Every Good Endeavor By Timothy Keller: Summary

In his book Every Good Endeavor, Timothy Keller seeks to reimagine and rekindle the idea of “connecting your work to God’s work” by examining God’s original design for work, identifying the main effects of sin on work, and then offering a glimpse into how Christians may work in light of the Gospel. Furthermore, throughout his three sections, Keller presents Christians not only with a reminder of work’s original dignity and importance but also with a reminder of how the Gospel should affect every aspect of our lives and our being, as we were saved by grace, through faith, but were also “created in Christ Jesus for good works, which he has set ahead of time for us to do (Ephesians 2:8-10).” Overall, Keller’s Every Good Endeavor encourages Christians

Further, Keller emphasizes that work as God designed sets humans apart from the rest of creation, and that certain types of work are not better or more sophisticated than others in God’s eyes (Keller 48-49). Keller also reminds his readers that work is meant to be cultivation, or culture making, as seen in the Cultural Mandate in the first chapter of Genesis, and is not only to be service to God but also to other people through love and through what Keller calls the “ministry of competency (76-80).” As Keller moves to his second section, called “Our Problems with Work,” he identifies and analyzes the ways sin has affected our view and response to work. For example, Keller first explains that work, affected by sin, becomes fruitless, meaning sin affects every aspect of personal and public life, and even of both secular and “sacred” spaces (86,89). Moreover, Keller states that as a result of sin, “we will be able to envision far more than we can ever accomplish” and the experience of work itself will be one of strife