Authentic Passion 4 "Work" Series

AUTHENTIC PASSION 4

“Work”

TEXT: 1 Corinthians 3:1-13 Main: 5-13 Key Verse: 9

INTRO: This morning we are continuing our Series “Authentic Passion. This series is based on the 4 passions that a Christian should have in there lives. Authentic Passion4: Worship, Word, Work, & World. As a Christian we are marked by our passion… Our Passion for God. People are always looking and observing us. This morning we want to continue our series by looking at:

“Having Authentic Passion 4 Work”

I made a statement last week and I have since posted on Facebook and twitted it on Twitter: That is…

”If you are working for God then you tend to live and do things in your own strength, but if you are working with God (Partnering with), you are not-relying on your own strength but on His strength and resources.

Let me Explain:

I would rather work with God then for God.! Why in this world would I want to do, design, build, or create anything without consulting God in the planning and doing of not mine, not His, but OUR work together. I work with Him and he uses the creativity and innovation that He has given me before I was ever born to complete any work that needs to be done.

God gives us an example of us partnering with him in 1 Cor. 3: 1-13 but I want to major on vs. 5-13 We READ...

5 Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers through whom you believed, as the Lord gave to each one? 6 I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. 7 So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase. 8 Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor. 9 For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, you are God’s building. 10 According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. 11 For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, 13 each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is.

Our Key Verse if you don't get anything else this morning is vs. 9 We Are Gods Fellow Workers... We are His partners... We are to work with God not for Him.

Then in verse 13, Paul say's that every man’s WORK will become clear..or made Manifest... This word Work here means labor, something that is done with determination... A lot of times we start out to work for God and we fail because we do it in our own strength and so there is no determination to finish on our part.

The reason for this is because we labor or work for the wrong reason. John 6:27 Says, “Labor not for the meat which perisheth.” We work for personal gain… and often we get so consumed with making money that we don’t see the harm that working only for me, myself, and I causes.

This is we as Christians we don’t work for those things. Sure we have to work but we also know that God is our source.

(ILL) It amazes me that some people will work everyday of the week not because they have too but because there is fear they don't have enough, or that the company will suffer. Case in point… we got employees at Perdue who work all week from 7 or 8 in the morning and then go home late and still work from home on there laptops. This boggles my mind, and they wonder why there families are falling apart, or that the marriage is failing. I said to my boss Friday, have a great non-working for Perdue weekend. He said he would try.

The point is you have to know when to shut the machine down, turn it off and go home. I have said it before Ministry/Working is a never ending thing. You always have one more call to make, email to send, one more appointment…. But at sometime you have got to turn it off and STOP! Stop thinking about the machine. God said to the Hebrews you shall work for 6 days and on the 7th day you shall rest. Hello!!! Even God took a day of rest from work in Genesis when it says on the 7th day of creation God rested.