it was actually a very natural fit. Um, lots of good thinking had already been done. And uh, so we got to collaborate on it, which was great. And then as it happens, we get to co-teach a course in the theology of work this coming uh spring semester. So the collaboration continues.

SPEAKER_00

Well, that's fantastic. Um well, let's dive into some of the content of the book. And I I like to start with this question uh for whom did you write this book? And what were you hoping for as a result of this project, which I'm assuming took, you know, multiple years to finish?

SPEAKER_02

Well, I think I'll offer one part of it, which is I I think in many ways we're we really would like people who are in the faith and work movement, whether those be what could be called thought leaders or ministry practitioners in the faith and work arena, they're probably in many ways at the heart of the target audience, so to speak. Uh so people who are helping other people think and act faithfully as Christians in the workplace. And of course, we always need to, in the faith and work conversation, always need to add the caveat that work is not limited to our paid employment. Um, in our culture and in our society, when somebody says, Well, what kind of work do you do? Obviously, that question is always directed toward full time, usually full-time, but paid employment, which obviously is very important, but hopefully, as reflected in the book and in other faith and work endeavors, work is something that really permeates our lives. Yes. Um, in whether, you know, taking care of household chores is a form of work. And my daughter, who is a quote, so-called stay-at-home mother and homeschooler, she said, you know, gee, it it actually means it might have something to say to me. Um so I would say that's at least part of for whom we have written the book.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, Ryan, let me turn to you. Yeah, I would add to that maybe two other target audiences. Uh, one would be pastors. So alongside the work I do at the seminary, I also pastor a congregation. And in my early days as a pastor, you know, I was also working at the Denver Institute of Faith and Work. So I was thinking a lot about work and vocation. And as Dave says, you know, it's critical that we be able to speak to work theologically because so many of so many of our hours and our days and our months and our years are spent in the workplace. And if Jesus can't make a claim on that space, then like, what are we doing here? Right. So I wanted to think about discipleship, but I I found actually that in some ways the theology of work that was on offer wasn't all that workable for many people in my congregation. I have a congregation where, for lack of a better term, would be maybe a blue-collar congregation, lots of people doing jobs that they sort of kind of have to do. They're not pursuing their bliss or anything like this. And I found that, man, it is there a way to sort of include those folks in the faith and work conversation. Uh, so that was one thought that came to mind and was the impetus for the book. And then the other target audiences is people who are helping, I think, especially early career folks, people coming right out of college, who are starting to ask questions about vocation and what they're going to do with their lives. And there's an enormous amount of pressure around this, and it is important. And I think, you know, frankly, stuff like uh what y'all do at Upper House, right there on a college campus, a major research university, where Christians are starting to think about I've got this education. What now? What comes next? I mean, that's a really pivotal discipleship moment. So uh I would just add that to what Dave said.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And sometimes I think the expectations can be false, right? We expect too much out of that first job. And so, you know, the you you referred to sort of find my vocational bliss. I think you said something like that. I think sometimes we we can assume that, you know, our first job is going to be the perfect job and it's gonna meet every need that we have from an ambition perspective, uh, an interest perspective. And that doesn't always prove to be the case. Uh it it it takes a while to find fit. And sometimes, quite honestly, we we don't find that fit, right? And that's partially the purpose of the book. So um, and by the way, I wanted to mention you talked a little bit about the history, and one of the, I think, one of the components of this book that's so helpful is the appendix, I think, in the back of the book, where you do an update to the history of the faith and work movement. So for those who are in the movement and have read David Miller's book, you'll really enjoy the appendix where uh David and Ryan talk about that history and sort of um add to that history. So thank you for for that part of the book. So in this book, you critique the existing uh faith and work movement, and um you spend most of the book correcting maybe a deficiency or an oversight. And I'd I'd like to to talk a little bit about what you see as maybe a missing component of the faith and work movement or uh a dimension of the movement that really hasn't been covered well or maybe covered in ways that are unhelpful. Uh so would you speak to the critique that you offer?

SPEAKER_02

Aaron Powell Yeah, I think it's accurate to say that this is a critique. I'd want to quickly just add or qualify that by saying it's uh for lack of a bird, it's a loving critique, meaning we both have been involved and anticipate continuing to be involved in the faith and work arena. So we think that a great deal of good has been done and is being done. And and I'll just speak to one of the, if you will, the misunderstandings or oversights that we think needs to be addressed. One of those is um the reality of finitude. You know, and and finitude, a bit unlike fallenness, finitude isn't exactly a major theological loci. It's not a major topic of theological reflection. There certainly there are very significant theologians before us who thought about it, and we try to learn from them in the book. But the fact is that we don't think that the reality of finitude, number one, has been adequately explicitly acknowledged. It's kind of implicit or tacit in a lot of the discussions around faith and work. We want to kind of raise it to the level of explicit attention, and then secondly, to make it clear that creational finitude. So finitude that is a product not of human miscalculation or human nefariousness, uh, but finitude that's woven into the very design of creation by God, that that is affirmed as good rather than finitude only being seen as some kind of a problem to be overcome. If only we could push past these limits, we'd be better off.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, David, I wonder for the listeners and the viewers, if you could just speak to some of those limits. What uh at a real practical level, what are the the dimensions of finitude that you're referring to?

SPEAKER_02

Uh this may uh initially sound trivial, but it's not. Every day we need to sleep. We are not made to work or just be active 24 hours a day. Right. Now, I don't really fully understand why that is. Um, I remember my father, who was a very hardworking businessman, said, When I get to heaven, one of the things I'm gonna ask God is, why did you design it so I spend a third of my time sleeping? My dad had this very, what can I say, conscientiousness about use of time, right? Um, but the reality is we by virtue of our creaturehood, our creaturliness, we're not supposed to work 24 hours a day. We're not supposed to work 12 hours a day, most of us, ordinarily. And so that's just one, if you will, of the most direct ones. And I this is where I think, for example, historically speaking, the invention of cheap, safe electric lights just is one example of a very significant human, wonderful creative invention that helped to, if you will, push the boundaries on work. So, I mean, in principle, we can work 24 hours a day because we have access to light 24 hours a day, most of us in a industrialized context. So that's just one of many examples, give some in the book of the very concrete daily reality that there are limits and not just our work, but our lives need to, if you will, embrace these limits and to live and work accordingly. Yeah, and that this is just to say quick, this is not a function of the fall. What I just described is not bad or wrong. It is the way God has designed us.

SPEAKER_00

Very helpful. Ryan, let me turn to you. The and and David, we could come back to you. The the question was, and I I appreciate your your um corrective a little bit, that it's not just a critique, you're affirming uh a lot of the good work as well. Brian, in your mind, what what were you concerned about in trying to fill in in this faith and work movement? Uh maybe you can play off of some of what David has has offered, or maybe you've got some some insights you'd like to offer to that question.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah, I would I would reiterate what uh David said that the faith and work movement, uh, I think unquestionably is a net positive. I mean, I it's done tremendous work to get Christians to see not only is your work meaningful, but it can be one of the ways in which God is working redemption in the world. I think that's absolutely true. The limitation I kept bumping up against, right? That nut that was hard for me to crack when I was working at Denver Institute for Faith and Work is we kept coming back to the question. And I want to be clear, Denver Institute has done a lot of good thinking around this too. We kept coming back, well, how do we get different kinds of workers involved in this conversation? Right. Right. We've got this big flagship program that's really amazing, the 5280 Fellowship, which does incredible work. It's formational, it does professional development. Fellows create this big professional project, and some of these are really amazing. And the question we kept asking is, well, how do we get folks who are working in the trades or working in retail or something to get involved? And I really came to be convicted that the operative theology really can't. It really can't get there. It maybe can make some overtures. But one of the phrases we use in the book, we ask, is there, is there a theology of work for everyone? Because I think it's fair to say, like to take one example, uh, Andy, Andy Crouch's book, Culture Making, is an amazing book. It was paradigm shifting, really important book. But its vision of work as sort of co-creation with God is really only realizable for people who have a lot of agency in their work or find a lot of purpose, uh, and typically a lot of compensation. And so that agency, dignity, power narrative, that is a good theology of work, but it can't speak to all workers. So we wanted to say, well, is there a theology that's more capable of speaking universally to the human experience in all kinds of work? And unfortunately, it's kind of a bummer, but fallenness and finitude are really, I think, the only ways into a universal theology of work because those are the only universal experiences in work.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, that's almost a uh drop the mic kind of statement. I mean, there's a there's a lot in that statement. I um let's explore that a little bit. I uh let me explore it through this angle. You you use the framework of uh creation fall, redemption, new creation. And you you you give kind of a corresponding chapter one, two, three, and four to each of those storylines or acts of God in the world. And so creation, you spend a lot of time on that. A lot of the history of the faith and work movement is anchored in kind of the creation story and our agency in the creation story as cultural stewards and the cultural mandate is a big part of that uh from Genesis one and two. Then the fall is often neglected. I think you're referring to this agency power dignity dimension. And a lot of people that are in uh, well, it's not, it wouldn't just be blue-collar jobs, but jobs that just draw out the toilsomeness of work, you know, experience on a daily basis, the fall and the toil and the difficulty of labor. Then there is kind of this third chapter, and you don't spend a lot of time on this in the book, or at least that was my observation. And I wondered about that, and I actually want to ask you about that, which is redemption. This is a little bit of the Tom Wright that the new heaven and the new earth breaks is has broken in in the present. And we had these experiences, even in our toil, of getting glimpses of the world to come, of God's creative hand at work in the world. And then finally, there is this fourth chapter, this fourth move of the new Jerusalem, the new creation, where everything is tested and made new. And, you know, there are threads of continuity and discontinuity between this world and the world to come. And I think the argument in the book, or at least as I understood it, was you know, most of the theology of work movement is anchored in chapter one and four creation, new creation. But a lot of the work is in the middle, and a lot of it's in that toil, challenge, difficulty, even the frustration of work. And that's often neglected. And some of us have more or less frustration. And I would make the case that even in white-collar professional jobs, there's a lot of frustration. So I think this is good news for everybody that there are just limits, there's boundedness, we ought not to have too high expectations of our work no matter where we serve. But let me ask you, I'm probably drifting a little bit here, but let me ask you about the redemption piece, that chapter three. You guys kind of skip over that in the book. And I wondered why why you skipped over it. Because if it is part of the middle, it's it's you know, the inner parts of the sandwich here. And um you don't address it much. And and and maybe this is a good time to, you know, just put the question to you why don't you address it?

SPEAKER_01

Well, let me start Dave, because this is my fault. So uh the first thing I'll say is guilty as charged. And there's a couple of reasons for this, right? I think your intuition is absolutely right. It's not that we intentionally de-emphasize chapter three, but you're right, we don't develop it in this grand narrative. Uh, I'll give you two reasons. One sort of more crass and one a bit more sophisticated. The crass one is there's a million faith in workbooks that do that for you. Yeah. Right. Like a lot of the discourse is uh quite rightly and very powerfully operationalizing this concept of redemption. So lots of really good work has already been done about how the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ opens up new possibilities for work. I'm thinking of someone like Miroshlav Wolf's work, uh, work in the spirit, where yeah, I mean, we want to take seriously that God is with us by his spirit, empowering our work, transfig, transforming it. And man, I'll tell you some of the most inspiring experiences I had working at Denver Institute for Faith and Work was watching people working in my city in really redemptive ways to bring shalom where it had been vandalized. So we didn't think that was the place to make the contribution. That conversation is alive and well. Um, and there's lots of resources and um very, very good work. Um, the second reason was you you mentioned the threads of continuity and discontinuity. I mean, I would want to I would want to think about eschatology as having been inaugurated, but of course not realized. And so even though Jesus is has emerged victorious over the powers, right, sin and death and destruction, and that does open up new vistas for our work. I I think though we really need to take a sober reckoning of how it's been inaugurated, but not yet consummated. And I think that the resurrection of Jesus, it is breaking in. But man, you know, Paul uses the metaphor of sort of twilight that that day is breaking, but there's still plenty of darkness. And yes, of course, Christians in the workplace, in the marketplace can be bearers of the new creation. But man, there's a lot of corners where it's still very dark. And especially if we think globally, many of the world's workers are toiling in the shadows there. And so while we're still waiting for the light, what can a th a theology of work do? So that was that was the intention, uh, but we're also we're certainly vulnerable to that critique.

unknown

Sure.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, no, it's uh that's really helpful. And I accept that. That that makes a lot of sense. I think you're right. Um it's been developed and developed well. Chapter three, uh redemption and in in the grand story, been developed in other resources. David, let me turn to you.

SPEAKER_02

I don't know if Ryan will want me to say this. I haven't had a chance to share it with him yet. So during coffee with my wife this morning, I mentioned this particular question that you had raised, and I said, perfectly on target question. And I was, I said, you know, we're gonna have to come up with something to say in response to this. And she said, Well, you're both Eeyores. So that was my wife's and my wife knows, my wife knows and loves Ryan and his lovely wife, and uh she just said, Well, you're both Eeyores. That's the explanation. And and there there is an element of that, but I I think I would really, first of all, just say I really do agree and affirm everything Ryan said, and then, you know, this is a book, a book, not the book. Right. And most readers wouldn't really uh what can I say, be on to this if they weren't part of the faith and work arena. But the book really is an attempt to address uh rather particular arena of thought and action, faith and work, and in terms of historical development. And the historical development, especially in the last, say, 20, 30 years, has been to the good, a very affirming, positive, uplifting, kind of glorifying vision of work. And that's there's a time and a place for that, and that has had a role, but there's been increasing awareness within the faith and work movement itself that there's been some unintended kind of byproducts of this enthusiastic kind of narrative about work. And our book is it is not, frankly, kind of a survey introduction to faith and work comprehensively. That's not what the book is. It is a kind of a particular argument, if I can put it that way, or statement, in the context against the backdrop of some of the dominant themes in faith and work movement, which we're trying to address what we, and we're not alone in this, what we think are some of the overlooked and misunderstood dimensions.

SPEAKER_00

We will return to our conversation in just a minute. But first, a quick reminder: if you're enjoying the Upwards podcast, make sure to subscribe on your favorite platform and leave us a review. It helps others find these meaningful conversations. And if today's topic resonates with you, check out David and Ryan's book, Worth Doing: Fallenness, Finitude, and Work in the Real World from Minivarity Press. It's an excellent resource for anyone wrestling with questions about vocation, purpose, and faith in the workplace. You can also find past episodes and resources at slbf.org forward slash studio. Now let's get back to the conversation. Yes, and I think uh as an extension of those comments would be very helpful not only to a particular set, a large set of jobs in our own economy, in our own country, but to workers globally, right? Who who often in many places don't have the number of choices, economic and career choices that we might have in our context. So very helpful. I'm convinced we we've got to spend time on chapter two, the fall. You have convinced me. Before I get into sin and some of the other things that make our work difficult, I'd like to just ask you to personalize kind of the creational limits dimension. Um I imagine you feel in your own work, uh you come up against boundaries and limits and limitations. And I wonder if you might offer a personal story of your own sense of creational limit and how maybe you first experienced this as something that wasn't good news, but maybe you've experienced it now as something that is good news. That was my experience reading your book. I actually, I mean, it is it is a little Eeyore in some ways because you're you're focused on the limitations and the boundaries of work. And there's a lot in the literature has been on the positive dimensions, the sort of culture-making components of our work. And that's not this book. But I found the book to be liberating in that it took some of the pressure off of me to feel like I always had to be on the top of my game. It didn't excuse me from good stewardship or good responsibility, but it reminded me that I have limits and I have capacity constraints, and nobody, including God, doesn't expect me to get everything right. And so I found myself actually, you know, I was reading this largely on a Sabbath day, on a Sunday day for me, and uh I found it to be um freeing in some ways. But I wonder if you could give an example, maybe as you even worked on this book, something that you became aware of even in your own life that was a creational limit. And, you know, the content of the book actually helped you address this creational limit.

SPEAKER_02

Ryan, if it's okay, I'll go first. And I don't want you to think I'm dodging this by going back to something that was 40 years ago, but the fact is, you know, long before I was ever involved in this project, obviously, but it carries through to today. And in my work, okay, my work, it was early in my PhD studies. And I was probably three, four months into starting my PhD work. And in my case, at that time, it was a full-time residential kind of uh arrangement. And just to say that I came to a rather scary realization that this endeavor could consume me. It could take my marriage, it could take my kind of physical, emotional health, and I really came to an awareness of again, I didn't probably put it this way, my limits, and that I had to put some boundaries and controls on my pursuit of this PhD, or it was actually gonna take parts of my life. And by God's grace, and and this is not you you just mentioned Sabbath. I happened to have a student colleague, a student peer at in the program, who was himself a very diligent, not self-righteous at all, but a very diligent keeper of Sabbath, which I had never done. And I I, if you will, embraced the practice of Sabbath, perhaps not for what one could call ideal reasons, but the fact is I embrace the practice of Sabbath weekly, and I have practiced it fairly consistently for the four decades since that happened. And uh you mentioned also use the word gift. I consider it just a great and if you will, necessary gift. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

So that's helpful. It's a good example. Ryan, do you have an example? Cool.

SPEAKER_01

Uh where to start. I'll give you one. For me, I experienced my finitude most often by bumping up against the limits of my physical health and energy. Uh my entire life, all my days. I've been, uh I don't know, what what generations past would have called somewhat a frail constitution. Like if I if I lived in the 19th century, I'd be like in the tropics covered with leeches while they tried to like cure my melancholia. So uh sick often, still am sick often. And but I I notice what will happen. There will be periods of extremely intense work demands. I'm in one right now. It's advent season. I'm a pastor. Final grades are due uh next week. So I can anticipate by about next Thursday, I'll probably get sick. It's like clockwork. And, you know, I don't like to be sick. But nothing will remind you of your creaturely finitude like that. That, uh, especially when you're a pastor or professor. And like, listen, uh I imagine, you know, a lot of people who are interested in faith and work, literature and discourse, people who'd be listening to this are typically high bandwidth people, high achieving people. They just think I can just add one more thing, I can add one more thing, I can power through, I'll make time, I can do it. And then eventually your body will just tell you that you cannot. It will tell you to stop. And it sounds weird, but to sort of welcome that as a reminder of your creaturely existence is not a bad practice. And the reason that finitude is good news is it it is precisely finitude that makes you a creature and makes you it makes God God. And when we try to defy our finitude, it's not a uh a surprise that we break down because that's not in our nature. And our work cultures, man, they they really cultivate this idea that finitude is is like an illusion. You can just power through it. And number one, you can't. And number two, even if you could, here's the dirty little secret. Say you do get everything done that you set out to do. Well, Monday's gonna come and there's gonna be more work. You're never gonna get to the end of it. So it's in the nature of a creature to have more to do than can be done. And there's great freedom in just recognizing that and pacing yourself a bit.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. That that's really helpful. So I think we've covered finitude that's woven into God's creation story. It's woven into who we are as individuals. It makes our work hard. There are limits, boundaries to what we can do and accomplish. There's another part of this, which is sin. You know, we are fallen individuals. Uh, sin plays out in the workplace, uh, both individually and corporately. In the book, you talk about kind of three expressions of sin there's enmity, uh, absurdity, and tragedy. And I love those chapters. I wonder if you could just unpack that idea for us and um and why a deeper understanding of sin and its expressions can be good news for us in how we engage our work. Uh, not good news maybe in what we experience, but but good news in in how we engage the work that God's called us to take or that we've chosen to take on for either intrinsic or instrumental purposes. We'll get into that, but but why is why is sin important to understand?

SPEAKER_01

All right. Well, I can take a crack at this. That taxonomy, enity, absurdity, tragedy, was an attempt to give us more vocabulary, more delicate tools to try to describe the human situation, right? I think when we have only two tools, sinful or not sinful, if that's the only vocabulary we have, it's like trying to use a hammer to fix every job, right? Uh, and that that's not always the right tool for the job because I was trying to describe uh work that is kind of bound up in sin, but it's not necessarily our fault and it can't necessarily be otherwise. And I just found that like sin's not that helpful a word to describe that. So landed on these three words, uh, and I can I can attempt to articulate what I mean by them. Enmity, I have in mind the ways that we use work to damage one another, right? Like exploitation in economies and in industries, uh, sharp dealing, unfair business practices, the way that we use work to harm. And then also the ways that we sort of ask work to do too much. We we ask it to bear the entire weight of our identity and our purpose. You alluded to this earlier. That ends up being idolatrous. I think that's sort of ennitous work. That's not what God intends for our work. By absurdity, we're trying to describe something like work that ends up uh being boring, perhaps, or unchallenging or futile, you know, and and maybe you've had the experience of working so hard on a big project only to find that, you know, your superior says, Oh, we're actually going to go in another direction, or that initiative's not going to go anywhere, or we thought you'd be able to do this, but you can't. There's no money for it. A lot of, frankly, I think a lot of our work just kind of ends up being pointless in that sense. Not meaningless, but it doesn't come to fruition. Tragedy is an attempt to describe the ways that work brings us into spaces where we both misuse our gifts as an image bearer and are also bound up in systems and structures that that corrupt and distort what we're trying to do. Right. And so a good example here might be I've got a friend who's a very faithful believer who is a pretty high-level, high mid-level executive in a big tech company. And he says, Well, we're doing this amazing stuff that has so much promise to help people. And then one of the byproducts is like we create these products that are really harmful. And my job is to oversee both of them. Right. And he's sort of stuck here. How do you how do you think faithfully in a situation like that? So I'm not trying to, we're not we're not trying to go a full ear and drag everyone down, but I don't think it helps anyone actually to not be honest and sober about how bad it can be out there. Because only when we're honest about diagnosing the illness can actually the remedy take effect. And so what's the good news? Well, the good news is in terms of enmity, God doesn't intend work to bear the full weight of your identity and purpose. It can be one part of a meaningful human existence, but it's by no means the uh only one. So don't ask it to bear the full weight of your life. Uh absurd work. Well, this is where like instrumental accounts of work can help. Yeah, you're, you're, you might be in a season where you're not doing what you want to do. You don't find it that meaningful. But man, does it provide an opportunity for you to provide for your family or other peoples around you or uh create meaningful relationships in your in your workplace? Can it still do that? And tragedy here, I just want to take the pressure off people. If you're looking for a job, and this I think is relevant for a lot of the young people you engage with, John, if you're looking for a job where you get to work in something you find completely meaningful, that perfectly aligns with your values, that doesn't create any harm in the world, well, best of luck. If you find that job, let me know. It's part of being a creature to just be workers in the system we get.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. And I I think that really is Ryan's handiwork there. And just to say that everything he's described as we know tends to, for lack of a better word, fall even more profoundly on people who do lack agency, people who aren't in pretty privileged kinds of positions. And by the way, this isn't a a rail against the man. That's not what this is about. It's just an acknowledgement that some of these things take particularly harsh forms, concrete forms, for people who aren't in a C-suite, aren't in an office, you know, are doing other kinds of labor or work.

SPEAKER_00

So that's Yeah, and I think I I found the taxonomy helpful just to even diagnose the brokenness around me and my uh capacity to affect change. So there are dimensions of my work that really are tragedy. You know, there, there, uh it's a larger system, and I I have less capacity to affect change. I can pray for change, I can do my little thing, but I probably am not going to fix the system or the industry. But there are places uh with respect to, for example, enmity, where I can be a non-anxious presence, I can be a healing presence, I can guard my own emotions in way that in ways that don't spill out in the workplace in harmful ways, right? So there's all kinds of ways where in in that situation I have more agency because I um, you know, I just have more ability to control who I am and what's going on around me. So I found it to be helpful just uh to diagnose brokenness and then adjust accordingly. So I think that's very helpful. And um uh thank you for for kind of defining that and and speaking to that a little bit. You you spent a lot of the book, David and Ryan, you know, on this issue of sin. Is there anything else you want to say about either this taxonomy or the ways that we experience brokenness in the workplace?

SPEAKER_01

I'll only add to what you said, John. I had actually not thought about the taxonomy in the way that you just described it, but it's a wonderfully helpful insight that actually once we can sort of name the kind of brokenness that's going on in our industries, that helps to bring some clarity to what can be done and probably what can't be done. Because there's nothing more frustrating in a professional environment than to sort of be confronted with circumstances that one has no agency over, especially if we have a theology of work that has conditioned us to think that we actually can redeem it when perhaps we can. Right. And so I really loved what you said about how if you're in a tragic industry, there's only so much you can do about that. Now, there might be redemptive possibilities there too. But you can, you can make adjustments on those other levels. Like if you, I know you oversee a team, John. Uh many of our listeners maybe do, or are part of a team. We can create less ennitous teams. We might not be able to change our industry, but we can on a smaller scale, perhaps, we can work that kind of redemption. So it's not my insight, it's yours. I'm just grateful for it. It's really helpful.

SPEAKER_00

Well, and I think the principles of the book, you know, the more I sort of spend with the time with material, I recognize that there's as much here for kind of a no-collar, blue-collar role as there is for somebody who might be in a position of leadership or managerial oversight. Because I think the reality is we we do experience different dimensions of brokenness and we carry them in different ways. That I think, you know, the the work that you do in this book can be helpful for us to address. For example, sometimes in senior leadership positions, you you have to carry a lot of the burdens of employees in the organizations. You have to keep a lot of things internal. There are places to share, there are places not to share. And that can be a heavy burden. That can be a place of toil and weariness that you just have to carry. Uh, you know a lot of secrets, you know a lot of the dimensions of brokenness, you know the things that aren't public. Uh, you you have experiences with employees, board members, uh, other stakeholders, and you carry that. And sometimes you have to carry it individually. And it's a different kind of burden than the sores that you might have on your hands from working on an assembly line. It maybe is more of an emotional burden than a physical burden, but it is a burden and a and a dimension of the toilsomeness of labor that uh is real. And this is why I think the work that you do is so important. It helps us to make peace with those moments and to identify what agency we have in those moments and to respond as well as we can in those moments and realize that the goal is not to get out of that moment or to self-actualize out of that moment. The goal is to be faithful in that moment and not expect more or less of that moment.

SPEAKER_02

And underlying your comments is going back to this recognition that the two realities, at least that we're focusing on in this book, which are not all of realities, but that finitude and fallenness are universal. That whether you're talking to an executive in a C-suite or a house cleaner in a hotel, they all have 24 hours in their day. Now, the person in the C-suite has maybe more discretionary control, we say agency over what happens in those 24 hours. But even they are not limitless. They have certain accountabilities and responsibilities that that shape how they use their day. But the fact is that we all have the same, if you will, the same amount of time. We all need sleep, we all need food, we all need rest. All of us, regardless of what kind of paid employment we do. And likewise the reality of fallenness. It's not just employers who are, if you will, crippled by sin, employees are crippled by sin, right? And then the institutions and the systems that we all build, they're not completely evil, but they are all tainted by the realities. Of the fall. So these really are the reason that we hope the book can say something for, if you will, everybody, which is a grand claim, is that these two realities that we're grappling with truly are universal to human life and experience.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. So I want to start to wrap our time together, but I want to move in a pastoral direction. And that is because these are universal experiences, and we on a daily basis, hourly basis, feel our finitude and the impact of the fall. What is your pastoral response? How can we invite God's presence into those moments? Do you how do you talk to your students? How do you talk to your parishioners about those difficult moments in work and how to respond in those difficult moments?

SPEAKER_01

Toward the end of the book, we gesture towards some perhaps constructive possibilities for this kind of theology of work that we're partially envisioning. And in that place, we say, well, a Christian theology of work, it can take a lot of forms. And we've talked about that, how there's different ways to come at the question of the theology of work. We're taking just one approach. But whatever form it's going to take, it's going to have to resist what we call these sort of toxic work mythologies that people sort of import into their understanding of vocation, but they're not Christian ideas, like you are what you do. That's not a helpful way to think about human purpose and flourishing. Now, work is an important component of our personhood, but it's by no means the only one. And I have found with young folk, right, finishing college, thinking about vocational trajectories, there's so much pressure that if I don't get this right right now, my life trajectory is going to be completely off. I will never realize what I was meant to be. I'm going to miss my vocation. I've had people ask me, did I miss my calling? Well, it takes some pressure off to recognize that, you know, you're not what you do. To be a human being is to live under God's blessing and benediction and love before you do anything at all. And then that other mythology we seek to deconstruct is uh do what you love. That if if you don't have meaningful work, then you've somehow missed it. And you you alluded to this, John. Maybe by God's grace, as your career unfolds, you will find your way into what Amy Sherman calls the vocational sweet spot, which is a helpful concept, right? That where your gifts and your tasks are aligned and you are just you feel tremendous life. But man, no one gets there at 25, you know, unless like you're playing for the Nuggets or something, which was my dream, didn't work out. But a lot of times if people ever reach that, it's it's late in their career. So I think we need to sort of do some work to pump the brakes on this idea that if you're not doing what you love, then you're wasting your time. No, there's all kinds of value in work that you don't love. Um so that's one angle in.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. David, I wonder, I want to ask you, David, and I wonder in the in the moment, that's Brian, that's really helpful. I think that that's that's and I'm glad you brought up some of the mythologies, bad mythologies or pathologies, maybe even that are that are common out there around our vocational journey. But in the very moment, you know, we're we're in a moment of of distress or anxiety. What would you say pastorally to somebody that is in that moment and they're they're feeling the toil of work and they have an opportunity to respond in a variety of ways? How would you coach them or counsel them or guide them to respond?

SPEAKER_02

I actually uh just yesterday had an extended phone conversation with uh a former student who's now gone on, and he's a very fine theologian, and we have a really valuable friendship to me. He's got many more years ahead of him than I do. And he is uh in a really very tough place in his employment. And so we talked yesterday on the phone, and you know, there's in some ways the truths to be pastorally shared together are not unique to questions related to work. Um, work is a part of life, and as Ryan has rightly highlighted, you know, we have to remember it's a part of life, uh, and paid employment is a part of life, that the kinds of pastoral, if you will, truths that we need to remind each other of in the context of trials in work are the same as those that we would with a trial in another arena of life. We're made by God, He is our creator, and I really do think that that is that is a fundamental, fundamental realization that if we don't embrace the reality that there is a God and that who and what we are and the world we live in is created by him and he pronounced it good, recognizing yes, there's the effects of the fall, but it's fundamentally good. If we don't have that anchor, it is a challenge, uh frankly, to really be encouraging and provide good news. So I think that anchoring our identity and the world around us in the fact that there is a good God who has created and designed this and he is sovereignly involved does not mean that it's going to be always easy or always in accord with our likes, uh, our preferences. And that can be a, you know, that kind of word to somebody who's really in the valley is best shared in the context of relationship. It can't always be just because of life circumstances, but ideally, this fellow and I, for example, who spoke yesterday, we've got probably, I don't know, 25 years anyways, of right relationship. So the fact is God is there, God is good, he's not uh left us. So the point is that the encouragement or the pastoral guidance is turn to him. It's okay to talk to other people, that's important, that's good, uh, like I did yesterday, but ultimately it is to with that reminder that God is there and he is good and he hears us to turn to him in prayer. Uh, maybe especially in the middle of the night, when for many of us, that can be a time of really turning over the hard things.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, that's really helpful. Ryan, I'm going to put you on the spot, you pastor at church. I wonder if you could offer, if you'd be willing to offer, uh, this isn't the end of the interview. I have one more question, but what would a benediction look like that is encouraging your congregates to find God's faithfulness in moments of finitude and fallenness? Do you have a benediction? David offered, I think, good pastoral advice. What kind of benediction would you offer your congregation around finitude and fallenness? You know, I think of a benediction as a last and good word. A last and good word. And so in some ways, this is a summary, you know, it's my my request of a summary statement. How, you know, rather than sort of sending people out in victory and with optimism, uh, you know, you're sending people out with a sense of realism and God's presence in in boundaries and limits and fallness. And I'm I I mean, I'm I I've gone off script, clearly, but I am curious. I mean, it's an intriguing way to sort of send people out because it may be more of their reality than the other. And so if you had to offer a benediction around finitude and fallenness, what would it be? I'm just I'm kind of pastorally curious. That is excellent.

SPEAKER_01

Love that question. Probably something like you can go lie down in safety, which is a line you get again and again in the Psalms.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01

And why that line comes to mind is uh, I'm thinking of like um, I think it's Psalm six, where you get that line first where David is being hunted by Saul. Conditions of finitude and fallenness, indeed, right? All kinds of pressures bearing down. If he doesn't keep moving, maybe Saul will catch him. Can he really afford to sleep? Right? Doesn't he have to keep grinding? I think we all feel this pressure. Well, there's always something to do. I gotta keep grinding, right? And especially when we're in situations that are really contorted by sin, we just feel like maybe if I just work harder, there's a way through this. Uh, maybe the most spiritual thing we can do is actually just lie down and sleep. Let God be God. It's it's not insignificant that in the Hebrew reckoning of time, days start in the evening when humans are doing nothing. And we wake up to quote unquote start the day, but God's been on the clock for 12 hours already. It's a very helpful way of remembering remembering that that it doesn't depend on us. You can sleep.

unknown

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00

God's got this. That's a good word. I I I love that benediction. Your work is really important. I know our listeners and viewers would love to hear what you're working on. Uh, what projects do you have coming?

SPEAKER_02

I don't know what I should have. I retired technically. Technically, I'm finding it's not quite retired. But uh I mentioned before, I think the Keram Forum, and part of the Keram Forum, there's also an endeavor called the Keram Fellowship.

SPEAKER_00

Sure.

SPEAKER_02

And um the Keram Fellowship is bringing a few people together to think together about what kind of scholarship, scholarly work now needs to be done to do theology in ways and on subjects that advance the flourishing of people and the rest of creation. I I know that sounds rather grand and big. The fact is there's a kind of a two-phase endeavor that's being undertaken. And the first one is really planning and visioning. And um I've been invited to be a part of that, and so between January and June, that's one of the places I'll be focusing my own attention. And then also, as Ryan mentioned, he and I will be co-teaching course on the theology of work this coming spring semester at at uh Denver Seminary.

SPEAKER_00

Wonderful. Um, Ryan, let me turn to you.

SPEAKER_01

Uh yeah, two things. One project that kind of that was sparked by the work we did for Worth Doing that I've been pursuing recently. I've been doing some thinking and writing about the question of whether Jesus worked as a carpenter. And if he did, what does it mean for the theology of work? I'm interested in that question. Did Jesus work like we work? And if he did, uh what are the implications? So I've been uh I've been doing some writing on that recently. And then I think uh maybe a project that's on the horizon, and I'm afraid this is going to just reinforce your conception. But I'm interested in writing a little bit on Martin Luther on despair and resilience, spiritual despair and resilience, uh, as a kind of guidebook for pastors. And interestingly enough, as I've been thinking about that project, Luther says that when we when we get into moments of despair, work actually can help. He says, when I get really down, I go out in the field and I spread manure, which is an interesting idea that work is one of the ways that actually God intends to minister to us in the midst of pain. So I'm interested in that too.

SPEAKER_00

That's that's great. And you've referenced uh in the conversation a couple of organizations, uh, Carm Forum, Crum Forum, uh, Denver Institute. They do great work. Um, so we'll make sure that we uh link those in the show notes. David and Ryan, thank you so much. Uh, I really appreciated this book. It it really was a different angle, has helped me immensely. Uh, I know I'll be pondering a lot of what you wrote for a long time. So thank you for your good work and your continued good work. And I've enjoyed this conversation immensely.

SPEAKER_02

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01

Thanks for having us very much.

SPEAKER_00

Thank you for joining us for this rich discussion on faith and the realities of finitude and fallenness in our daily work. David and Ryan reminded us that our work matters not because it's perfect, but because God is present amidst the limits and brokenness we encounter while working.