1Corinthians 9:24-27

Comedian Lily Tomlin once said, "The trouble with the rat race is even if you win, you're still a rat. We often compare life to a race. If you aren’t going to make the meeting, you say to your boss, ‘I’m running late.’ Can you think of other expressions? I haven’t eaten lunch – ‘I’m running on empty’. That guy has no experience – ‘He wants to run before he can walk.’ She is smarter than I am – ‘She can run circles around me.’ This meal is nothing very special ‘It is run of the mill.’ The football team is ahead – ‘They are going to run down the clock.’

We are starting a three week series today on the Christian at Work. Today is How to Run the Rat Race without Being a Rat. We want to think about ways you can live on the job that will make God happy and you will feel that same joy also. So if you have any troubles at work, then Paul’s words about his own struggle will offer some comfort and guidance today.

"Integrity begins with I." It starts with you and me. And it has to include our work. If you work 8 hours and day and spend two in commuting and then sleep 8 hours, you only have 6 hours left for family. How can you be a Christian and not think about being a Christian on the job. A lot of our lives are spent on the job.

If gossip hurts a family or friendship, then it is also going to damage your life at work. If hiding money from your spouse is bad, then pilfering from the office is bad. If lying to your children is bad, then lying to a customer is bad. If you are not racist at home because of your Christian beliefs, why would you tolerate racism at work?

 These are simple ideas. The problem is that our work is seductive. Others are running in evil ways. We see them cutting corners and tripping others as they run and we get the feeling that we should hide our true selves. Usually, we don’t really join in. We simply stay quiet and let the sin happen. For example, another employee falsifies an expense report and we simply let it happen. Supervisors can make gutter like demeaning remarks, especially about women, and we don’t laugh, but we weakly smile and say nothing. Sometimes, another employee is going through a hard time, and we are also busy and we feel that ‘we are not our brother’s keeper.’ as Cain said in the Bible.

 So being a Christian in the work place takes some energy and courage. We have to choose an integrated faith that invites Christ into the work place with us

 Those are real-world costs that we might face if we refuse to do what's wrong. In fact, that's what happened to Jack Eckert. Jack Eckert owned a chain of nearly 2,000 drugstores around the country. One day Jack Eckert gave his life to Christ. He became a Christian. Afterwards, he walked into one of his family-oriented drug stores and he noticed the Playboy and Hustler and magazines with violence that made him a huge, huge profit every year. He removed those magazines at all 1,700 drugstores that he owned.

When you run a business, you are making more than a profit. You are protecting the jobs and salaries of the people who work for you. Taking away a source of profits takes some courage.

Last year, the church leaders at a Staff Parish meeting were troubled that we started some employees at minimum wage. They did not feel that a Christian organization ought to pay that low. If you work minimum wage full time, its $12,000 a year. Who could live in New York City for that money? So we made a painful change and it calls on each of us to give more. Because for each dollar per hour that we raise the minimum salary at our church, it makes a change of $6,000 in the budget. Isn’t that interesting? It sounds great to say that we should be Christ like, but there are real costs in that commitment.

 But I also want to think of some benefits of a clean race. What can we see in life as a blessing or benefit when we pursue biblical integrity at work?

 First, there are personal benefits of running with a clear conscience. Proverbs 10:9 says, "The person of integrity walks securely, but he who takes a crooked path will be found out."

We can sleep well at night. In fact, as the author of The Power of Ethical Management, Ken Blanchard, put it, "There is no pillow as soft as a clear conscience."

I follow political news and of course, there are indictments ahead in the Bush administration. The outing of this CIA agent is about to spill into the press. And the chief advisors to the President are changing their testimony. I was thinking about them and feeling sorry, sensing their trapped feeling now. When you remember that Integrity starts with I, you don't have to struggle to remember when you've told the truth and when you've told a lie. There is no energy trying to keep stories straight.

 Second, your kids are watching you run. Proverbs 27 says, "The righteous man leads a blameless life. Blessed are his children after him."

Kids are not perfect, but they’re fairly good at spotting hypocrisy. For instance, if you're trying to raise your kids to respect the property of others but they see you ripping off supplies from work, they say to themselves, "Oh, I get it -- the real trick is you just don't get caught."

The teacher that calls in the father of little Johnny for an emergency conference. She says to the father, "I don't understand why little Johnny is behaving the way he does." The father says, "What's wrong?" She says, "All he does is steal the supplies of the other kids. He steals their paper, he steals their pens, he steals their paste. I don't understand why he's doing that." The father's puzzled too. The father says, "I cannot understand why my son would feel the need to do that. Johnny knows I can get him all the supplies he needs from my work.

 Then a third benefit is this: Acts of integrity always bring more health to the whole system. I had a course on ethics in higher education. And one of units was the positive value of shame. Do you know that when we stand up for anything or vote for anything or do any good act, it affects the whole system? People say, why vote? Even if you vote and you lose, people take note of how many others were willing to stand up.

 Civil rights did not happen because most Americans wanted it, but it happened because a few determined Christians were willing to stand and require it of the nation. 

 Finally, there is a spiritual benefit to running with integrity. This is the most important benefit of all. How do we benefit spiritually?

If you said to your spouse, "Okay, here's the thing. As long as I'm at home I'm committed to you. But when I go off to work, well, I might fool around a little bit." If you said that to your spouse, it would probably cause a rift in your relationship.

So too with God. When we are loyal during the week as well as the weekends, there is a new sense of communion with God. In other words, the rat race is not the only race we're running. In fact, it's not the most important race we're running. As Ken Blanchard put it, "Nice guys may appear to finish last, but usually it's because they're running in a different race."

I want to challenge you before you get to Monday morning. Before those challenges look you in the eye, make the choice right now with God's help to follow his agenda, to decide that now. Can you do that? Can you make that kind of a choice today, because, if you do, God will give you the two very things that you need to follow through. He will give you a pardon and he will give you power.

He will give you a pardon because not one person here, myself included, has been perfectly ethical in the marketplace. Many times I made the wrong choice. Some of you have woven a web of deceit so elaborate in your jobs, you don't know what your job would look like if you were to do it straight. You just don't know, and you need God to say to you, "I can forgive you for what you've done." You need God to say that to you, regardless of what you've done.

Friends, if you ask God to forgive you for the ethical lapses of your past, you can begin again. You can. He can give you a pardon.

Lastly, he can give you power for your future to do the right thing. Some of you, when I say I know God can give you power, you say, "Yeah, that sounds too good to be true." He will give you power to face the consequences that you may have to face because of the ethical lapses in your past. He can give you the power to apologize or to make restitution where it's appropriate. He can give you power to make the right choices in the future.

Friends, we are in a race – not the rat race, but the human race. We need to be true to God in the 2100 hours each year that we spend working. God will give pardon and power to do it. Get ready, get set, Run!