1. Being a Christian in work is being just. Following Jesus Christ in our work means being just because Jesus is the Just One.²¹⁶ God is a God of justice.²¹⁷ We work justly because God is just,²¹⁸ God loves justice,²¹⁹ and God desires that we do justice.²²⁰ From the Holy Spirit we receive the heart, wisdom, and strength to work justly.
2. With every injustice in the world we do God an injustice. With much injustice, we do God much injustice. With all the injustice in the world, such as poverty, famine, illiteracy, loneliness, exploitation, and wars, we do God unimaginable injustice.
3. Injustice in the world is not God’s fault but ours. Injustice undermines God’s world; therefore, we have a responsibility to fight injustice and foster justice both in and outside of work.
4. By committing our work to the fight against injustice and the promotion of justice, we testify that God once created the world right and will one day make it right again. Injustice can be a blessing in disguise if it brings us to its elimination.
5. Working justly means paying attention to the people who are being wronged. By being a bright light in our work, we can illuminate our environment to see where injustice is. To isolate ourselves from injustice is to avert ourselves from God.
6. Working justly means respecting each other’s autonomy. Autonomy is necessary to be human, to exercise our free will, to have freedom of choice, and to decide for ourselves whether and how to follow Jesus. We are not to dictate, direct, command or program people to behave in particular ways. We deny God when we design people in our image.
7. Working justly means treating others humanely. The inhumane treatment of people is ungodly because people were created in God’s image and likeness. It is inhumane if in our work we humiliate, ignore, belittle, or insult; if we pressure, exploit, or extort; or if we mishandle, mistreat, or mutilate anyone. A person is not a lemon to be squeezed. People are not disposable items to be discarded after use. That is why we should treat people in our work at least as well as we want to be treated ourselves, by other people and by God.²²¹
8. Working justly means treating others respectfully. Every person, as the image and likeness of God, has the right to be treated in an honorable manner. “Honorably” means treating the other with reverence as if the other were Jesus Himself. God commands reverence for humanity because this is about reverence for God. Human rights are God’s rights.
9. Working justly means giving what someone is entitled to. Anything that is crooked is not straight. Doing justice in our work²²² means that we deliver quality in our work, we don’t do half a job, and we deliver our work on time. We work as if our lives depend on it.
10. Working justly means treating people equally. Because before God every person is of equal value,²²³ we treat every person equally,²²⁴ we do not judge based on a person’s standing,²²⁵ and we ban privileges in work.
11. Working justly means treating equal cases equally. In our work, we disapprove of discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender, religion, and origin because it discriminates where God does not. God never discriminates, not even at the gates of heaven, because heaven or hell is the result of our choice to believe or not in God.
12. Working justly means distributing benefits and burdens justly.²²⁶ Because of our fall from grace, there is scarcity, and this gives rise to justice. With just distribution of benefits and burdens, of joys and pains, and of profits and losses, we give what belongs to each. Whoever takes part in bringing about any benefit must also proportionately share in the benefit obtained. Profiting and bargaining may be acceptable; but exorbitant prices, wages, and profits are unacceptable. The only acceptable occupational excess is excess of talents.
13. Working justly means demanding a reasonable fee for paid labor. Reasonable compensation is not determined by supply and demand; thus, it is not market-based. Reasonable compensation is determined by what is a reasonable margin on the costs incurred. We may earn money according to God, but anything that we earn too much is something we unlawfully take from another. Price gouging is a scam and a swindle.
14. Working justly means compensating those we harm. What we do for the harmed we do to Jesus.²²⁷
15. Working justly means acting against those who commit injustice. To tolerate an unjust person is to accept and justify his injustice. To respond to an unjust person is to uphold justice, to allow neighborly love to speak for oneself, and to take care of the unjust. By being our brother’s keeper, we reconcile justice, neighborly love, and service.
16. Working justly means protecting the health and safety of others and of ourselves. Those who expose others or themselves to unnecessary physical risks at work are attacking God’s Holy Spirit. After all, our bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit.²²⁸ Illness, disability, and death due to unnecessary risks at work are unworthy both of man and of God.²²⁹ We therefore must avoid dangerous and unhealthy work as much as possible.
17. Working justly means being justified first by faith. The best antidote to injustice in work is justification by faith in God. We can only really do justice in our work if we are justified by God.²³⁰ At the same time, we must ask ourselves whether the many occupational injustices are because of lack of belief or because believers have so little commitment to a more just world.

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Questions

1. Which Bible verse about justice do I find particularly appealing and provides guidance for what working justly means (to me)?
2. To what extent do I agree with the above summary of what working justly means?
3. Are there any missing elements in the above list of what working justly means? If so, which ones?
4. How would I personally describe what working justly means for Christians?
5. How would I describe concretely what working justly means for me?
6. To what extent do I subscribe to the idea that justice is an important characteristic/virtue for Christians in their work?
7. To what extent do I subscribe to the idea that justice is an important guideline/principle for the behavior of Christians in their work?
8. To what extent is justice an important virtue and principle for me in my work?
9. How do I experience the importance of justice in my work?
10. Do I work to bring about justice? Do I do so wholeheartedly?
11. To what extent can I work justly in my work?
12. How often have I recently brought justice to my work?
13. How justly do I do my work? How does it show?
14. To what extent do I use justice as a principle for my behavior in my work? Could I illustrate this using the decisions I have recently made in my work?
15. When I look back at my working life, could I say that I have increasingly become more just in my behavior?
16. To what extent do people I work with think I act justly in my work? What have they said to me about this?
17. To what extent do I think God thinks I act justly in my work?
18. How can I become and act more justly in my work? How would I do this concretely?
19. Which elements of working justly am I going to bring more of in my next working day?
20. What am I going to say in a prayer to God about working justly?