God’s Fingerprint
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My wife is an artist. She makes mosaics, using cut or broken pieces of stone and glass to create beautiful works of art, full of color, texture and motion. I can see the fingerprint of God on what she does. He is the creator, making astoundingly beautiful things. Mosaic art is a great representation of His heart for taking broken things in people and situations and putting them together to create beauty. God is an artist.
A friend of mine is a doctor. I can see the imprint of God on what she does – a healer with endless compassion. Another friend is an author. I can see the mark of God on what he does – communicating complexity and resolution through narrative. Another friend works in government. I can see God in what he does – effectively administering justice and serving the people under his authority. The same could be said of parents, musicians, farmers, teachers, and all sorts of people. They carry a piece of God’s heart in what they do.
So, I was asking Jesus the other day, “If God is an artist, doctor and author, is he also a business person?” I know he loves business people (He loves everyone), but is there some part of Him that actually is a business person? If so, maybe I should connect with that part of His essence to be better at what I do.
I discovered a while back that He loves to answer my real questions, and He is beginning to answer this one. The point that I came to was a better understanding of how God is a business person, and I got there by asking Him what a business person actually does.
He was happy to show me a whole bunch of places in the Bible where He was a business partner with someone. For instance, Abraham was not just a herdsman, but ran a large agricultural empire. In many of the examples of Godly business people in the Bible, there was a common outcome – blessing other people. Abraham is a great example of this. In Genesis 12:2, God tells Abraham that He will bless Abraham and make his name great, so Abraham will be a blessing to others. The point of Abraham’s vast business empire was not to get rich, but to bless others.
So, what is God’s fingerprint on business people? There are probably many of them, but one that I think is significant is that we do what we do in order to bless other people. We bless them by creating jobs, supporting families, gaining financial security and teaching them the importance of honoring people. Business – like the Kingdom of God – is built by building people to accomplish a greater vision. That’s what God does with all of us, and it’s His fingerprint on each of us. I came to understand that in addition to being an artist, doctor and author, God is also a business person.
For me, the implication of this is that doing business from a Kingdom perspective is not just inviting God into our day to day work lives, it is much greater than that. It’s not about what we are supposed to do, but about who He actually is, and how that mark of heaven is seen in us. When we do this well, we are not operating from our identity, but from His identity.
Now that’s a good day at work.
GK
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Gary Klopfenstein is a highly successful business executive with over 30 years’ experience in asset management, strategic consulting and leadership development. His specific areas of expertise are in the design and implementation of investment strategies, across both traditional and alternative investment classes, investment research, client acquisition, business growth and catalytic leadership development. Gary has a wealth of global expertise including successful client relationships in the U.S., Canada, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Australia.
Gary is Chairman of GK Investment Management, a private asset management company established as a family office. In previous roles Gary has served as Chief Executive Officer and member of the Board of Directors of Berenberg Asset Management, the U.S. asset management arm of a 400-year-old German financial institution, and as Senior Managing Director, member of the Board of Directors and Head of Direct Alternative Investment Strategies for Mesirow Financial, a Chicago based diversified financial services firm. Gary was responsible for growing the business from $1 billion to $60 billion in less than ten years.
He has written one book, Trading Currency Cross Rates, and edited two others, FX: Managing Global Currency Risk and Strategic Trading in the Foreign Exchange Markets. Gary is a frequent speaker at conferences and a regular publisher of thought leading papers for global publications. He is considered to be one of the industry founders of the specialist management of global currency risk.
Gary and his wife Candice live in Chicago, have been married for over thirty years and have two adult children.