Self-Deception in Business

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Introduction

When a preacher talks to businessmen, it is not uncommon to have the topic tend toward things like “learning to be generous,” or “maintaining a work/family balance,” or “don’t forget to tithe.” You have perhaps been exhorted this way before, and I think of Ambrose Bierce’s wonderful definition of exhort, viz. “to put the conscience of another on a spit and roast it to a nut-brown discomfort.” Let’s not do that.

And when businessmen tune out whenever a preacher talks to them, part of that reaction might be related to the weariness that comes to one who has spent too much time on the spit. Sure, but maybe it is not always the preacher’s fault. Sometimes businessmen like to think of themselves as “men of the world,” you know, street smart. And the preacher, they think, might understand systematic theology well enough, but he doesn’t understand how these margins are killing me. 

Another option for this talk, a good one that was suggested to me, was to speak with you about postmillennialism and the investing of talents. That really would be a good topic, and was tempting, and well worth the time, but alas, not this time.

That is because there is one subject that I have been mulling over for many years now, and as the years go by, the examples I have seen of this kind of thing have just continued to accumulate. I have seen multiple examples of this, time and again, from all around the country, and I have never seen it addressed anywhere. So here goes. Wish me luck.

When Everybody Associated with a New Venture is Excited

When a start-up is young, and the entrepreneurs involved are also young, and the investors are not yet cynical, they all of them think they are getting along because they are spiritual people, motivated by the milk of Christian kindness that is just sloshing around inside them. But the reason that everyone is getting along is that it is not yet apparent to them that they are betting with real money.

They are having a good time playing poker, and the joy of the game is great because they are betting with red and blue counters. Not only so, but the feeling of spiritual zest that they are experiencing is not the Holy Spirit at all, but rather a mixture of leaded gasoline, adrenaline and caffeine.

So the thing I want to address is what happens when it becomes apparent that real money is actually involved—either an opportunity for a huge upside or the dire prospect of a catastrophic down side. I cannot recollect how many times I have seen this thing happen, and then observed good conscientious Christians start to act like radical relativists, reinterpreting reality—whether they are dealing with the reality of contracts, plain scriptural requirements (like not suing a brother), misremembered conversations, off-kilter origin stories for the start-up narratives, disputes over whose idea it was, other obligations, and all the rest of it. I have seen lawsuits, I have seen fractured friendships, I have seen various forms of default, and all the rest of that.  

These people are not hardened liars, the kind of fraudulent types who go out to deceive, knowing that this is in fact what they are doing. But the problem is that when sweet Christians engage in this level of deception, it is absolutely essential that the first one to be deceived be themselves.

And this is why we should first take a look at what the Scriptures describe as the characteristics of self-deception. Remember how weird self-deception is. It occurs when one part of you tells a lie to another part of you . . . and you buy it. Not only do you buy it, but enough of the truth is peeking through so as to leave you culpable. But not so culpable that you have a full awareness of what is going on. You are guilty enough to be answerable to God, but not so guilty that you have trouble sleeping at night.     

Self-Deception Described

First, let’s consider a few general statements about self-deception. A few sober observations from Scripture should steady us up a bit. 

This should make every humble Christian budget for the possibility that what you think is going on around you is not actually not going on around you. Even the apostle Paul held this possibility up on an open palm before the Lord.

Second, self-deception arises from egotism—thinking more of yourself than you ought to.

Third, self-deception comes in when we neglect application of the Scriptures that we are being taught.

Fourth, when we trust in the ongoing narrative that we tell ourselves about our behavior, and that narrative is justifying sin, we deceive ourselves.

Fifth, when a man simply takes his ideas of best practices from the world, without holding it up against the template of Scripture, he is deceiving himself. He assumes that he knows the ropes, but the ropes that he learned in business school were all pagan ropes, with pagan assumptions.  

Now let’s put all these into one paragraph, draping the description over the shoulders of one man. He has not reckoned on his own fallenness; he flatters himself intellectually; he does not look for places to apply what he learns in Scripture; he tells himself a narrative that casually makes his adversaries the bad guys; he allows the world to shape his understanding of the world, instead of having the Word do it (Rom. 12:1-2).

Successful Business Type Guy

If we take a clinical look at these things, we should see right off that type of men who are likely to get ahead in business are also likely to be extremely susceptible to this kind of thing. He is an alpha, and not full of self-questioning. He is a natural leader, and so it is easy to assume that the other people following him are some kind of validation. A confident personality, he does not feel the need to turn to Scripture for direction. And so we have the set up for the old joke about how you can always tell a Harvard man, but you can’t tell him much.  

A Handful of Scenarios

When it comes to self-deception and self-justification, there are as many twists and turns in all the various situations as there are twists and turns in the human heart. But with that said, here are some common ones.

Remember Upton Sinclair’s wise observation—“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”

Being Double-tongued

This happens when stories change over time, and change according to circumstances. The story that the proverb addresses directly has to do with the value of the thing you bought—whether a vase at an antique shop, or an undervalued company. But truth doesn’t change according to the day, or the weather, or the person you are talking with. Were you really let go for that reason? Has your resume benefitted from some of these shifting stories?

Preferring a Loss to Your Testimony Over a Loss to Your Wallet

A man agrees to go to work for Company A, signs the agreement, and three days later Company B offers him a much better deal. Instead of immediately thinking of Psalm 15, the man starts reasoning to himself that the second offer was “providential,” or so it seems to him. His wife agrees—and so he breaks his word in order to work with “providence.”

A Willingness to Rip Off People You Think Can Afford It

The standard is plain. We are not to fear the great, and we are not to fudge on behalf of the small. I have unfortunately seen a common consensus among Christians that measures justice according to the impact it will have instead of according to the facts of the case. There have been periods in church history where grinding the poor was the big problem, but the big problem in our era is envying the rich, and deciding disputes accordingly.

A Willingness to Have Unbelievers Adjudicate Between Christians  

Please note that the issue is not a civil magistrate adjudicating between two believers. That would be fine—if the country were Christian, and the civil judge were a Christian himself. The issue is hauling a dispute about justice before someone who is an unbeliever, and has no ground for understanding justice at all. As far as Paul is concerned, it would be better to lose your shirt than to have the church go through that embarrassment.

A Few Closing Comments, in a Pauline Vein

By “Pauline vein,” I mean something like “I am out of my mind to talk like this,” right before going on to a unique kind of scriptural humblebrag. You know, the kind of humblebrag that is not conceited or silly. I am a pastor and a writer, addressing a group of businessmen and entrepreneurs, and I know that it would be easy for folks in your position to think something like, “this man is probably to be trusted if the subject is the book of Romans,” or perhaps “on the education of third-graders,” but—you hasten to add to yourselves—“he is no businessman.” Why should we listen to this, especially when he is so unrealistic as to tell us to lose money the way he just did?

Now there is an important sense in which this is quite true. I am no businessman. But by the goodness and grace of God, I have founded four multi-million-dollar enterprises, have built a church and started a denomination, and have worked through countless hours of board meetings, not excluding their endless stream of financial reports. In short, not only have I been on the fifty-yard line, I have had season tickets on the fifty-yard line for about four decades. I am no businessman, but I have been a close observer of businesses and businessmen for lo, these many years. And I can see things that many experienced men of business for some reason cannot see. As Paul put it, in a paraphrase, “By the grace of God I am what I am: and I know a trick or two” (1 Cor. 15:10).

And so I offer these observations for your prayerful consideration.