The Intersection of Leaders in Business and the Church

“The Table Podcast” featuring Dr. Darrell Bock and Greg Forster

via Hendricks Center for Christian Leadership and Cultural Development at Dallas Theological Seminary

Transcript podcast teaser below regarding the divide between professionals and pastors…

“There’s a failure to recognize that both groups bring knowledge to the table. I’ve been influenced in this particular respect by Dallas Willard and his analysis of how people will respond and change the way they live based on who they think has knowledge. As I’ve meditated on that and looked at it in the world that we move in, in our program what I see is religious professionals coming to the table with an unspoken assumption that I’m the one with knowledge because I know the Bible very well, and I know theology or I know that world.

That gives me the deepest insight into the way the universe works.

The misunderstanding between pastors and professionals

Meanwhile, economic professionals will come to the table thinking “I’m the one with knowledge because I know how things get done.” In the world that economic professionals live in you are not recognized as possessing knowledge if you don’t know how to produce results. The people who accomplish things are recognized as having knowledge because that is the measurement of whether you have knowledge.

Whereas, in the world of religious professionals and particularly in academia which is where my work is focused, you are recognized as having knowledge if you are able to systematically articulate a propositional body of knowledge.

Economic professionals, for the most part, even if they are very articulate people who can make a verbal presentation very well, they don’t have a systematic propositional body of knowledge. That’s not the way their world operates.

Viewing professionals and pastors through a different lense.

I remember attending a conference for Christian business leaders and as I went around the room, introduced myself, met people, people would ask me what I do. I said that I teach the pastors that you are not a checkbook. I cannot tell you how many smiles, thank yous and how much affirmation I got from the business folks at that conference that they feel like their pastors, if they even have pastors, view them as a paycheck.

Now, on the other side, there is often a failure among economic professionals to recognize the need for the church and the critical role of pastors. That’s why I add if they even have pastors because many of them have simply dropped out of the local church. We can call upon pastors to say, these guys are not checkbooks. But we can also call upon business leaders to say, God uses the local church. The local church is pretty important. It’s pretty central. You should show up. You should be there.” Greg Forster

To hear the whole interview, visit The Table podcast.