One thing everyone of us has in common is the desire to feel we have accomplished a job well. This applies in our church life, in our home life and in our life at work.
Different jobs suit different people of course- we all have differing abilities. I know for me that one kind of job I am definitely NOT called into is anything involving fixing things in the house. People say that for me DIY means Destroy It yourself.
But recently, even I experienced something of the satisfaction that comes from knowing you have achieved a job and done it well! I fitted a doorbell! The first time someone came to the door I am sure they were thinking "O well, here I am at the door of the Warnock’s house this means only one thing there will not be a doorbell so I will have to knock, and knock then eventually get my mobile phone out and RING them if I want in but no, whats this a doorbell? DO I dare touch it? What if Adrian fixed it? Will I get electrocuted? So, trembling, I take my life into my hands and wonder of wonders IT WORKED!!!!
I actually did it! OK, OK so it was only one you plug into the mains plug and stick on using a sticky tape but I still got a RUSH I kept pressing it thinking "I did that!"
Mind you, we did have a few noisy people round this week and when someone turned up late no one heard the bell so the trusty mobile phone came in handy nonetheless ..
Which of us doesn’t know that "rush" of thinking "I did it" . "I achieved what I set out to do"
Perhaps at church someone says a simple "thank you" to us and we suddenly realise they meant it and the thing we just did really helped that person! Perhaps at home we get called into school one day and fearfully go thinking "o no my kid must have misbehaved" then when we get there we hear they are doing well and we think "thank goodness!" Perhaps in the workplace we clinch a deal and get that promotion we have been waiting for!
Work is good, God intended us to have that kind of relationship with it!
Todays talk is called "Entrusted with a job". This is because I want us to remember that God has given us ALL a job to do. We have an employer that goes beyond our earthly employer. God has a unique roll for each of us in work, church, family that HE has assigned to us. He has a series of hats for us to wear and has entrusted us with each of them I am a preacher, father, husband, friend, employee, at times employer, and so the list goes on. Each hat represents a job, and each hat has been ENTRUSTED to me by God!
Todays talk will apply as I say to the three main aspects of our lives that each of us will have a part to play in work, church, family
But, there are two sides to our relationship with the jobs that we have been given for some of us, we can especially if we feel we are being successful become addicted to work. We drive ourselves harder and harder either just in one area of our lives so that the other areass suffer or perhaps even more seriously we try and drive ourselves too hard in ALL THREE areas and we are the ones who suffer.
They say that the workaholic is very similar to the alcoholic- he or she just doesn’t know when to STOP!
The trouble is, by the end of our lives will we feel we have accomplished much? When you hear the word "job" we obviously tend to think of the workplace and I will speak about that but clearly a sense of having a "job to do" is not exclusive to our paid work.
In us we have a sense that we have been put on earth for a reason. Somehow the 9-5 (or 7-7!) doesn’t satisfy. "Eat-work-sleep-eat-work-sleep-eat-work-party-sleep" Doesn’t fulfil on our death beds do any of us think we will say "Gee, I wish I had spent more time at the office!"
This is a valuable thought, but can lead us to the first of several misakes we can make about work whether we mean our work for God in workplace church or home our drive to work and work well sometimes is defeated by another job we have which is a drive to leisure and to be lazy!
Wrong thinking WHEN THINKING ABOUT THE JOB GOD HAS CALLED US TO FULFILL
" It doesn’t really matter I am on my way to heaven aren’t I why all this talk about working and a job for me to fulfil? Lets take it EASY and just cruise through life!"
Many Christians think something like this "don’t talk to me about me having a job to do I am just happy to be saved and I plan on coasting my way to heaven I don’t want to get too serious"
It’s a a bit like driving down a hill and turning off the ignition allowing the car to just roll this is all well and good until you get to the bottom and realise that the power assisted brakes and steering are not working! We should never do ANYTHING passively!
I want us to turn first of all this morning to a passage that will shake us out of our complacency and make us realise that it DOES matter what we do with the rest of our lives once we have become a Christian. There is a job for each of us to perform in Gods church and one day we will be asked to give an account for how we did that job.
1 cor 3.9-13 1 " For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.
According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. 11 For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw 13 each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. 14 If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.
How you are building your own life, and the life of Gods church will have eternal consequences. Do we want to be one who gets there "as though through fire"?
Like so many passages, the above is intensely community focussed. The foundation of Jesus is laid in the lives of individuals who form a family, the church and EVERYONE needs to be careful how they build on it and I am convinced this means in individuals and in the church.
These words should make us sit up and take notice what work does God have for us to do?
FOR THE CHRISTIAN THIS MEANS WE THINK WE HAVE ESCAPED, and WE HAVE INDEED ESCAPED JUDGEMENT, but we have NOT escaped ACCONTABILITY.
HOW MUCH MORE SCARY TO FACE GOD WITHOUT THE COVER OF JESUS TO MAKE SURE WE ARE SAVED? DO YOU HAVE THE FOUNDATION OF JESUS LAID IN YOUR LIFE? IF NOT YOU CAN HAVE IT LAID TODAY!
By now, we should recognise that this passage is speaking about stewardship even though the word itself isn’t mentioned- we know this because of the mention of an accountability for the work being undertaken- just like any builder we engage, God has a plan that he entrusts to us to carry out and will ask one day "Did you do it?"
Sometimes, we have a tendency to settle for a lower level than we need to. I am increasingly convinced that God would have us aim for an ever increasing effectiveness in the work we do in the workplace, Church, and our family
God wants us in this passage to be CAREFUL are we CAREFUL when we are at work or slapdash? Are we CAREFUL in the church or do we think "ah they will understand if I don’t volunteer for a job" I will just turn up each week isn’t that enough- or at home when we let our masks slip off and our family sees the real us too tired to make any effort at all! God says BE CAREFUL.
Diligence and focus are values that we rarely see modelled in todays culture most of you will have heard of Apple computers who hasn’t- its interesting to see the level of focus and commitment their founder brings to the job of selling computers, ipods etc- they just sold their BILLIONTH song for download!
It is said of Steve Jobs of Apple that when he does a presentation at a product launch " he brings the combined energy and talent of all those people and many more back in Cupertino, California, and channels it to the audience. It makes me think of a magnifying glass used to focus the power of the sun on one small spot until it bursts into flames." And "The team and I spent hundreds of hours preparing for a segment that lasted about five minutes."
LETS BE FOCUSSED if they can be that focussed about PCs, cant we give us much energy to training ourselves so that we will be ready for that 30 second opportunity to share the gospel at work , or to lead worship in small group, or demonstrate a Godly character at home,
Lets use the opportunities we have well is this excessive? I don’t believe so!
Bunyon "I preached as a man in chains to men in chains"
What is true of Christian preaching, should be true of every aspect of the Christians approach to our job of work whatever that might be. We live as a steward not wanting to WASTE the vocation God has given us.
The story is told of a man working in a stone quarry, carving out great blocks of stone. "what are you doing?" he is asked "I am building a great cathedral" he replied
One of our problems as Christians is that we often miss the great sense of purpose and fulfilment God wants us to have in our lives as we forget that we have been entrusted with a job to do by God and that job is a vital part of his great purposes.
WRONG THINKING No 1 " It doesn’t really matter I am on my way to heaven aren’t I why all this talk about working and a job for me to fulfil? Lets take it EASY and just cruise through life!"
Right THINKING BE DILIGENT - the Test by FIRE is coming!
WRONG THINKING NUMBER TWO
"Don’t add to my busy life. All I can do is keep my head above water All that stuff about working for God just applies to the leaders- its for THEM to do the work of the church"
NO, leaders exist to help US do the ministry to help US to do the work of the church. We ALL have a part to play so that the church can be built up and that part is not just about Sunday church, but also what we do in our home and workplaces.
Where is the church at 8am on a Monday morning- we don’t leave a building behind that people can point to and say "theres jubilee church". There answer is Jubilee church is on the underground going to the office, in a lecture room, getting the kids ready for school.
The wonder is that the REAL work of the Church starts the moment we LEAVE this room! God has a job for us a community of people to make an impact in the whole AREA in which we live and work!
THE MAIN MINISTRY OF JUBILEE CHURCH HAPPENS OUT THERE IN THE WORLD
It is possible to have in our minds a wrong divide between the leaders and the rest of us the truth is we ALL have a job to do, and the leaders do not exist to do the job they exist to help us to do it back out there in our workplaces and in our families!
EPH 4:11-16 " And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, [1] 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, [2] to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love."
These leaders will exist throughout church history until we are all mature and perfect what do they do? Notice that the answer is different things our leadership teams show us the simple fact that God has a different job for us all- but notice the thing they have in common- they exist NOT to do the job of the church but to EQUIP us to do the work of the church.
Incidently, for the theolgians among you- the rest of the passage makes it clear that these ministries will only disappear when we are all perfect and mature so until such a day we go on needing ALL of these as we shall go on to see!
A Pastor loves Christians and teaches US how to do the same. The key word to understand the pastor is simply the word LOVE. We learn from the pastor how to care. SO the pastor help us learn how to care for one another we will only be a caring church if we ALL care thank God that we DO experience the love of God expressed through his people here but ask yourself today is there a way that I can better love and care for my brothers and sisters? Why not volunteer for one of our practical care teams hospitality, welcome, integration?
But its not just about the church- what about the workplace on a Monday morning if we can show them how to LOVE we will have done an amazing thing so MANY people are lonely and cry out for any kind of community indeed if our family life reflects this love how can our neighbours and friends not notice?
But, we cannot focus simply on loving one another and sorting out all the problems in our lives or we become an exclusive club and impossible to join, and is incredibly inward looking- spending our lives in an endless pity party looking at each others tummy buttons!
A Teacher loves books and teaches us about the bible. The key word to describe a teacher is of course the word LEARN The bible gives us principles to live our lives by. The teacher helps us to learn about God in order that we can teach others what can I do to pass on what you have heard? Perrhaps children in Sunday school, perhaps leading word in small group, perhaps helping on the next alpha course?
But again, its not just about what we do in the church. Out there in the workplace we should take the principles the teacher has taught us with us and therefore we will know how to live and if they ask us " how come you are so wise?" lets have an answer ready! But of course a church which only loves books will be more like a bible school than a community, and merely being able to have all the answers for someone’s arguments will not win the person over! God has not called us to argue people into the kingdom.
A Prophet loves God and teaches us how to KNOW Him in worship and prayer. The key word is the word KNOW in an experiential sense! A prophet raises our hopes, gives us visions that seem utterly unattainable but nonetheless inspire us and encourage us. The Prophet teaches us to know God through prayer and worship and exercise of the Spiritual gifts. They go around putting hope into us. How can I be a more prophetic Christian? How can I put myself in the place where God can fill me with his Spirit so that I can go and exercise these gifts for the benefit of others and yes, scarey thought just maybe we can exercise these gifts out there in the world?
We should leave the presence of a prophet feeling 10 feet tall and almost FLOAT home to our families and into work! But again, a church which only loves God may be of little use on earth, and may at times be offensive for the sake of being offensive!
An Apostle loves the Church He strategizes and leads us into serving in the best way the purposes of God. The word SERVE is key to understanding the apostle. The apostolic leader puts the whole picture together he can see clearly both the vision of the prophet of where we should be , and the problems of the people that the pastor sees only too clearly and says "This is where we are, This is where we are going, and This is the next step", The key word here is actually SERVING the purposes of God, and the apostolic leader will almost instinctively know how best to use the unique talents God has given us . But even for the apostolic ministry the focus is always on the " out there" and the " making an impact" and as we grow a big church we are doing it to change whole office blocks, whole schools, whole neighbourhoods .
The Apostle helps us to have a big picture of the purpose of God for the church today . How can I allow myself to catch the vision of Jubilee and see how the work I do at church, home and work fits into that global purpose? How do I need to SERVE Gods purpose and the vision for this church here, in my workplace and at home?
Very rarely we see a great leader who has some of the charisma and wisdom of the apostle out there in the workplace they are like GOLD-DUST and can change the value of the stock of a company overnight just by sneezing!
An Evangelist loves non-Christians for him the key word is simply GROW. HE will provoke and train us to be out there in our neighborhoods and workplaces TELLING PEOPLE ABOUT JESUS and inviting them in. The Evangelist helps us to learn how to welcome non-christians and share the gospel with them. What can I do to better share the gospel eg making sure I have some church cards in my wallet, praying for opportunities to invite, tell my story or share that "God made us for a purpose, we turned away from that and learnt to hate God and live for ourselves. Jesus came to die for us and take our guilt so that we could be forgiven and fulfil the purpose God had made us for" Knowing someone like this sure does wonders for your boldness and courage to actually DO the job God has called us to do.
Of course, as vital as this is a church which only loves the non-Christian will soon become a rather unpleasant place to be, where you are valued only for the number of people you bring there. But boy,
OUR PRIMARY PLACE OF MINISTRY IS NOT THE CINEMA OR EVEN THE PREMIER BAR, IT IS INSTEAD IN OUR FAMILIES AND IN OUR WORKPLACES ALL OUR MEETINGS, OUR LEADERS ALL EXIST TO HELP US BE PREPARED TO GO OUT THERE AND FULFIL OUR MINISTRY!!!
Leaders inspire and motivate us actually this can even be true in the workplace. It is well known that there are some individuals who can inspire loyalty and high performance in the teams they lead at work. The challenge is of course for us to learn to follow our leaders even when they are NOT the most inspiring! Both in church AND in the workplace
Romans 13:1 "There is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God".
That verse is one to learn for everyone who has ever been frustrated by bad management at work! Are you part of the problem or part of the solution? Become part of the solution by fulfilling YOUR place in the chain of command both at work, church and home .
Don’t long for promotion to another level, don’t wish you had a different role- just do what God has called you to do now WELL. This is a two-way thing we have to be willing to be lead and be willing as appropriate to lead! Leaders need followers or they are not leading they are taking a walk!
WRONG THINKING NUMBER TWO : "IM TOO BUSY - All that stuff just applies to the leaders- its for THEM to do the work of the church"
RIGHT THINKING Allow our leaders to inspire us to do the work well in the workplace, church and family! Lead others as appropriate to help them catch a sense of purpose at work, church and home.
Wrong thinking No 3 BAD PRIORITISING
Eg "OK I get it I will throw myself into the church and forget my family and job"
At the beginning of the talk, I spoke about WORK, CHURCH and FAMILY. Actually, whilst when we think of the job has got for us that is the natural order we often tend to think, the correct order is actually the opposite.
This is such a common error we start in our thinking about our significance in our paid employment thus for the mum she can feel "I am only a housewife" because no one pays her to do it and statsistics say she looses around 500,000 in lifetime earnings potential by being a parent of a single child and staying at home!
But to the ordinary person in the church with a job, thinking of things in this order can cause us at times to become so committed to our jobs we are not really interested in our church or our family, and at other times to conclude that the only way to be really FOR God is if we were to actually WORK for the church so that at least two of these spheres come together into one!
Working for the church is not the pinnacle of Christian life! All of us need to see ourselves as carrying out the role Christ has assigned to us
1 Cor 10:3 1-11:1 " .whatever you do, do all to the glory of God."
EMPHASISE THIS VERSE!!!!
Col 3.17ff And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them. Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord. Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. Slaves, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not by way of eye-service, as people-pleasers, but with sincerity of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.
NIV "Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men"
HCB "Whatever you do, do it enthusiastically, [ a] as something done for the Lord and not for men"
IN FACT OUR LIVES SHOULD BE LIKE AN ONION SKIN at the centre of our priorities and taking up most of our emotional energy, love and attachment should be our relationship with God. Get that right, and allow that rightness to fix your priorties and spill over into your family. Focus on your family as your second priority and you will find that it is easy to come to church as your next priority and do everything that you need to there. Approach church in the right way and you will see that the work of the church really needs to be done OUT THERE in the marketplace so you will go out emboldened and enabled to do the job God has called you to in the office, college or school
Don’t rely on your work to be there for you . Jobs make poor friends, and even poorer lovers. They are not faithful to you and will tend to come and go. The best job will come to an end one day even if you keep it "for life" it will end when you retire. Then what will you have left? Your church, your family and most importantly your God!
This whole message applies to
-The Mother who is staying at home raising Kids who will add value to the lives of others
-The Mother or Father who although they go out to work on their return home put on the hat not of career person but of loving parent to children pouring their lives into those of someone else
-The salesman standing for honesty and integrity,
-the nurse who cares for the sick patient as though he or she was Jesus Christ himself
- The student studying hard to achieve the best they can with the talents God has entrusted to them
WE ALL have a special roll unique to us that is in our family this is easy to see- no one else can be the father or mother of your kids or the lover for your wife or husband, in the CHURCH you have gifts God has given specifically to YOU to exercise, but you are not quite as indispensable as you are to your family so if a conflict of interests arises your family must always come first - there will be times when the family will of course be willing to make a sacrifice so you can do something in church, but they will do so knowing that on your return they should be getting a better husband wife or parent!
In our workplace, we often think of ourselves as indispensable, and it is true that your talents hopefully fit you well for the job you are doing, the harsh truth is, however that if you leave the company will carry on without you!
But you are not at work to please your employer, you are not doing things for the church to please Tope, nor dare I say it are you loving your family to please them. God is your boss, he is the one who has placed you in the job he has for you at home, in the church and in the workplace.
Wrong thinking No 3 BAD PRIORITISING
Eg "OK I get it I will throw myself into the church and forget my family and job"
Answer "Whatever you do, do it as working for the LORD!"
In each area family , church and work, God has a task he has entrusted us to do! He has saved us for a purpose. Our salvation is NOT dependent on our works but simply on us trusting in his work and in the GRACE and FAITH that GOD gives to US! We STOP working, receive the gospel almost passively, then once we have grasped this, get up and work with the POWER that HE gives us, to accomplish the unique job he has entrusted us to accomplish!
Eph 2:8-10 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
SO IN SUMMARY GET RIGHT WITH GOD. STOP WORKING TO PLEASE HIM. REALISE THAT HE LOVES YOU AND HAS FORGIVEN ALL YOUR SINS, THEN GO OUT THERE AND TAKE AHOLD OF THE JOB HE HAS GIVEN YOU TO DO BE DILIGENT IN ALL THAT YOUR HAND FINDS TO DO- IN THE FAMILY, IN THE CHURCH, and IN THE WORKPLACE. WHY BE DILIGENT? BECAUSE ONE DAY WE WILL HAVE TO GIVE AN ACCOUNT TO THE ONE WHO MADE US, SAVED US AND ENTRUSTED US WITH A JOB TO DO!
RESPONSE
Do you need to receive Gods unconditional acceptance and stop working to please him? DO YOU NEED TO BECOME A CHRISTIAN.
Are you in danger of "slipping into heaven by the skin of your teeth" or even are you not sure having drifted off that you ever were a Christian and want to come back to God?
Do you need to recommit yourself to working for God, BECAUSE he is pleased with you and has been gracious enough having saved you to give you a job to do? Do you need a fresh sense of purpose and vision to drive you to accomplish the job God has entrusted to you in church, home and work? Do you need a new job? Or more than that in the meantime do you need a new attitude to your job?
