Scriptural stewardship: A conceptual framework for teaching ethics in agriculture

ABSTRACT Stewardship refers to the management of resources belonging to another. Based on three parables of Jesus, we find that in general, stewardship requires that managers address the competing demands of physical resources, subordinate laborers, clientele, and personal interests. We present a conceptual framework to guide consideration and discussion of the issue of balancing competing demands. This framework can provide an operational model to qualitatively or quantitatively assess a manager's stewardship profile. Finally, ethical decision‐making based on the concept of stewardship requires attention to the question of ownership of the resources, and we present our analysis and conclusions on that issue.