SURRENDER REWIND: We are taking a family trip and want to be fully present with one another.  We thought it would be a good time and an even better idea to offer a refresher on the importance and implications of “surrender” for a faithful leader pursuing faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing. This post and the next one will look back at that foundation.

The Four Gaps

We introduced the first three gaps in post #010 (The Need – Mind the “Gaps”) and then explored them in more depth in post #165 (“Leading Faithfully” Basics – The “Gaps”).  The fourth gap was the subject of post #248 (Crossing the Fourth Gap).  Here they are:

• “Sunday/Monday”

• “Sacred/Secular”

• “Knowing/Doing”

• “Safety/Surrender”

The first three can be thought of as “wisdom” or “knowledge” gaps.  Understanding is essential to crossing them and gaining that understanding is a key focus of the RENEW stage of the Integriosity^® process.  The RENEW stage builds the momentum needed for the organizational heart change that comes through the RE-IMAGINE, RE-ALIGN and RESTORE stages.

We believe faithful leaders sometimes get stuck behind the wisdom gaps because business as usual and faith as usual can distract organizational leaders from the truth of God’s purpose for work and business and what is required to be obedient to that purpose.

The fourth gap–“Safety/Surrender”–is very different.  It is arguably the most important on the journey toward faithful integrity (and the most challenging), but unlike the others, it isn’t about wisdom or knowledge; it’s about heart.  Crossing the fourth gap requires a leap of faith.

The “Wisdom” Gaps

We believe a faithful leader’s journey to leading with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing must start with RENEW–renewing the faithful leader’s mind about God’s purpose for work and business.  It is the renewal called for in Romans 12:2:

Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.

The RENEW stage of Integriosity is exciting because it reveals the sacred nature of work and business.  We believe it is a revelation at the center of a quote from A.W. Tozer:

Let every man abide in the calling wherein he is called and his work will be as sacred as the work of the ministry. It is not what a man does that determines whether his work is sacred or secular, it is why he does it.

The revelation that our work can be our ministry and the understanding of how to “work” in a sacred way come as a faithful leader crosses the three wisdom gaps.

• “Sunday/Monday”: this gap is crossed when you understand that what you do Monday-Friday is not disconnected from the faith you practice on Sunday—you should bring your whole self (including your faith) to work or to your business.

• “Sacred/Secular”: this gap is crossed when you understand that your work or business itself has intrinsic value in God’s Kingdom—your work and the way you manage your business constitute a sacred vocational calling and a form of worship (you have probably heard that the Hebrew word avodah can mean work, worship, and service). As Tozer says, what matters is the WHY behind your work or business.

• “Knowing/Doing”: this gap is crossed when you understand how to act on those understandings and begin implementing change in your work and organization through deeds. In saying what you “do” doesn’t matter, Tozer is distinguishing types of vocation, not suggesting you don’t need to “do” anything or that conduct is irrelevant—deeds do matter, but they must come from the right WHY behind your work or business.

Crossing the wisdom gaps requires renewing your mind regarding God’s purpose for work and business and regarding how to begin aligning your work and the purpose, values and culture of an organization with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities. Moving across the three wisdom gaps of faith/work integration equips a faithful leader to see their role, their organization and all its people in a new light.

The “Heart” Gap

Unlike the “wisdom gaps”, the Safety/Surrender Gap is a “heart” gap.  It is the decisive gap to be crossed in a faithful leader’s journey toward leading with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing.

• Safety/Surrender: this gap is crossed when a faithful leader surrenders their organizational leadership to God, accepting their role as a stewardsrather than the ultimate owner. That surrender must be lived out and renewed in daily decisions. To borrow from post #267 (Give Up Sinatra for Lent (and Then Forever), it is crossed when a leader gives up leading in line with their will–“My Way”–and leads the organization in line with God’s will–“His Way”.

Oswald Chambers declared in My Utmost for His Highest, “There is only one thing God wants of us, and that is our unconditional surrender.”

Crossing the Safety/Surrender gap is a necessary step to transforming the heart of an organization to a bigger WHY aligned with God’s purpose for work and business and to living out true “stewardship” as commanded in the Creation Mandate.

The stewardship of surrender required to cross the Safety/Surrender gap–what we call “faithful stewardship” –means leading the organization in line with God’s will, which includes aligning its purpose, values and culture with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities and transforming its WHY–its heart–from what the world values to what God values.

Faithful stewardship demands more than a faith focused on “being a good Christian.” Transforming the WHY of an organization to what God prioritizes rather than what the world prioritizes requires putting profit in its proper place as a means rather than the end toward which a business is managed and optimizing profit to maximize the flourishing of all creation touched by the organization, particularly people.

Getting Stuck Behind the Gaps

To a large extent, Integrous and the idea of Integriosity were inspired by the observation that there is an abundance of excellent content and conferences on the subject of faith/work integration, but there seems to be a surprising number of faithful leaders (and faithful workers) who are stuck behind the “gaps”.

As a consequence, there seems to be a surprising shortage of institutional “heart-changing” implementation of faith/work integration by faithful leaders.  Faithful leaders (and faithful workers) with the best of intentions get “stuck”.

We believe they get stuck behind the wisdom gaps because business as usual (business in the way of the world) exerts pressure to keep them stuck, and faith as usual (well-intentioned “faith” messages and teachings that represent “bad theology” or, at least poor communication of good theology) can lead them to believe there are no more gaps to cross.

Stuck Behind Sunday/Monday

Some faithful leaders remain stuck behind the Sunday/Monday Gap, which means they do not see how what they do Monday-Friday is connected to the faith they practice on Sunday.  They do not bring their whole self (including their faith) to work.  Business is business as usual, work becomes work as usual, and faith is for Sunday.

The secular “world” view of faith and occupation is that they have absolutely nothing to do with each other (unless the occupation is in “ministry”).  A person’s “faith identity” is personal and does not belong at the office/factory/store (sometimes because the proponents of this view are hostile to faith).

The “world” is effectively stuck behind the Sunday/Monday Gap, but so are many regular church-goers. What they do Monday-Friday is disconnected from the faith they practice on Sunday (or Saturday)–not because they are hostile to faith, but because they have never been taught otherwise.  As seen in some of the most “Christian” countries in the world, professed Christian identity can coexist with corruption when faith does not shape everyday decisions.

But it is more than just a lack of understanding.  The world–and our culture–does not want a faithful leader crossing the Sunday/Monday Gap.  As in the time of Jeremiah, “the word of the Lord is to them an object of scorn” (Jeremiah 6:10).  The spirit of mammon at the core of business as usual is working against it 24/7/365.   Ephesians 6:12 is quite emphatic:

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

Business as usual is “everywhere.” Its assumptions shape much of what is taught in business schools and management training programs, rewarded by management, boards, and stockholders, and demanded by investors, fund managers, and stock analysts.

Business as usual is portrayed as “good business.” Approaches that put profit in service of a broader purpose or put those purposes alongside profit (including stakeholder capitalism) are often denigrated and dismissed by proponents of business as usual as illegal, a departure from “good business,” or contrary to capitalism.

Stuck Behind Sacred/Secular

Some faithful leaders have successfully crossed the Sunday/Monday Gap but remain stuck behind the Sacred/Secular Gap, which means they do not understand that their work or business has intrinsic value in God’s Kingdom.  They do not understand that the way they lead their business is a sacred vocational calling and a form of worship.

A leader stuck between Sunday/Monday and Sacred Secular likely believes they should BEHAVE faithfully (e.g., by doing fewer bad things and more good things, being generous, and evangelizing), but business is business as usual.

Based on informal survey findings shared with us and our own experiences, it would appear that only a very small slice of people whose faith is based on the Bible have really crossed the Sacred/Secular Gap.

• In 2019, a representative of a faith and work organization mentioned that they and another organization had conducted surveys of workers in an effort to ascertain whether Evangelical Christians understood that all of their work was a sacred activity.  They got at this by asking people when they thought they were living out their faith at work.  Based on those surveys, these groups concluded that only 5-9% of the workers surveyed had a Biblical understanding of work as a sacred activity and a calling.  Some did not feel their work had anything to do with their faith (still stuck behind the Sunday/Monday Gap), and others cited only the times they were doing things like attending Bible studies or prayer groups or praying for co-workers (still stuck behind the Sacred/Secular Gap).

• Anecdotally, we have witnessed a similar lack of understanding when giving talks about faith/work integration and Integriosity—even to groups specifically formed and focused on faith/work integration.  We often start a talk by asking the audience how many are in “full-time Christian ministry”.  Typically, only a few hands go up—pastors and people who work in ministry not-for-profits.  Thankfully, by the end of the talk the same question typically brings a very different response!

Faithful leaders being stuck behind the Sacred/Secular Gap is not merely a lack of information; it is a stronghold. It is held in place by church vocabulary that can imply vocational ministry is more sacred than other callings; teaching that omits the full extent of God’s grand story from creation to restoration, and so misses the role of work and the workplace in God’s kingdom on earth; workplace habits and incentives that form people toward other ends; and spiritual resistance that seeks to keep the division intact.

Sadly, the church has often failed to teach the sacred nature of business and work.  Sometimes this is probably because the teachers have never been taught. Other times it is because Christian teaching has sometimes given too little attention to the Old Testament and the Bible’s grand narrative from creation to the coming of God’s Kingdom, choosing to focus on sin and salvation–what Dallas Willard calls a “Gospel of sin management” in which “transformation of life and character is no part of the redemptive message.”

This truncated Gospel is sometimes called a “Two-Part Gospel” because it comes from just the two middle parts of God’s grand four-part narrative (1-Creation, 2-Fall, 3-Redemption through Jesus, 4-Restoration of the Kingdom).  As we explored in detail in post #190 (“Leading Faithfully” Basics – First Things – Kingdom), a faithful leader can’t lead an organization with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing without understanding and embracing a BIGGER Gospel.

A Two-Part Gospel does not tell you WHY you are here, HOW you were made, or WHAT work (and business) and relationships represent in God’s design. While evangelism and serving those in need are unquestionably “good,” they are not enough to explain WHY work and business have intrinsic value in God’s Kingdom–they can get a leader over the Sunday/Monday Gap but are not enough to get a leader across the Sacred/Secular Gap.

Willard identifies two forms of what he calls a “Gospel of Sin Management” (which we see as related to the limitations of a “Two-Part Gospel”): a Gospel of the right (correct beliefs) which emphasizes evangelism and a Gospel of the left (correct actions) which emphasizes a social gospel of serving the less fortunate.

With a Two-Part Gospel of evangelism, it is hard to see how work (or business) can have faithful integrity unless it is explicitly evangelistic. With a Two-Part social gospel, it is hard to see how work (or business) can have faithful integrity unless it is “doing good” for the less fortunate.  In his book Surprised by Hope, N.T. Wright offers a scathing critique of these narrow views of the Gospel:

It’s no good falling back into the tired old split-level world where some people believe in evangelism in terms of saving souls for a timeless eternity and other people believe in mission in terms of working for justice, peace, and hope in the present world. That great divide has nothing to do with Jesus and the New Testament and everything to do with the silent enslavement of many Christians (both conservative and radical) to the Platonic ideology of the Enlightenment.

Historically, maintaining the Sacred/Secular Gap has also given the role of the clergy an “elevated” sacredness as a vocation—an implication we do not believe aligns with God’s view of work and business.

We believe even a fair amount of faith as usual theology espoused in the faith and work movement also leads to faithful leaders getting “stuck” behind the Sacred/Secular Gap by presenting faith/work integration as principally about using work and business as platforms for evangelism or social good.

Stuck Behind Knowing/Doing

Faithful leaders face two challenges in crossing the Knowing/Doing Gap.  First, the faith and work content that itself is stuck behind the Sacred/Secular Gap will likely only provide guidance on how to use work and business as platforms for the evangelism or social good.

Second, even faith/work content that recognizes the intrinsic Kingdom value of work and business can be challenging for a faithful leader to convert into transformative action.  For example:

• Content that is meant to be practical may not lay a sufficient Knowing foundation.

• Content that focuses only on the theology of faith/work integration may leave the leader stuck behind the Knowing/Doing Gap unequipped to put that theology into practice.

• Content based on a faithful leader’s story can be hard to apply to a different person, or in a different industry, or in a different region, or in a different organization, or at a different time in the organization’s development or as part of a different faith journey.

• Content in the form of generic practical checklists can lead to confusion, frustration, intimidation, just giving up, or worse. While they may feel “easy” to implement, in fact, they might call for action that would represent poor stewardship of a particular business.

• Content that consists of general principles (e.g., “Apply the Golden Rule”) avoids the checklist problems but will likely be difficult to apply practically without more context or understanding, particularly in the midst of leading the organization day to day.

Stuck Behind Safety/Surrender

We suspect the ability of a faithful leader to cross the Safety/Surrender Gap is primarily limited by a leadership principle often attributed to John Maxwell:

We cannot lead anyone farther than we have been ourselves.

A faithful leader can’t lead beyond their own personal faith.  They are unlikely to align an organizational culture with Biblical beliefs they do not hold, Biblical principles they haven’t embraced personally, and Biblical priorities that do not order their personal life.

If it is true that “we cannot lead anyone farther than we have been ourselves“, then a prerequisite to crossing the Safety/Surrender Gap is a faithful leader who has surrendered their life to God’s will.  Surrender is difficult and seemingly rare.

Understanding the sacred nature of work does not itself establish the personal surrender necessary to lead an organization across the Safety/Surrender Gap. If less than 10% of self-identifying Christians have crossed the Sacred/Secular Gap, evidence suggests a much smaller percentage have experienced that level of personal surrender.  Based on George Barna’s book Maximum Faith, it would seem the number might be less than 3% in the United States.  Barna laments:

The bottom line in God’s eyes is whether or not we love Him. Sadly, over the last thirty years my research has invariably revealed that we give God world-class lip service but we follow the whims of our minds and hearts.

Barna continues:

His goal for your life is that you cease to live for yourself. His best offer is for you to choose to live solely for Him, in which case He will guide your development in ways that maximize your potential. He wants you to define success according to your obedience to His will and pursuit of His vision for your life, rather than simply meeting the standards of the world — even the church world. . . . [T]rue spiritual transformation is impossible unless you become fully dependent upon God. Fully dependent.

Barna identifies “ten stops on the journey to wholeness”. The ones that matter for our purposes are Stop 5, Stop 6 and Stop 8.  Stop 5 means actively engaging in personal spiritual growth and a faith community and getting involved in things like Bible studies, fellowship groups, prayer groups, service projects, and mission trips.  Barna calls it being a “good Christian“.

Stop 8 is the level of personal transformation and Biblical faith in a leader that we believe aligns with crossing the Safety/Surrender Gap.  Barna labels Stop 8 as Choosing to Surrender and Submit Fully to God: Radical Dependence.

Sadly, Barna estimates, based on his research, that only 2% of people in the United States are at Stop 8 or beyond, and that was back in 2011 when he estimated that 80% of Americans identified as Christian! His research suggests that many Christians remain at the earlier stops rather than progressing toward surrender and deeper transformation. A major roadblock comes at Stop 6, when moving forward means confronting the brokenness of Stop 7.

Most believers who get to Stop 6 abandon the investigation once they realize the commitment and cost of moving forward on the journey to wholeness. Instead, they retreat to an earlier stop on the path and simply settle for what the local church and other spiritual entities have to offer. In the process they retain their good intentions but typically become either invisible or institutional “pillars.” In other words, rather than pay the price of a deeper relationship with God, they retreat to the shelter of the religious games that ensnare most churched people.

Until a faithful leader surrenders to God’s will–when they are still pursuing their will–the WHY that drives their organizational leadership will be more focused on being good, doing good, looking good and feeling good based on the standards of the world or their faith community.

We do not believe the faithful leaders who personally fall back to, or stop at, Stop 5 will cross the Safety/Surrender Gap in leading their organization.  They are likely to satisfy themselves with the “be good, do good, look good and feel good” comfort of the faith as usual Placebos we described in post #180 (“Leading Faithfully” Basics – The Stumbling Blocks of “Faith as Usual”), engaging in the unquestionably good faith activities along the faith as usual Side Roads we explored in post #181 (“Leading Faithfully” Basics – The “Side Road” Detours of “Faith as Usual”).

In the words of Ed Silvoso in his book Ekklesia:

The enemy of the “best” . . . .  is the “good”, because by being so satisfying, it deprives us of the hunger for the “much more” that in this case God has in store.

Crossing the Gaps

For a faithful leader to navigate crossing the “gaps”, it is helpful to understand what faith/work integration looks like at each of the “stuck” points as well as on the other side of the “gaps”.

Going back to Tozer’s comment about work being “ministry”, let’s look at three versions of “work” and “ministry”:

• Ministry AT Work: religious activities at the workplace that are not part of the work itself and not unique to the workplace. Work is the platform.

• Ministry THROUGH Work: religious or charitable activities unique to a workplace but not part of the work itself, such as a faith statement on a website, evangelism through customer materials, or profits given to Christian causes. Work is the vehicle.

• Ministry OF Work: the work itself as ministry, carried out according to God’s design and for His glory. The work itself is sacred.

Ministry AT Work.  Ministry AT work occurs when a person has crossed the Sunday/Monday Gap but may not have crossed the Sacred/Secular Gap.

Their ministry activities are deeds done AT their place of work, but they are not activities unique to their work, to their business, to their workplace or to workplaces in general.  When this is the limit of a person’s understanding, work and business are treated as secular platforms for sacred deeds. Based on the informal surveys described above, this is how “ministry” and “work” come together for 90% of Evangelical Christians.

Ministry AT work is bringing overtly “faithful” deeds and activities into the workplace.  For example, organizing Bible studies, prayer meetings and community service projects, wearing or displaying “faith” objects, hiring a corporate chaplain, praying for a co-worker or telling them about your faith.

Ministry AT work is not bad–it is “good”. The person’s WHY for their ministry deeds can be different from their WHY for work and business, because their ministry deeds and work/business activities are occurring on parallel tracks. The WHY for work and business may still be aligned with business as usual–to earn money or maximize profit.  The WHY for ministry deeds is probably to evangelize people (directly or indirectly) or to “do good”.

Ministry AT work can be inspired by a narrow “Gospel of sin management” with its focus on correct beliefs (evangelism) or correct actions (a social Gospel of helping the underserved). While these activities can also flow from a fuller understanding of the Gospel, the limitation arises when they are treated as the full extent of faithful work.

Ministry THROUGH Work.  Ministry THROUGH work is another ministry/work combination often stuck between the Sunday/Monday Gap and the Sacred/Secular Gap.

While ministry AT work is faith deeds done at the workplace in parallel with work and business (with work and business being the platforms), ministry THROUGH work is using work, business and the workplace as the secular vehicle for sacred activities that are unique to a workplace or business but not about the work itself. For example: including faith expressions in mission/value statements, on a company website, or in or on packaging; evangelizing employees, vendors or customers through work activities and materials; and donating profits or products to faith-based charities.

Like ministry AT work deeds, ministry THROUGH work deeds are “good”.  A business as usual WHY of maximizing profit can easily co-exist with ministry THROUGH work, because ministry THROUGH work is not about the work or business itself—it is about faith deeds that are facilitated by a work/business vehicle.  Those faith deeds only need a narrow Two-Part Gospel for inspiration.

Ministry OF Work.  We believe what Tozer is describing is ministry OF work.  Work and business activities are the faith activities because the work and business themselves are treated as sacred.  Ministry OF work requires crossing the Sacred/Secular Gap, but it does not necessarily require crossing the Safety/Surrender Gap.

A ministry OF work opens new possibilities for deeds that are part of “work/business” itself but also constitute “ministry”. (Tozer did not say “deeds” don’t matter—he said that the nature of the work does not matter, distinguishing vocational categories.)  For example, regardless of the type of work or business (CEO, banker, lawyer, shopkeeper, plumber, barista), deeds can be wrapped up in HOW you carry out the work and operate the business and WHO you are while working and leading.

It is understanding work as God’s creation and gift for living out Imago Dei, the Creation Mandate in Genesis 1:28 (be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, subdue it, and exercise dominion), the Golden Rule, and the commandments to love God and love your neighbor through the work itself, through the products and services it creates, and through the wealth it generates.

With ministry OF work, the WHY of ministry deeds aligns with the WHY of work and business deeds, because the work/business is the ministry and the ministry is the work/business.

The overt faith deeds of ministry AT work and ministry THROUGH work are not inconsistent with ministry OF work—they can all be occurring together.  But (unlike ministry AT work and ministry THROUGH work) ministry OF work can’t easily co-exist with a work or business WHY of Profit as Purpose—maximizing profit as the ultimate end—because that WHY can’t sustain the sacred ministry nature of the work and business.

They may co-exist until a faithful leader is forced to “realize the commitment and cost of moving forward on the journey”.  Crossing the Safety/Surrender Gap requires that profit be optimized as a means rather than maximized as an end.  The co-existence will be challenged when pursuing the sacred ministry of the work and business clashes with the WHY of Profit as Purpose. James Hunter warns:

To enact a vision of human flourishing based in the qualities of life that Jesus modeled will invariably challenge the given structures of the social order. In this light, there is no true leadership without putting at risk one’s time, wealth, reputation, and position.

Crossing the Safety/Surrender Gap to faithful stewardship requires radical surrender, which requires radical dependence, which requires radical trust, which is the manifestation of radical faith. In the words of Barna:

[God] wants you to define success according to your obedience to His will and pursuit of His vision for your life, rather than simply meeting the standards of the world — even the church world. . . . [T]rue spiritual transformation is impossible unless you become fully dependent upon God. Fully dependent.

The other side of the Safety/Surrender Gap is where good intentions transform into God’s intentions and where faithful leadership through faithful integrity truly begins to reflect God’s purpose for business and work.  If a faithful leader wants their organization to cross that gap, that journey must begin with their own heart.

The only WHY that can truly sustain work/business and ministry simultaneously—and the only WHY of a faithful leader who has truly crossed the Safety/Surrender Gap—is the ultimate purpose for which we were created—to glorify God.

PERSONAL NOTE (from PM): I have said this before, but it bears repeating. I do not like making statements about the teaching of the church and the faith/work movement that could be heard as critical or judgmental.  I don’t like making statements about faith/work practices that might offend people in the church and faith-work movement advocating and praising those practices.  But I don’t believe a faithful leader can aim for God’s “best” unless their mind is renewed about what it is and about the shortcomings of stopping at the “good,” That renewal includes understanding the importance of an organization’s WHY in the journey across the gaps from business as usual to business a better way in alignment with Biblical beliefs, principles and priorities. It also includes understanding the challenges of truly leading as a faithful steward in alignment with the will of God, choosing obedience over outcome, regardless of the personal cost.

That renewal begins with shining a light on the beliefs and practices that have left us feeling good about the “good”.  It is shining a light on teachings that can leave faithful, well-intentioned Christians comfortably sitting behind the Sacred/Secular and Safety/Surrender Gaps without even knowing they exist.  Integrous and Integriosity are for those who have been convicted by the Holy Spirit to want more. They are for those ready to move from personal faithfulness to organizational faithfulness (the topic of a future post).

ESSENCE: Leading with faithful integrity through business a better way toward Biblical flourishing requires getting across four “gaps”: Sunday/Monday, Sacred/Secular, Knowing/Doing and Safety/Surrender.  Unfortunately, because of business as usual pressure and faith as usual detours, many well-intentioned leaders get stuck. The first three are “wisdom” gaps, and the journey across those “gaps” starts with RENEW–renewing the faithful leader’s mind about God’s purpose for work and business, which reveals the sacred nature of work and business.  Moving across the three wisdom gaps of faith/work integration equips a faithful leader to see their role, their organization and all its people in a new light.  The fourth gap is a “heart” gap.  It is the most challenging and arguably the most important of all.  A faithful leader crosses the Safety/Surrender Gap when they have surrendered their leadership of an organization to God, recognizing God as the owner with the leader as merely a faithful steward. Crossing the Safety/Surrender Gap is a necessary step to transforming the heart of an organization to a bigger WHY aligned with God’s purpose for work and business, and that requires radical trust by a leader with a transformed heart. When the organization’s WHY is aligned with God’s WHY for work and business, the work/business becomes the faithful leader’s ministry and the faithful leader’s ministry becomes the work/business.

Copyright © 2026 Integrous LLC.  Integriosity is a registered Service Mark of Integrous LLC.

Photo Credit: Original image by Paul Michalski using Gemini
(photo cropped)