LIBERTY UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF DIVINITY
Assignment Title: Ethics in Christian and Church Settings
Course: CHMN 699 - Internship
Student: Kristine Sage
Date: January 29, 2022
Professor: Dr. Joel Breidenbaugh
INTRODUCTION
Ethics is about knowing and doing what is good or right, and workplace ethics is about
knowing and doing what is good or right at work. For the Christian, this means applying the
Bible and other resources of the Christian faith to help decide and do what is ethical or moral at
work. (In this article, “ethics” and “morality” are used interchangeably.)
Three general approaches to ethics have achieved widespread use both in Christian moral
thinking and in the world at large. The approaches are:
1. Command — What do the rules say is the right way to act?
2. Consequences — What actions are most likely to bring about the best outcome?
3. Character — What kind of moral person do I want to be or become?"[1]
What distinguishes Christian ethics is not that it uses different approaches, but that it
brings biblical values into each of these approaches. There are biblical commands (also called
principles), biblically desired outcomes and biblical character traits (also called virtues) that
Christians need to bring into their moral decisions, actions and development.
In developing a Christian ethic, we will consider what help the Bible provides for each of
these approaches. Then we’ll explore whether we might need to combine these three in some
way to give us a more balanced and integrated approach. Finally, we’ll consider how to live with
the reality that our world is fallen, or imperfect, and that there is almost never a perfect
solution.
We will be developing a Christian approach to ethics as applied to work, but we will not
attempt to give answers to major issues in workplace ethics. Instead, we will develop Christian
ethical principles and methods that readers can use to apply the principles to issues and cases.
At this point, we offer you the choice between two different presentations of these
approaches. Choose to read a narrative involving a real-life case study a more either or
systematic presentation of the different approaches. The systematic approach is briefer and
more abstract. The narrative approach is longer and applies the approaches to a real-life
situation faced by used car dealer Wayne Kirkland.
Command Approach
