INTRODUCTION
In this series we are trying to discover what the Bible says about work: how does God view work, how should we view work, and what place should work have in our life, etc.? We want to get answers to some practical questions about work: do we have the right job, how to we mix faith on the job, what does God expect about the way we work, and so forth.
We’re in the beginning phases of exploring this subject. We are trying to discover the most basic things the Bible says about work.
Last week we began by verifying the fact that God and work belong together. God belongs at work. For this reason we can’t live a life in which we are workers part of the week, and Christians the rest. Our faith and our work are to go together. God belongs at our work and with us when we go to work.
Review:
God and work go together.
Work is part of God’s plan for our life.
All of life is to be one integrated whole.
This week we want to expand on the personal part of this, specifically the second item in last week’s outline. I hope by the end of today’s message that you will have a fresh appreciation for the fact that you and I need to work, that work is an important part of God’s design for our lives, that work is valuable to us on its own, and that there is a right perspective on work we can adopt.
Today: You and I @ Work
You and I .
You and I need a perspective on work.
I. You and I
Four reasons this is true:
1. We were
We are made in God’s image: as
Genesis 1:26-27
Even just a momentary glance at the creation story tells us that work was meant to be in our DNA from the outset—God called humanity to fill the earth and subdue it.
We’ve been given that are not needed just for eating, sleeping, and preserving the species.
Psalm 139:14
Psalm 144:1
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
2. The world God gave us
The world needs work to make it and inhabitable.
Genesis 1:28
Genesis 2:15
Genesis does not present the creation as a finished product, wrapped up with a big red bow and handed over to the creatures to keep it exactly as originally created. It is not a one-time production. Indeed, for the creation to stay just as God originally created it would constitute a failure of the divine design. From God’s perspective, the world needs work; development and change are what God intends for it, and God enlists human beings (and other creatures) to that end. From another angle, God did not exhaust the divine creativity in the first week of the world; God continues to create and uses creatures in a vocation that involves the becoming of creation.
3. Work is
Work has value in and of itself. Without producing anything work does some things that are useful for us. Here are some of them.
Work us
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work us
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work involves us
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work us
Ecclesiastes 2:10
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Matthew 25:20–21
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work provides a sense of
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work helps us have good
Ecclesiastes 5:12
Here are a of these benefits that work can provide:
(MULTILINE)
Of course our work and working conditions can challenge good mental health. In such a situation those of us in Christ have resources that non-Christians don’t have that allow us to experience God’s comfort, His peace, and His hope. Long-term mental health can be a reason to look for other work, but even in challenging situations, believers can still gain many of the mental health benefits of work.
Work gives us opportunities to bring and to be for Christ.
Matthew 5:16
1 Peter 3:15
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
4. Work for us
Work provides for
Proverbs 28:19
Work provides for
1 Timothy 5:8
Work provides something we can
Ephesians 4:28
Acts 20:35
Review: You and I need work
Four reasons we should believe this:
1. We were designed for it
2. The world God gave us requires it
3. Work is good for us
4. Work provides for us
II. You and I need a perspective on work.
Work is a not a secular activity.
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work is one of God’s to us.
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work is to us becoming the person God wants us to be.
Ephesians 2:10
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Work is part of being , of following Jesus
Mark 1:17
Ephesians 4:11–13
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Our work now will someday be a part of
1 Corinthians 3:12–15 (NASB95)
Matthew 25:21 (NASB95)
(MULTILINE REVEAL TINY)
Review: You and I @ Work
You and I need work.
You and I need the right perspective on work.
Application
I will for allowing me to work.
I will let God into what he wants me to be through work.
I will work in ways that him and bring to him.
I will for my coworkers and look for ways God wants to use me to bring others at work to .