I am guessing that there are many of you who run their own business. Maybe even some of you who started a business from scratch..from the ground up. Speaking from experience, it can be a hard road. Surviving the early, lean years. Learning how to manage funds. Paying taxes. Following all the legal rules. All the while trying to maintain your skills in the field you have chosen.
But I think most people would say that the most arduous aspect of running a business, is the aspect of managing people employed by you. Not that most employees are bad people. As a matter of fact, the hardest part of selling our business was that we no longer were able to interact and have a relationship with people who had become like family to us over the years. No, the issue was more the administrative aspect. Hiring. Firing. Managing time off requests. Finding help when someone was out sick. Benefits. Assessing performance for giving raises.
There was also the task of helping employees becoming the best possible worker they could be. Training them and correcting them when they did not quite meet expectations. In a sense you were like a parent in that you saw the potential in the person and when they could not meet that potential you get a bit disappointed. So you redouble your efforts to try to get them to succeed. You as an employer see the goal, the end result of all that training and practice. And you hope the employee does as well. Because, when they succeed you feel as much pride for them as they do for themselves.
And that brings us to Paul. In a sense, Paul is an employer of a multi-divisional company. We maybe can call it ChristianityRUs. Paul spent his early years traveling to various locations in his territory establishing new branches of this new dot com enterprise. He worked with a team of sales managers to spread the word about his new company. People were excited and latched on to this new concept eagerly. Especially considering that many had a very poor lot in life. So this new message of “Blessed are the poor in spirit”, must have struck a cord. So I am guessing that there was an initial rapid growth spurt for this upstart business.
But then the hard work began. Keeping the employees on the right track. All the talk of the messiah and His second coming had to create a buzz. So, when Christ did not make his second appearance in short order, there had to be some grumbling among the staff (the people of Corinth, Ephesus, Rome, etc). Look at the the disciples in Corinth as described in today’s reading. They took the message Paul was relating to them and ran with it. They took it to its logical conclusion that, because they were on the “inside” with Paul, they were special, chosen people and had it made. They began to look down on those who were not following the message as they were. Those in “competing companies” as it were. They became “puffed up” and full of themselves, losing humility in the process.
Paul had his hands full with these communities. How would he keep them moving in the right direction? One method was the series of letters, or epistles, that he wrote to each community. At times praising their progress to help reinforce good behavior, as any HR manager worth their salt would do. But also admonishing them when they failed to meet their goals. Pointing out where they were struggling and also offering advice as to how they can improve and excel. A good manager, and parent, never yells and corrects without providing a sound path to guide them. Paul tells them in today’s first reading they needed to learn to suffer as Christ suffered. To embrace humility in order to serve as Christ served.
Servitude is also the topic of today’s Gospel from Luke. Only this time the topic is service to the Sabbath. At least this is how the Pharisees saw the Sabbath and its relationship to man. That man is to bow to the Sabbath and all its requirements. Particularly those of cessation of activity. But Jesus turns the tables on them, as he usually does. He makes it clear that the Sabbath is actually a gift to man. Not something that is to bind man from doing good works on the Sabbath. In fact, Jesus declares Himself as Lord of the Sabbath. Another instance where he alludes to his divinity. He makes it clear that the Sabbath is an opportunity to satisfy human needs. We see this in the example of satisfying hunger with grain from the fields and David’s eating of the bread of offering in the temple. And the Sabbath is not an excuse to neglect displaying acts of mercy. As Jesus demonstrates later in the chapter by healing a man’s withered hand.
So go ahead and plant the seed of our faith in others, be they co-workers, friends or family. But don’t forget to manage that seed as best as you can by watering it with encouragement. By fertilizing it with correction. And by helping to rid it of weeds by showing mercy. Even on the Sabbath.
Note: Consider listening to the Relevant Radio (www.relevantradio.com) program, Morning Air. Periodically there is a contributor named Dave Durand that talks about business management from a Catholic perspective.
