I worked a summer in a call center. While it wasn’t my favorite job, it wasn’t lacking in drama. You might be blessed, cursed at, thanked, or chewed out all during one shift (sometimes all in one call). On occasion, dissatisfied customers would refuse to hang up until getting their way. This posed a problem at the end of a shift, because management forbade associates from terminating calls.
Part-time associates were only allowed so many hours a week lest they cross into more expensive, “full-time” territory, and full-time employees required permission from management to work overtime. Prolonged calls jeopardized these restrictions (and the call center’s budget). Management had a solution: If a call ran past your shift’s end, you were to clock out and finish the call unpaid — clearly an unethical, if not illegal, policy.
Why such an unethical policy? On the surface, saving money was the priority. And just as likely, middle management wished to please superiors with high rates of completed calls and customer satisfaction while staying under budget; good stats, of course, increase the chances of promotion. Such a performance review seemed impossible while paying employees for unbudgeted work. So, unwilling to accept their limitations, managers took matters into their own hands, stealing underlings’ earnings to increase their own, simply by demanding they work off the clock. These managers believed they had to cheat to get ahead, and they were willing to wrong their neighbor in the process.
Cheating isn’t unique to the modern workplace. God designed us with weaknesses — natural limitations that teach us to live by faith in him. Adam and Eve, too, despised their creaturely confines and sought to profit themselves by seizing what was God’s. Sin brought corruption to us, our work, and the workplace. Satan tempts us to believe we can’t enjoy the good life without cheating. As in the garden, so too in the office.
Such behavior didn’t end in the garden; it persisted in the history of God’s people. God called Abram to go to the land of Canaan, promising to make him into a great nation and give that land to his offspring. The plan hinged on Abram and his wife Sarai having offspring, an unlikely prospect given they were 75 and 65 at the time, married a likely 60 years of marriage with no children. Obviously, they thought, the good God promised wouldn’t arrive via the vitality of their barren bodies.
Abram and Sarai were called to trust in the Lord’s power to do good in the face of their frailty. But the couple struggled with doubt. Once, Sarai told Abram, “Since the Lord has prevented me from bearing children, go to my slave; perhaps through her I can build a family” (Gen 16:2). In Sarai’s eyes, the Lord was the problem; he kept her from having kids. Trusting and obeying the Lord, she believed, was a poor plan for getting what she wanted (and he promised).
Where could Sarai turn for the good life? “Perhaps,” she reasoned, “I can build a family.” She trusted herself to find a solution. Sarai directed her husband to sleep with her slave, who bore a son. Refusing to trust the Lord, Sarai sexually exploited Hagar to get what she wanted. As is often the case in unbelief, the final solution involved dishonoring God and abusing her neighbor.
We can imagine the pretext Abram and Sarai might have offered to justify the failure of what they were called to do: We just wanted to see God’s purposes succeed — so we did what we had to do to get what God promised! After all, the world will be blessed through our offspring — so we’re really seeking our neighbors’ good!
From our perspective, the foolishness of such excuses is obvious. Yet aren’t we prone to the same sorry defenses? Fudging on my timesheet means more money to give to missions! one might say. Or, Breaking the law keeps the company afloat, ensuring all these people still have jobs. We try to spin faithlessness into fidelity under the guise of helping God do good. But God doesn’t need our disobedience to fulfill his purposes. He created the heavens and the earth without a counselor. He can certainly succeed without our cheating.
In the beginning, God called us to rule the earth as his image bearers and priestly servants. Our work was to communicate what God is like to the watching world and heavenly realms. Unethical choices and blatant immorality only send the message that he is unjust and wicked. Ethical policies and moral behavior communicate that God is good and that we can trust him to do us good. That is our calling — to glorify God in all things. Every other calling is subordinate.
Jesus came to redeem us from our rebellion against this calling by living righteously, dying for our sins, and rising again. The devil tempted him to accomplish his mission through sinful shortcuts. Showing him the world’s kingdoms, Satan said, “I will give you all these things if you will fall down and worship me.” But Christ refused to cheat, replying, “Go away, Satan! For it is written: Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him” (Matt 4:8–9).
Christ refused to exploit his position to serve himself, opting instead to serve God to the point of death for the sins of his people (Phil 2:1–8). Because of his faith-fueled obedience, the Father raised him from the dead, exalting him to the highest place in all creation. His seat at God’s right hand proves that sin is never necessary for vocational success.
What is vocational success, after all? As Christians, we are ambassadors for Christ (2 Cor 5:20) — royal representatives, redeemed and restored. His kingdom is not corrupt. His will is never immoral. Vocational success, then, is representing his person, work, and kingdom in all we do — every resume, report, decision, policy, and time sheet.
Belief in the gospel (and not in ourselves) frees us from cheating. It is “by holding firm to the word of life” that we are strengthened to “be blameless and pure, children of God who are faultless in a crooked and perverted generation” (Phil 2:15–16). Faith liberates us to embrace our limitations, resting in Christ’s strength to supply all our needs. The one who lost his life, and gained it forever, can be trusted with daily bread and eternal glory. The kingdom of Christ doesn’t need our cheating. Neither do we.