September 5, 2007
‘…Whatever happened to moral responsibility among the financial institutions? Do their employees have no conscience at all?
One robust answer to these questions came earlier this year with the publication of God at Work: Living Every Day with Purpose, by Ken Costa, the South Africa-born vice-chairman of UBS Investment Bank, and a 30-year City of London veteran.
It might seem surprising to see a seasoned dealmaker fromone of the world’s toughest professions trying to get a discussion going about God. There is not always a lot of evidence of benign intent in the banking sector…
But Mr Costa is not advocating a softhearted approach to business. He would not have survived at SG Warburg, SBC and now UBS had he ever done so. He reminds us that in the Bible’s parable of the talents (Luke 19: 11-27) it is the two servants who put the master’s money to work who are rewarded, while the one who preserved the capital and took no risk is punished. And he quotes the great Methodist John Wesley, who told his followers: “Gain all you can, without hurting either yourself or your neighbour.”
Mr Costa has written his book because he senses the need for a greater awareness of spirituality even in the heat of commercial battle. The world may be more efficient, but perhaps it is also “more efficiently unfair”. And the - now faltering - recent bull market has made him even more aware of the dangers of excess. “There seemed to be a headlong compassionless pursuit of financial reward without restraint,” he writes…
…at a time when scepticism per-sists about “do-gooding” ap-proa-ches to business, religious faith may offer an alternative values-based code of conduct. The credit crunch of 2007 suggests something other than a market triumphalist free-for-all is needed…
Could Christianity even prove a winning business strategy? The idea might provoke hollow laughter among many in business, even those who consider themselves Christians. Mr Costa, an evangelical Christian, is prepared to be mocked. “If the Christian faith is not relevant in the workplace it is not relevant at all,” he says…’
Read the full article here.
God at Work has received a favourable review in the Spring edition of Faith in Business, a quarterly journal that aims to help readers discover a fuller sense of God’s purpose and hope in their working lives.
‘Called God at Work, it is of course about God at work at work! But it’s more than that. It’s really about God at work in the life of the author day by day in the life that he actually leads, whether at home with his family, at work at the bank or preaching in church. It is a plea for Christians to understand that there is no area of life into which God does not wish to come.’
‘It should be compulsory reading for every member of university Christian unions contemplating their future career and inclined to the view that only youth work or school teaching are safe enough and worthwhile enough avenues of secular work for a committed Christian. This book explodes that myth. But nor is it a plea for more Christians to go into The City. It is simply his testimony that wherever you walk: up the steps to a pulpit, into the classroom, into the surgery or the law court, onto the stage or into the biggest business house in the world, you may “walk with the Lord in the light of his Word”.’
Read the full review here which appears in issue 11:1 of Faith in Business Quarterly.
FIBQ.
Thanks to Amazon it is now possible to search inside God at Work. Check it out here.
Comment from the FT’s live financial markets blog.
‘No bank…would survive the promised return of Christ.’ So says Ken Costa, the vice-chairman of investment banking at UBS, reports the FT’s people column…
In the book, he describes a moment of epiphany, struck by the looming facades of the Bank of England and the Swiss Bank Corporation…
“As an investment banker in the City of London, I have read the Financial Times and the Bible almost every day for the last 30 years.”
But which has generated the greater return?
FT Alphaville.
‘Investment bankers are not often thought to harbour religious beliefs, other than a desire to bow down before the altar of mammon. Ken Costa has set out to challenge that view by publishing a book called God at Work: Living every day with purpose.
In the slim volume, the vice-chairman of investment banking at UBS sets out deeply personal views on reconciling his faith with the City, where he has spent his entire working life.
Mr Costa, who was born and brought up in South Africa, writes that the apartheid regime initially turned him away from Christianity, but that his belief was revived while studying at Cambridge University in the 1970s. He joined SG Warburg in 1976 and embarked on a stellar career that saw him rise to the upper ranks of the investment bank.
But he retained a sense of perspective. In one passage, he describes being impressed by the looming facades of the Bank of England and Swiss Bank Corporation. “But then, in a flash, I saw the truth,” he writes. “No bank - Swiss Bank or the Bank of England - would survive the promised return of Christ. Strong as they appeared, their apparent security would be broken in an instant.”‘
In the People Column of the FT.
THE BAPTIST TIMES
‘God is in every workplace’
24 May 2007
Ruth Dickinson meets Ken Costa to find out how God and work can fit together.
It’s probably fair to say that Ken Costa’s working life is not, on the face of it, going to be that representative of anyone else’s. While you might wonder what this high flyer has got to say to the ordinary nine-to-fiver, it’s worth taking a look at his book…
Right from the beginning, Ken rejects the lazy but pervasive assumption that the only real Christian work happens in Christian organisations.
‘It is a very sad state that we’re in, that we divided up creation into those things which God is really keen on, and those things that God doesn’t really mind if they happen or not,’ he says. ‘That is a reductionist view of God. He created the entire world order for us. To separate them out would be for us to look at the creation and to actively pick and choose from within it. So you either have the view that he is lord of all - including commerce and [secular] work - or he is not Lord at all.’
What actually matters according to Ken, is working out what God has called us to do and how he has gifted us to perform our calling…
Work, according to Ken, is something which the church has overlooked at great cost to itself. ‘The principal cause of the decline of the church in this country is that it is irrelevant to 95 per cent of people 95 per cent of the time.’ Addressing issues of work, he says, is one major way in which new life could be breathed into the church…
The whole point of the book is to help people seek to glorify God in the work that they do…
More here.
The Baptist Times.
IDEA
‘Bringing God into the Workplace’
May/June 2007
Extract on Tough Decisions, from God at Work in the in the May/June edition of Idea, the Evangelical Alliance’s bi-monthly magazine.
Read here.
idea
Punctuated with godly wisdom and liberally dusted with real-life stories that illustrate biblical principles, this compact hardback is a gem!
Costa acknowledges it is difficult and getting even harder to be a Christian in the workplace – particularly in the financial sector where markets have become more volatile and decisions more complex, making choices less clear cut. Ken Costa chairs Alpha International so it is no surprise that this book is written to appeal not just to Christians…
High: A book to regularly return and dip into to be reminded of timeless truths.
More
Rick Warren, Pastor and author of The Purpose Driven Life, which has sold over 20 million copies, has given his endorsement to God at Work. ‘My friend, Ken Costa, in his book God at Work shares practical and life changing steps to live out your faith at work and bring glory to God. Outside of your marriage and family, God uses work as a school for character development. You’ll experience tremendous joy in letting God work in you and through you at work.’
