All right, good morning. I think it's 9.02 or 8.02 for those of you whose bodies are still adjusting to daylight savings.
! But I will go ahead and get started. We have quite a bit of ground to cover today.
And so I will say welcome everyone to this new series on work, vocation and the gospel.
This class is a natural sequel to the Sunday School class on the doctrine of creation that we just concluded.
And for those of you who may have not listened or at least as a good reminder before we start,
in that class we began or Luke began, I should say, by exploring the different ways to understand the creation story.
Especially looking at ways we can remain faithful to core anchoring truths that I believe he referred to as non-negotiables.
I think at some point in the class.
Even as we hold them in tension to the contemporary and scientific accounts that are prevalent today.
Then after this, Nick turned our attention to the doctrine of the creation of man.
Exploring or expounding what it means to be created in the image and likeness of God and the implications of that today.
Now, John Hinkson built on that by discussing the cultural mandate that is given to man in Genesis 1, 26-27.
And tracing how that mandate intersects with the arc of the gospel.
Creation for redemption and new creation.
That class in many ways serves as the functional introduction to this one.
And it's actually the bridge to this.
So, if you haven't listened to it, Nick sent out a newsletter highlighting it.
I would, again, encourage you to do so.
Because much of what we will discuss across this series will connect to themes that John introduced in that class.
But, because it is that important, if I could attempt to paraphrase John here.
The cultural mandate, as he described it, derives from being created in the image and likeness of God.
And it is essentially man's call to continue God's work of creative cultivation, which he, that is God, demonstrated in his work of creation.
So, how does that cultural mandate serve as a bridge to this class, this series?
John may have said it implicitly, but I will attempt to do so explicitly for the sake of this class.
Work, at its core, as I see it, is essentially how we go about fulfilling that cultural mandate that God has given to us.
Or, in other words, how we continue to creatively cultivate God's good creation.
Our goal, then, in this class, or in this series, I should say, is to unpack, over the next seven to eight weeks,
what the concept of work in the broader context of the story of salvation looks like.
What is God's original intention and design for work?
How sin and the fall corrupted and continues to corrupt God's grand design for it?
And how, through the power of the gospel, our work can be and is redeemed today in a way that not just restores God's original design,
but foreshadows and provides a foretaste of the fullness of what we would experience at the dawning of new creation.
My goal, specifically today, is to set the stage for the rest of the series by taking a closer look at God's original design for work,
as revealed in the Garden of Eden.
And from there, if we have time, I will quickly sketch out the rest of the terrain that the remaining classes will cover.
I'm not sure we will have time, but we'll try to get to that.
And then I stated in the announcement blurbs for the series, our guide will be this book,
Every Good Endeavor, written by Tim Keller.
Alex and I, who will be teaching this course together, will borrow liberally from this book as we teach this series.
We will supplement some of its ideas with a few of our own,
but we'll recommend getting the book and going through it as we go along,
so that you can, in some way, start to engage the ideas, even be ahead.
We talked about setting a class atmosphere before people started coming in.
You can read ahead and then come to class with questions that you have.
So, with that, let us turn to the Lord in prayer to ask for his help as we begin to look at this topic together.
Father Lord, we thank you for creating work and making it the means through which we join you in tending the rest of your good creation.
Give us wisdom and insight as we look now into your work to explore your design for it.
May that picture reveal to us ways you may be calling us now to reorient the work which we currently do to align with how you have made us
and the purpose for which you made all things.
That is, for the praise and glory of your name.
I ask in Jesus' name.
Amen.
Alright, so like I said,
today we are going to be spending much of our time looking at God's original intention and approach to work.
And it is helpful in that case to look at the context where work first arose.
And so, I will ask you to turn with me your Bibles to Genesis 1, 26.
And I will read until the end of chapter 2.
I may skip a few verses as we go.
Because much of our class will be in some way like an exposition of these verses,
Beth has kindly printed copies if you don't have your Bible.
And I will ask you to follow along as I read.
And then at the end, I am going to ask the class a couple of questions around,
what do you see from this passage pertaining to God's design for work?
And I will try and bring them all together after we do so.
So, I will start.
Again, I would say, I skipped a couple of verses.
But anyway, if you are following in the passage,
all I am going to read in the handout,
all I am going to read is here.
Okay, so, starting from verse 26, Genesis chapter 1, it says,
Then God said,
Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.
And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the birds of the heavens,
and over the livestock, and over all the earth,
and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.
And God blessed them, and God said to them,
Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it,
and have dominion over the fish of the sea,
and over the birds of the heavens,
and over every living thing that moves on the earth.
And God saw everything that he had made,
and behold, it was very good.
And there was evening, and there was morning, the sixth day.
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished,
and all the hosts of them.
And on the seventh day, God finished his work that he had done,
and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done.
So God blessed the seventh day, and made it holy,
because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created,
in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.
When no bush of the field was yet in the land,
and no small plant of the field had yet sprung up,
for the Lord had not caused it to rain on the land,
and there was no man to work the ground,
and a mist was going up from the land,
and was watering the whole face of the ground.
Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground,
and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.
And the man became a living creature.
And the Lord God planted a garden in Eden in the east,
and there he put the man whom he had formed.
And out of the ground the Lord God made to spring up
every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food.
The tree of life was in the midst of the garden,
and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden
to work it and keep it.
And the Lord commanded the man, saying,
You may surely eat of every tree of the garden,
but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat.
For in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die.
Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field
and every bird of the heavens,
and brought them to the man to see what he would call them.
And whatever the man called every living creature,
that was its name.
The man gave names to all livestock,
and to the birds of the heavens,
and to every beast of the field.
But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him.
So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man,
and while he slept, took one of his ribs,
and closed up its place with flesh.
And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man,
he made into a woman,
and brought her to the man.
All right.
Hopefully as you were reading, you were thinking.
So now this is where I open up the class,
to get your ideas.
What does this passage,
or what are some of the things you observed from this passage,
about God's design for work?
Yes, ma'am.
God all the time made,
and everything he made perfect.
Okay.
You can see this to the perfection.
Okay.
God made everything perfect.
Yes.
How did God,
was the process by which God made everything perfect?
But please,
all right.
Yes.
How is that?
Yeah.
Okay.
With his work.
Yeah.
And with using man to take care of the field,
and take care of the garden.
Okay.
So God created man to take care of the garden.
Anything else?
That's the problem of seeing when humans feel bigger than God.
Ah.
That's how it is.
Nobody,
I mean,
you can even,
you know,
we are a grasshopper.
Yes.
So sin,
we will find later,
corrupts God's work.
Yes.
But,
it's not in the passage today.
Today is God's good design for work.
What do we see?
Yes.
So work is good,
it's a harsh part of our life,
but it has limits.
Okay.
Work is good,
work has limits.
Where do we see that,
that work has limits?
That work has limits.
God rested from his work.
Okay.
God rested from his work.
Maybe God's work has limits.
Why do we know that those limits apply to us?
I should have mentioned,
by the way,
sorry,
Susan,
I should have mentioned,
we see many ideas here that are amplified in the rest of scripture.
So it's not,
feel free if you have to defend to go outside of scripture.
Yes.
All right.
So we come in?
Uh-huh.
Yes.
So we find out later that this was a specific pattern that God had for us,
even though it doesn't say it so very explicitly in this passage.
What else?
There's still quite a few more.
What do we see or learn about work in the passage?
Well,
Adam has administrative responsibilities.
Okay.
According to verse 26.
Uh-huh.
So what does that mean about work in general?
Well,
every job I've ever had
has a certain amount of administrative responsibility,
even if it's very circumscribed.
Okay.
So there are different elements or parts to the work that God gives us to do,
is how I would generalize it.
Ma'am.
Can you perhaps fulfill God's purpose?
Work is meant to fulfill God's purpose.
Did I hear that right, Ma'am?
Yeah.
Okay.
Yeah.
I think that's fair.
Yes.
Again, Peter?
Work isn't meant to be alone.
Mmm.
Like God created a helper.
Yeah.
I struggle to include that.
But I think it is true.
We will come back to that at the implications.
But yes.
Work is not meant to be alone.
I agree.
I have a question.
Do we have to rest for seven days?
Do we have to rest?
No, yeah.
Like, you know, like special days.
Okay.
Ma'am, I will again come back to that.
Oh.
We will.
No, no, no.
It's good.
Do we have to?
So over the course of the class, there's a lot of the questions that, the implications for which we will tackle.
Yes.
Tackle.
Yes.
Alex, do you have?
Okay.
Anyone else?
Josh?
It seems like our work is meant to be an extension of God's authority or dominion.
Mmm.
He says have dominion.
Okay.
Yeah.
Over creation.
Yes, indeed.
We, in some way, work underneath God's work.
And that, I think, we will see also in the rest of the passage.
Yes, Richard?
So the passage is not exclusively about work because in verse 28, he says, be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth and subdue it.
That's true.
But increasing in number is not work.
Yeah.
So the cultural mandate of work is not the entire mandate that God gives us.
And I think we're just looking at that particular mandate of, you know, subdue the earth.
And I think John talked about it actually quite a bit in his class.
But, yes, the entire mandate is not limited to work.
Be fruitful and multiply is not essentially the work.
But we're looking especially at the work element of it.
Anyone else?
The multiply can be to make things better, to multiply good.
Okay.
Or you make it easier.
Okay.
I think, like, work is tending beauty but also functional.
Ah.
So, Lord God made us bring up every tree that is pleasant to sight and good for food.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
I think, John, again, sorry, I keep referring to it.
I really recommend you listen to the class.
I listened to it twice and I read it.
The transcript, it is that good.
John talked about it.
He, like, the creative, the word creative cultivation in some way brings together those two ideas of both the beauty,
the creativeness, but the cultivation bringing order to it.
And so, yes, 100%.
Okay.
Yes?
Yes, ma'am.
God is in order.
He perfectly ordered.
Yes.
God's order.
Our creative cultivation is actually patterned after God's way of work.
Yes.
So, God was also doing that ordering creation even after making it.
All right.
So, we have quite a number.
So, I will walk through a couple of them just for comprehensiveness and then discuss what these observations tell us about the way God designed work to operate.
I think, first of all, God worked, I think somebody may have said, and delighted in his work.
We see this in verses 2, in chapter 2, verses 1 to 3.
There is an inherent goodness to work, but it is something that God did and God enjoyed.
It is in contrast with the perspective and myths of some of the ancient Greeks and also in some quarters today, which we will talk about later.
The second is that it's not at least obvious because our Bible is in English, but I think Tim Keller in his book talks about how the word that was used to describe God's work was pedestrian work.
It was a pedestrian work.
It was the same word that was used to describe human work.
God, in creation, was willing to get his hands dirty.
And he literally got his hands dirty in forming man from the dust of the ground.
And so, there is an essence in which God work is, it's not just, there is not a humbling aspect of work, but work takes on a great range of forms.
And God's work spans that range from what we did creative to the actual manual and practical.
And all of those, all that work is good.
The next one somebody mentioned was work is done, I think, in rhythms.
That's what Susan was talking about, like this, rhythms of work and rest.
We see this dimly in each day.
We didn't read Genesis 1, but we see that dimly in Genesis 1.
Then we see it a bit more clearly in Genesis 2, verse 3, in the sense of God's work.
But as I discussed, it comes to life more fully as we go further in Scripture.
And then the explicit pattern in Exodus 20 is where it's set before us.
And it states in verse 18, remember the Sabbath to keep it holy.
Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God.
On it you shall not do any work.
For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day.
Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
I read this and I thought it was funny.
God, I don't think this is exactly what he's saying, but it sounded like, I made the heavens and the earth in six days.
You can rest from your work because you're not making the heavens and the earth.
I don't think that's exact.
But it's like, yeah, you know, like how busy can you be that you cannot rest on the seventh day?
A thought to consider.
If we keep moving in the passage, we will also see that work was something that God created man to do and something that God calls him to do.
And we see this in chapter 2, verse 15.
And I will just try and find it here.
It said,
The Lord took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and keep it.
Work was part of our original creation and purpose.
And we will in some way come back to that later.
Then next, we are designed to benefit from and enjoy the fruit of our work.
We see this in chapter 2, verse 16.
And it's a point that while it begins here, it's amplified in scripture.
I think you all may be familiar when Paul picks this up.
Deuteronomy picks this theme up about do not muzzle an ox while it is shredding the grain.
And Paul, twice in the New Testament, picks this pattern up that the idea that we are, it's a good thing to be able to enjoy and reap the fruits of your work.
And that's how work has always been.
And so God, in asking the man to tend the garden, also encouraging him to eat of its fruit.
Yes, ma'am.
In heaven, we're going to walk too.
Yes, that was a point that John made as well.
Yes, indeed.
We're going to walk.
It's not going to be singing and, you know, all kinds of that.
No, you know what I mean.
Yeah, yeah, no, no, no.
It's thinking, oh, more, more.
We're going to be busy.
Yes.
Yes, indeed.
And then finally, someone mentioned that we are called to a variety of work.
I think Sarah, that was the point.
I think Richard, it's Richard, right?
Yes.
Okay, yeah.
Like Richard, you mentioned the administrative component of work.
We see in this passage, Adam called to different kinds of work.
He's called to creative work in naming the animals.
He's also called to manual, practical work in 10 in the garden.
There is a spectrum and a variety of work that God designs us to do.
And then I think Peter mentioned a point that I didn't want to make too much of, but I do
think it's very important that work was designed to be done in community, in a sense.
I think community is a strong word because, you know, here the pattern, the bigger pattern
at the core of this passage is marriage and the partnership in marriage.
But I think it was a point that embedded in the nature of work helps us to see that that
social component of work is a critical component.
Actually, studies have shown that for those who go back to work, who may not even need to
go financially for work, especially those who have rich retirement age, the social and
meaning component of work is a primary driver of why many go back to work.
So that part is definitely something that is worth us to consider.
So how do these observations together tell us about the way God designed work to operate
in a way that I think we can in some way engage on today?
I think, first of all, work is good.
I said that before.
God's working and delighting in his work reminds us that there is an inherent goodness to work
for it is something God did and enjoyed.
I think, okay, I guess it comes in the second one.
The second one is that we were created to work.
I think it's, the Lord God made man in some way to tend the garden.
If you read that, when he said, when, when it, in some way we start the narrative and talking
about the creation of man, it talks about, you know, when there was no fruit or no shrub
coming up in cultivation because there was yet no man to work the land.
And God made man and God planted him in the garden to work the garden.
We were made to work and work thus is a critical component of a meaningful life.
Now, while work may take on different forms in different stages of our life,
it is a key part of it.
A life purely of pleasure and leisure, while often romanticized sometimes,
is a life at risk of being devoid of meaning.
We were designed to work and it's not something we have to do, but what we were created to do.
So, if we are offered dreams of a life without any kind of work, sometimes that's the AI,
the AI mantra.
That dream is not, in some way, it's almost more closer to hell than heaven.
In part because if you think as a, ma'am, I don't think I remember your name.
Is it Julia?
Oh, yeah.
Julia?
Yeah, yeah.
Okay, yes.
Working or serving.
Yes.
You can serve all made around.
You know, not necessarily a serving.
Serving community, serving anything.
Yes.
Yes, ma'am.
But as Julia had said earlier, that if, as John put it in his class,
that work will continue in the new heavens and new creation that God will bring about.
You can then imagine, by definition, life without any form of work cannot be heaven.
And if it is not heaven, I leave it to your imagination what that life is exactly.
Maybe it is in hell that people don't work.
They just suffer.
But work is meaningful and is critical to the meaningful component of a life worth living.
I think third is that God called man to work.
Man did not define or create his own work, but responded to God's call to work.
Now, underneath this is a couple of ideas that I think came up in the course of our discussion.
First is that this work has a variety of forms.
It's intellectual work, practical work, and neither of them set up intention against the other
or as one being superior.
And that goes a grain to grain of our world today, where depending on where we sit on that divide of intellectual work,
white-collar work, or blue-collar work, we often tend to magnify one and demean the other.
We see both of them coming together in the garden, and it's also coming together actually in God's own work itself,
not necessarily just in man's work.
And so we are reminded that there is no superiority in either of these kinds of work.
But that said, even though we are called to a variety of work, Adam was still called to particular work.
Now, you will notice that Adam was called to tend to a specific garden.
He wasn't called necessarily to feed the birds of the air or the fish in the sea.
He was called to tend the garden.
And so maybe perhaps as humanity became fruitful and multiplied and filled the earth and subdued it,
that broader mandate would have been picked up as it is in the variety of work.
But if you look at Adam particularly, he was called to specific work.
And thus, it is a reminder to us that there may be a variety of things that we are, but we are called to specific work.
I don't want to go too deep in this because this is something that I think Alex, in his class next week on work as a calling,
will speak in more detail about.
In particular, as it relates to the idea that what God called Adam to,
I mean, Alex, I'm speaking on your behalf, but I imagine,
what God called Adam to was what is seemingly secular work.
But it's actually in contrast to what we think about calling today.
Adam was called to work the garden.
And it was a great cry of the Reformation that all God, all work is God's calling to work.
It's not all good work, I would say.
It's God's calling to work.
There is no special class for spiritual work that the people in the church do.
We can all be called to the work that we're doing.
But I will leave Alex to expand on that later.
Next, and I think this goes deeper into what Susan had mentioned.
This work that we are called to do came with constraints that were designed to remind us that we are not masters of our own selves.
But our work is underneath a greater work, which is God's work.
And our work is ultimately directed to the person who calls us to work.
I think we had, in one of the sermons in the past, in the series that we're currently going to,
the idea that when you are called, like being a steward of resources,
you are called to do and manage them on behalf of someone.
And we see these constraints that God has given.
God put constraints in place in work, even in Eden,
as a reminder of that reality,
that we do not work as unto ourselves, but unto somebody,
unto God who made us.
And there are two, these constraints we see in two specific places.
First, in the Sabbath.
We talked a little bit about the Sabbath.
And then secondly, we see it in the restriction God gives Adam
to not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
But because we generally chafe at the idea of constraints,
we all think about, you know,
best life is a life with all options and unconstrained.
I can do whatever I want.
But, I mean, as some of you know,
there is this thing called the paradox of choice, right?
Like if you are presented with too many options,
you actually, it's harder to make decisions
than when you are given a set of constrained choices.
So even though we chafe at the sound of constraints,
it is within the scope of these constraints
that we are designed to enjoy and find meaning in our work.
So if we look at the Sabbath, for example,
we know that rest is good
because being finite creatures is good for our recovery.
But this rest was patterned after God's rest.
And God, as we know in Psalm 121,
neither slumbers nor sleep.
So the primary purpose of this rest as a pattern
is not just rest, physical rest,
as it is, even if we look at Exodus 20,
where it talks about the Sabbath is unto the Lord.
The goal of rest, it came at the end, at the seventh day,
almost as a sense that it is a pointer to an end to work.
Now, end here I use not in the sense of chronological end,
like it's finished,
but in the teleological sense,
in which there is an end as a purpose
to which work is designed and oriented.
When we enjoy the Sabbath,
the goal of the Sabbath is meant to point us
to an end to work,
an end and a purpose and not a meaninglessness.
And I think Keller points out this in his book
around when he talks about leisure,
that good leisure allows us to see and appreciate
and reflect on the beauty and the purpose
and the end of work.
It's not really just,
oh, I'm tired, I need a break after six days of work.
It's actually an opportunity for us
to step back and see
this greater purpose of rest.
And then furthermore,
this is pre-fall or pre,
yeah, this is even before the fall.
After the fall,
this idea of rest takes on an even bigger perspective
in the rest of scripture.
Hebrews talks about it ultimately,
and I think picking up on Psalm 95,
this idea of rest,
that when we enter God's rest,
we rest from our own labor.
And that I think we're talking about
in this series on Galatians,
that ultimately we rest from our works
in God's completed work.
And that pattern was already set in the garden
and set in this idea of Sabbath.
So the Sabbath is not really just physical rest,
but this idea of an end to work
and an end, like I said,
in the teleological sense,
which means work,
we can see work as purposeful and meaningful
when we see it through the lens
of the rhythms God has designed
for work and rest,
as revealed in the Sabbath.
Then the second constraint we see in 2.17,
where God gives man a command
not to eat of the fruit of the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil.
Now, presumably that restriction
did not mean that man was not allowed
to tend the tree.
Remember, that tree was in the garden,
and Adam was called to tend the garden.
Yet he was forbidden to eat from that tree.
And depending on how you think about it,
some commentators say
there was nothing really special about that tree
as it was meant to be a symbol
of the constraints around which
God had set man to work.
It reminded Adam,
whenever he tended that tree
but not eating of it,
that his work was as a subject
of somebody who was greater.
But if you notice,
that restriction does not constrain Adam
from enjoying everything else in the garden.
And that, like,
satisfying the restriction of,
I will not eat from this tree
did not mean,
oh, now I'm suffering.
He could eat from whatever tree.
He could eat from the tree of life,
from all these other trees,
as long as he remembered
that this tree,
that knowledge of good and evil
was a tree that he was forbidden from eating.
Yes, ma'am.
I have a question about that.
Yes.
So, as well as the point of his authority
over Adam,
would it not be important
that he not eat of that tree
because when he did,
he had to leave?
Yes.
But, yeah.
That tree,
I mean,
it was,
it was even more than,
it was as well,
as well as God's authority,
that tree held a door open
that was shut down
because he chose it.
Yeah,
I think there are two elements
in which we can talk about
the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil.
Like there could be,
like I said,
some commentators would say,
I said,
some would say
there was nothing special about the tree.
Some may say
there was something special about the tree.
Regardless of whether
there was something special
about the tree or not
in a practical sense
of what it did,
there was a bigger point
to the tree.
And that was,
at the very least,
it would remind Adam
that you are not the commander
of this garden.
Right.
You,
this garden,
you are putting here to work
underneath the command
of someone.
And I'm,
knowledge of tree
opened the door
to the earth
of science.
And a lot of people
don't believe that.
Yeah.
Maybe,
I don't know.
No,
I think,
I'm trying to avoid
the conversation
around the elements
of the tree
because I do think
that regardless
of what you think
about the purpose
of the tree,
the bigger purpose
of the tree
still stands.
Yes,
ma'am.
Could it be also
obedience
and honoring God?
I mean,
God is asking
that,
of course,
you're going to
honor and be obedient.
Yes,
exactly.
Yes.
So the point is
that the signifying
obedience
is how we,
we work
underneath
God.
It's like a symbol
of man's status
relative to God.
We are not gods
of our own selves.
We are created
underneath
someone
to work.
I think,
yeah,
so we see this point,
by the way,
picked up
in different parts
of scripture
later on.
This idea that
even though
we enjoy the benefits
of our work,
there are portions
of the benefits
of our work
that are restricted
to us somewhat
as a reminder
that the work
is not ours.
We see in the
Old Testament
this idea of the tithe
that was God's
portion in the
things that he had
given them.
Presumably,
again,
a way I'm not saying
there's one-to-one
correlation,
but this idea
that there are
reminders in the
work that we do
and the fruit of
our work,
even though we
can enjoy it,
that remain to
God.
When God,
beyond even the
tithe,
right,
when God was
giving the
Israelites laws
about harvest,
they were not
to harvest to
the very edge
of their field
and harvest every
little grain.
They were meant
to leave things
as they went,
things that fell off.
It gained that
idea that there
was a portion
in our work
that does not
belong to us.
As we think
about that,
regardless of
what you believe
today about
tithe or not,
there is a sense
that of the
work that we
do,
all of the
fruit does not
belong to us
because it's a
reminder that
our work
comes from
someone else.
prayer.
Prayer.
You have time
for God.
Prayer.
Prayer is very
important.
Yeah, that is
fair.
So what's the
definition of work?
Ah, what is the
definition of work?
I thought I said
it implicitly in the
beginning, but I
think it's a good
one and I will
call it back.
I will go back to
that.
I think work
is the way we
continue God's
mandate in this
creative cultivation
of the world
today.
That is work.
That is how we
were meant to
fulfill the
cultural part of
that mandate.
Like Richard
mentioned, there
are multiple
parts of this
mandate that he
gave in 126 to
27, and that's
what we would
unpack in Genesis
126 to 27.
That part of
continuing his
creative cultivation
of the world
is work.
work.
How we do
that is what's
work.
Now, that
definition, though,
I would say is
not complete.
It's not complete
because the New
Testament picks
up more.
There is almost
like a component
of that element
that we see more
clearly in the
New Testament, but
I want to hold
that thought for
when we then
come back to
what is added to
that definition
of work, that
the New Testament
really, really
amplifies.
Josh, you had a
question?
This might go
wrong with that,
but we touched
on the end of
the purpose, the
telos of work, but
I wasn't clear on
did we come down
on that somewhere?
Did we define that?
The purpose of
work.
That was the last.
Well, the purpose
of work I mentioned
earlier in the
prayer, but it was
actually the subject
of Nick's last
class in the
previous series.
The purpose of
all is for God's
ultimate glory.
That's the end
of all creation.
Okay, you did
say that.
Yes, but yeah,
no, I think.
Okay, so if this
is what work was
meant, let me pause
because before we
transition to the
rest of this
class, any
further questions?
I have tried to
take a few as we
went along.
No?
Okay.
I'm going to write
it down to daylight
savings.
People are still
booting.
It's still 840.
It's 840.
Yes, Sarah.
Yes.
Just to provide a
perspective to
like maybe thinking
about the scope of
work as broader
than just vocation,
but, you know,
some of like,
let's say,
I'm hearing people
and other things
just to throw some
kind of other
perspectives out
there.
Yeah, so.
I mean, all that
falls under what
you said, but just
to kind of make it
explicit.
So, no, I agree.
We will notice it
says nothing about,
I mean, even though
we are enjoined to
benefit from the
work, it says
nothing about being
paid for the work.
And so sometimes
people are like,
ah, if the work
I'm not paid is
volunteer, like being
a stay-at-home
parent.
Well, you could
even say that the
Bible shows that
that is really work.
There was a stay-at-home
parent who was
actually paid to be
a stay-at-home parent
in Scripture.
Do you know who
that is?
Somebody who was
paid to be a
parent.
Was it Moses'
parents?
Exactly.
Moses' mom was
paid to be a
mom.
In some way, like,
so if you argue
that, like, it's
not paid, well, it
has been paid in
Scripture.
And, like, I
mean, for those of
us who work, who
keep our kids in
daycare, we pay
people to care for
our kids.
So even though
there's not
necessarily a, to
your point, a
financial exchange
in that, like, this
is work.
Because even
children are the
gifts of God, and
we are called to
cultivate them in
some way.
I mean, we use
different words
because they are
human beings.
But in the way
of the Lord, and
that creative
cultivation that
is done as
parents is part of
God's design for
work.
Even though you
could argue that
because it's a
special class, we
call it something
else.
We call it
parenting.
But it is as
much work as
regular work as
most people who
have kids will
attest.
I think from a
worldly standpoint,
being a stay-at-home
mom for a number of
years, raising my
kids, I had to
finally realize,
instead of always
defending myself,
like, you know,
people would say,
oh, it must be
nice.
Yeah, it's a joy.
You know, it's
wonderful.
Was that the day
that my value is
equated to a
paycheck written by
someone of this
world totally
negates my value as
a child of God.
And there's no
connection.
And when you can
finally, when I
could, at least me,
could finally,
clearly, I stopped
defending myself as,
well, I'm not
working right now,
but I will again
someday.
I've been working
since the day I was
born, and I will
until the day I die
for God's glory.
And that's all I was
doing.
And that was really
important for me.
So, you know, when
you say what the
work is, it's all
for His glory.
And it's, we
benefit from us,
but He didn't have
to give us all
those benefits that
He gave us.
He could have
said, I don't want
you to eat anything
out of the garden.
Just go and take
care of it in order
to get the dog
else to get it.
Exactly.
I mean, but,
you know, in our
sin, obviously,
that's the whole
other part.
We mess it all
up.
Yeah.
Okay.
Even like
retirement, you
know, just
different phases
of life work can
take a very
different picture
than just, you
know, plan-clied
vocation or
whatever we think
of traditionally,
just calling that
out.
I agree.
Yes, ma'am?
And parenting
is not the most
important.
It's certainly
most important,
very important,
and,
it's 24,
you know,
24-7,
but it's,
it's, yeah.
Yeah.
I think it's the
most important
thing that we
are called,
I think we are
the most,
it's the most
important thing
that we are
called to do
because everything
else we have
to do are
dealing with
things that
will pass away.
But the souls
of the kids
that we are
giving are
eternal.
Like, we are
human beings
and caring for
people,
actually, I
would say,
maybe more
extendedly,
right?
Like, people
are the one
eternal thing
that we walk
around and
exchange,
and engage
with, and I
think engaging
with eternal,
I think, is
definitely important.
All right, so,
if this is the
design for work,
we can see that
there are many
elements of this
design that
still resonate,
or still,
we can think
about as we
consider work
today.
Even though
sin has
corrupted,
sin in its,
sin actually
corrupts much
of what was
God's original
design for
work.
If we go
back to the
list that I
had, right,
like, what
did it mean?
That, you
know, the
idea that
work is good
is corrupted
by sin,
like people
think, and
there is
work that
is evil,
and it's
evil because,
you know,
men have in
their desire
for some of
the other
characteristics of
good work
have corrupted
the goodness
that is in
work.
work being
good is
corrupted by
sometimes,
like,
meaningless
work,
droning on
work, or,
you know,
we probably
have, like,
working in
sweatshops,
or labor
that the
corruption of
sin has
seeped into
God's design.
Work being
really fruitful,
so if we see
the garden,
the Bible
talks about
God planting
a garden that
yielded so
much fruit,
and then Adam
was just called
to tend,
and then after
they sinned,
the first thing
God tells Adam
is that the
ground will no
longer be
fruitful,
that by the
sweat of his
brow, the
idea that we
sometimes labor
so much to
produce only
very little,
that is a
function of
sinning, and
it's a reality
that we still
live in today.
I think our
desire to
define and
create our
work, it is
the mantra of
today.
You can be
everything you
ever wanted to
be, like, your
mind is the
limitation.
You can, of
course, identify
the good that
people are trying
to point to
in some of
that, like,
John also
mentioned in
this class about
being good
cultural critics
that recognizing
the good in
some of these
things, and yet
the corruption
of sin, but
yet, as we
find out in the
garden, that is
actually not
true.
We are
designed to
be all that
God calls us
to be, and
the work is
figuring out
what God
calls us to
be.
I think there's
a quote, I
forgot to look
it up, that
Einstein said,
or it's attributed
to Einstein, that
if a fish spends
all his time
trying to, like,
climb a tree,
you may think
he was made
for nothing,
but that's
because that's
not where the
fish was designed
to operate.
And so some
of that idea
of recognizing
the constraints
of which the
work that we
have been
called to do,
what God
has called us
to do is
where work
has always
been fruitful
and flourish.
everybody has
different work,
you know,
everybody is
important, so
somebody is
saying mindless
work, but
everybody is
different.
Yeah, that's
fair.
Beth?
It seems
like work is
sort of this
way of
participation in
creation, and
when we are
working as
unto the
Lord, or we
think working
pre-fall
mentality, it
sort of is
both an
expanding of
us and a
cultivating of
us, as well
as expanding
and cultivating
God's created
order.
I think we
like, we
grow, I guess
would be a
simple way to
say that.
I think what
seems to enter
in through the
fall is
exploitation.
Like, even
when we're
toiling and
it's not
yielding much
harvest,
it's sort
of like
exploiting, and
then when we
think about the
interpersonal power
dynamics and
whatnot, there's
often just that
entrance of
exploitation as
opposed to
cultivating.
Yeah.
I think that's
fair.
I think that
sense of
exploitation, I
think, connects
quite well to
this idea of
not all the
often results
when we are
trying to get
everything we
can from the
work that we
do.
But the idea
that, like I
mentioned, work
had originally
always been
designed in
some way for
there to be a
part of our
work that is
not really for
us or about
us.
And I think
in relating to
that, I think
your point around
exploitation and
where some of
that comes from
and a desire to
grab and hold
on to everything
that we can, I
think definitely
stems from
that.
Yes,
Christina.
Could we
also expand
the topic of
children to
spiritual children
and discipleship
for those who
don't have
children and
yeah, kind
of outside of
them?
Yeah, I
think so.
But in that
case, you
could even
think about
that work
as almost
directly spiritual
work, which
we would
actually recognize
today as
spiritual work
of people who
disciple others.
In some
churches, they
even have
positions of
spiritual director
or something.
So, yes, we
can because we
already do so
in any case.
Okay.
All right.
So, we were
talking about
other ways in
which sin
corrupts God's
grand design.
I think I was
talking about the
idea that we are
the masters of
our own work and
I think this idea
is a sinful
idea.
We are created
to work as God
calls us to
work and we
need to be
figuring out
what does that
mean to be
called.
And again, that
I think is a
topic we will
discuss in the
next class.
Work also, as
Keller talks
about in his
book, becomes
selfish.
It becomes all
about us.
It downstream
of that idea
of being
masters.
And he uses
the Tower of
Babel as an
example of that
selfish, self-oriented,
self-glorifying
element of work
that was not
designed in the
beginning.
And so, over
the course of
this class, we
will talk about
this part of
work, like
going into detail
and how work
has been
corrupted and
how then
ultimately landing
at how the
gospel redeems
work.
The gospel
gives us a
new narrative
for work and
a new power
and a new
purpose for the
work that we do.
And maybe to
the point that
I mentioned
earlier, in
the gospel, and
that's the
addendum to the
definition of
work that I
said in the
beginning, in
the gospel we
see work
repeatedly being
talked about in
the context of
service to
others.
And so, you
could argue that
it is sort of
embedded in that
creative cultivation
that I defined
earlier, but it's
not as explicit.
That work is
continuing this
work of God's
creative cultivation.
work in the
service of
others.
And that lens
of working to
serve others is
a lens that we
will come back
to in the
final phase of
the purpose of
work.
Paul admonishes
he that steals
should steal no
longer, but
work with his
hands.
Not so that he
can stop stealing
to satisfy, but
so that he may
have something to
give.
Because actually
working was a
way to transform
stealing from
taking to give
everything.
Because work is
meant to be done
in service of
others.
In fact, we
will talk about
that in the
latter part of
the class, about
the gospel's
redemption of
work.
So, yes
ma'am.
God doesn't like
pride.
Very, very
against God.
So, somebody
working for, you
know, for
pride, yeah,
God doesn't like
pride.
Yeah, no,
absolutely.
And that embracing
that humility that
comes with work is
also something that,
to Julia's point,
the New Testament
picks up.
I think Paul
mentions, I
think it's in
Thessalonians,
like, you know,
aspire to live a
quiet life and to
work with your
hands.
Not because
working with your
hands, in some
way that, because
in that culture
working with our
hands was seen
as, you know,
second grade to
working with your
minds in the
Greek and the
Roman culture of
the day.
And so that
humbling aspect of
the humility that
comes with service,
I think is
something that is
part of the new
narrative of how
we should think
about work.
So I think I
will end there
unless there are
more questions.
Yes, Richard.
If work is good,
and I agree,
is unemployment
a great evil?
I think it would
depend on what
the drivers of
the unemployment
are.
Yeah, I think
it depends.
What's causing
the unemployment?
Well, most
economists would
agree that a
certain level of
unemployment is
desirable.
Yeah, I think
that that is,
I don't know
then that it's,
so I think it
depends on how
you define
unemployment and
the context in
which when they
talk about
unemployment, I
think they
generally talk
about paid
employment.
So unemployment
in that regard
maybe you could
debate, but
whether you are
paid or not,
people who work
at home, I
don't think are
technically, I
don't know how
they are accounted
for in the
unemployment numbers,
but we've talked
about, right,
like that is still
work in God's
eyes.
So I don't
know.
I think there's
a clear yes or
no to that answer.
I think it
really depends on
the kind of
the unemployment
and the
reasons for it.
Oh yeah,
that's true.
That's also a
reason why people
can be unemployed.
All right,
well, thank you
for coming.
If you have any
questions, happy to
stay behind till
10 and answer
them, but
otherwise we'll
see you next
week.