My work is my service

Do you see a man skilled in his work?
He will serve before kings;
he will not serve before obscure men.
Proverbs 22:29

I not so humbly confess to applying this little proverb to myself. God being the royal one, me being the skilled on. Boasting? I think not, and show me where in the Bible demeaning oneself is encouraged. On the other hand, it tells us to use our gifts wisely, and strive and struggle and endure. To work. An absolute prerequisite to me doing my job is self-consciousness, that I claim knowledge and know-how in my profession. No one else is likely to do it for me, rather it´s a common tactic in negotiations and other social games to belittle your opponent. If I let that get to me, those things I´m set as an architect to defend and safeguard will suffer. Hail banality and ugliness!

Through Adam labour is divinely appointed and part of the human condition, just as the labour of Eve. Not always glamorous, but it needs be done none the less. There is a deep fulfillment in store for anyone who choose to take this seriously, a lifetime in the coal mine for those who see it as wage slavery and a mere interruption of leisure.

There are doubts of course. There are, God knows, days when it seems absolutely obvious I´m serving nothing but superficiality and speculative commercial interest. The question whether my labour bears good fruit is highly relevant and can´t be brushed aside. Not all work is good work. Some destroy the worker, body and soul, some destroy this world we live in or our fellow man. Some work is more pointless than digging a pit and filling it up again. What I deal with as an architect is giving aesthetical form to practical realities. Humans have in effect transcended the natural godgiven environment. We have become dependent on artificial environments, co-creators with God. It may sound like hybris, but that´s the way things are nowadays. As an architect my job is to see to it that man´s creation strives for the same qualities as God´s: order, complexity, beauty and power. This is of course impossible given man´s present condition. Try achieving order when disobedience rules the day, complexity when stubborn and lazy single-mindedness abounds, beauty when image is advertising and mind-meddling, power when half the population glorifies sheer force and the other half has a serious authority problem.

Everytime I see a beautiful church or a luscious garden or the ultimate work of art, a vibrant city, I´m inspired to get at it again, this Mission Impossible. Some degree of success is clearly possible. I also know that we humans will more and more make this earth our own, leave our marks everywhere. And a world without beauty is a foretaste of hell, a world where beauty still glimmer gives a taste for heaven. I believe all beauty is in the end a witness to the glory of God. And at the other end, ugliness and banality does violence against the human soul, giving the idea that we´re as crappy as our surroundings. We´re not, we´re meant to inhabit the heavenly Jerusalem, where God is the architect, hence my colleague! If the work is good enough for him, it´s good enough for me...

Soul sale

- everything must go

Nothing was delivered
and I tell this truth to you
not out of spite nor anger
but simply because it´s true

Now I hope you won´t object to giving
giving back all of what you owe
the fewer words you have to waste on this
the sooner you can go
“Nothing was delivered”, B Dylan

Modern advertising is all about flattering the consumer, rather than the product. For we both know that it´s the stuff we don´t need, that are in need of advertising. Modern advertising is the friend you don´t need and barely stand, but who flatters your vanity.

What´s the problem? If we ignore the obvious economic and ecological disaster? That we become dependant upon lies, that we base our selfesteem on illusions. I shop, therefore I am; I am a consumer, advertising produces me. A sports car makes me a racing driver, an aeroplane ticket a vagabond. Applauses from government and das Kapital.

All this is easily said, yet how do I live it or not live it? I have dreams of how my apartment becomes The Apartment, and that will require cash and perhaps even a small investment of my soul into the whole project. I travel, is that to meet friends and “broaden my mind”, or simply a status symbol and topic of conversation at work and parties? Consuming is not in itself suspect, not any more so than producing. The early economists had a tendency to consider production the moral part of economy, consumption the immoral, but this is clearly absurd. The only measure I can think of is that of Jesus, if it was your beloved friend who bought the couch or took a trip to Rio, would you be happy for him or feel envy? Or be afraid he´d gone materialistic?

Heard of zeitgeist? That means “spirit of the times”, and there´s no need to feel embarrased if you´re unfamiliar with the concept, it was thrown on the garbage heap of philosophy a long time ago, along with the German system builders who conceived it. But let´s salvage it just for this occasion, and while we´re probing around in the trash let´s pick up some evil as well. I mean, evil as a real and present menace to human existence. Let´s ask, what is the evil at work in our time? I´ll wager on consumerism. Not the empowerment of the consumer, if any, but the simultaneous seduction of the consumer and producer. Meaning, advertising manipulates the buyer, focus groups and consumer polls the maker. Through this, one could destroy the natural environment and waste precious resources on bogus needs. One could destroy the cultural fabric of human societies by making them sellable and marketable rather than livable (can be seen in the tourist resort of your choice). One could pervert the church into falling into the spiritual marketplace, selling ideas and rituals designed for maximum demand, rather than simply handing onwards what it has been given by grace. One could kill a soul by turning it into a commodity, given a price by external valuation (switch on your telly and most likely it´s being done on Big Brother).

If I was one of the lesser demons, and a bit lazy, that´s certainly the way I´d go about killing, destroying and maiming God´s creation in one neat blow. Blatant manipulation and deception under the guise of freedom...

Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience:...
That in the ages to come [God] might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
Ephesians 2:2,7