WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:08.240 Alright, so we are carrying on in our series on faith and work. 00:00:08.240 --> 00:00:16.780 Last time, last time Derek talked about work and it's meaning from Genesis one. 00:00:16.780 --> 00:00:21.140 And one of the ways to talk about that that he did mention is that in the Middle Ages, 00:00:21.140 --> 00:00:25.140 and this has happened several times throughout church history, there's a distinction that's 00:00:25.140 --> 00:00:26.140 developed. 00:00:26.140 --> 00:00:31.800 And the rest is still around between work that matters to God and what's been called 00:00:31.800 --> 00:00:36.640 the mundane or the profane in earlier centuries. 00:00:36.640 --> 00:00:42.200 And the work that matters to God in those ages and stages is ministry, the work of the 00:00:42.200 --> 00:00:45.679 priest, the work of the minister, the work of the nun in the late Middle Ages, whatever 00:00:45.679 --> 00:00:46.679 it may be. 00:00:46.679 --> 00:00:47.679 The rest of it is profane. 00:00:47.679 --> 00:00:49.359 It's mundane work. 00:00:49.359 --> 00:00:54.760 Profane meaning not appointed to sacred ends, not appointed to sacred things. 00:00:54.759 --> 00:00:58.280 And the Reformation had a lot to say about work. 00:00:58.280 --> 00:01:02.000 One of the big themes of the Reformation was about work. 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:07.679 And Luther spent a lot of time recovering the goodness of work at every level. 00:01:07.679 --> 00:01:11.680 So Luther has all these famous quotes about it that you can Google and find really funny 00:01:11.680 --> 00:01:13.599 ones sometimes. 00:01:13.599 --> 00:01:18.560 But some of the helpful ones he says are things like, how does God love to exercise his providence 00:01:18.560 --> 00:01:19.719 in the world? 00:01:19.719 --> 00:01:23.959 And he says through the milkmaid and through the mason and through the soldier. 00:01:23.959 --> 00:01:25.719 So he says, how does God protect the city? 00:01:25.719 --> 00:01:27.599 God is the refuge that protects the city. 00:01:27.599 --> 00:01:28.599 How? 00:01:28.599 --> 00:01:33.159 Because he puts a soldier who's been trained well on the city water protected at night. 00:01:33.159 --> 00:01:34.159 Work, that's good. 00:01:34.159 --> 00:01:36.159 And God loves these things. 00:01:36.159 --> 00:01:39.639 So we saw last week that God in the beginning is a creator. 00:01:39.639 --> 00:01:42.000 God is a gardener. 00:01:42.000 --> 00:01:45.879 He makes the world, he cultivates, he gets his hands dirty. 00:01:45.879 --> 00:01:49.919 He enters the garden, he calls human beings to work in the dirt. 00:01:49.919 --> 00:01:52.759 That work is good from the beginning. 00:01:52.760 --> 00:01:55.040 And so in the coming weeks, we're not going to do this tonight. 00:01:55.040 --> 00:01:57.520 I said we were going to get into the problems with work. 00:01:57.520 --> 00:01:59.840 That'll be next time actually. 00:01:59.840 --> 00:02:03.200 But we're going to see the fact that, and this is a really helpful distinction to always 00:02:03.200 --> 00:02:08.400 have with you, that the structures of creation are good. 00:02:08.400 --> 00:02:12.080 And what's wrong is sin. 00:02:12.080 --> 00:02:14.920 That the problem with creation is not the creation. 00:02:14.920 --> 00:02:17.280 The problem with creation is not work. 00:02:17.280 --> 00:02:19.400 It's not being human. 00:02:19.400 --> 00:02:20.520 It's not the family. 00:02:20.520 --> 00:02:23.320 It's not the institutions themselves. 00:02:23.320 --> 00:02:29.680 It is that sin has diseased and corrupted everything, including work. 00:02:29.680 --> 00:02:31.840 And so the first thing we have to say is work is good. 00:02:31.840 --> 00:02:38.960 Okay, so let's have a focus tonight and dig down in that a little bit deeper and look at 00:02:38.960 --> 00:02:42.800 more precisely the ways in which God wants us to work. 00:02:42.800 --> 00:02:45.320 Why exactly is it good? 00:02:45.320 --> 00:02:49.480 Basically what precisely are we made for in relationship to work? 00:02:49.479 --> 00:02:58.439 So let me read just two short passages, Genesis 1, 26 to 28, and then we'll flip over to Genesis 00:02:58.439 --> 00:03:00.519 2, verse 13. 00:03:00.519 --> 00:03:09.000 So 26 to 28, very famous, let us make man, God says, let us make man in our image. 00:03:09.000 --> 00:03:10.359 That's the Hebrew word man. 00:03:10.359 --> 00:03:13.879 That's Adam in Hebrew, which just means humans. 00:03:13.879 --> 00:03:17.280 It's not specifically talking about Adam by himself here. 00:03:17.280 --> 00:03:22.680 Let us make humans in our image after our likeness and let them have dominion over the 00:03:22.680 --> 00:03:26.800 fish of the sea and over the birds of the heaven and over the livestock and over all 00:03:26.800 --> 00:03:29.639 the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. 00:03:29.639 --> 00:03:31.680 So God created man in his own image. 00:03:31.680 --> 00:03:33.920 In the image of God, he created him. 00:03:33.920 --> 00:03:36.360 Male and female, he created them. 00:03:36.360 --> 00:03:42.319 And God blessed them and God said, be fruitful, multiply, build the earth, subdue it, have 00:03:42.319 --> 00:03:46.960 dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the heavens, and over every living 00:03:46.960 --> 00:03:48.560 thing that moves on the earth. 00:03:48.560 --> 00:03:53.480 All right, then jump down to chapter 2, verse 13. 00:03:53.480 --> 00:03:57.120 Sorry, verse 15. 00:03:57.120 --> 00:04:02.000 I meant to say the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:04.000 to keep it. 00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:05.000 Okay. 00:04:05.000 --> 00:04:06.000 All right. 00:04:06.000 --> 00:04:11.240 So how does work relate to who we are and what we're for? 00:04:11.240 --> 00:04:13.640 That's what we're asking tonight. 00:04:13.639 --> 00:04:19.839 And here we learn what we're for and we're for when you look at the big picture of Genesis 00:04:19.839 --> 00:04:24.919 1 and 2, we're for living in the kingdom of God that God has made. 00:04:24.919 --> 00:04:29.439 And that kingdom at the very beginning is on a mountain. 00:04:29.439 --> 00:04:35.319 Ezekiel 13 tells us that Eden is on a mountain, that it's a garden on a mountain and that 00:04:35.319 --> 00:04:41.279 this garden on top of a mountain is the coherence between heaven and earth. 00:04:41.279 --> 00:04:44.199 It's the union between heaven and earth. 00:04:44.199 --> 00:04:49.919 We learn in Ephesians chapter 1, verses 9 and 10 that the whole point of the Christian 00:04:49.919 --> 00:04:52.799 gospel is the union of heaven and earth. 00:04:52.799 --> 00:04:56.479 And here we have it right at the beginning, that heaven and earth are united. 00:04:56.479 --> 00:05:01.119 God is condescended into this garden that he's made, Emmanuel. 00:05:01.119 --> 00:05:06.359 And that means that as all the Old Testament scholars tell us, Eden is meant to be understood 00:05:06.359 --> 00:05:07.879 as a temple. 00:05:07.879 --> 00:05:10.839 So what we have here at the very beginning is a temple on top of a mountain and that 00:05:10.839 --> 00:05:12.399 temple is a garden. 00:05:12.399 --> 00:05:16.519 So the garden temple of God on top of the mountain, the mountain of God. 00:05:16.519 --> 00:05:24.000 A couple interesting points about this, when you dig into and study the temple itself, 00:05:24.000 --> 00:05:26.639 imagine the temple. 00:05:26.639 --> 00:05:32.559 It's full of garden imagery, garden images like plants and flowers were stitched into 00:05:32.559 --> 00:05:36.479 the canvases that made the tabernacle walls, right? 00:05:36.480 --> 00:05:40.920 The furniture itself, the menorah, the candle looks like the tree as a sign of the tree 00:05:40.920 --> 00:05:42.439 of life. 00:05:42.439 --> 00:05:45.319 But beyond that, the shape of it. 00:05:45.319 --> 00:05:48.520 So in the temple, we have a square, right? 00:05:48.520 --> 00:05:52.120 And there's the outer court and then there's the inner court. 00:05:52.120 --> 00:05:55.680 And then inside the inner court, there is another square, a room. 00:05:55.680 --> 00:05:58.040 And in that room, there's the Holy of Holies. 00:05:58.040 --> 00:06:00.920 And in the center of that room is the Ark of the Covenant. 00:06:00.920 --> 00:06:07.040 Now if you pay attention to the way God constructs, instructs Adam and Eve and Eden, you realize 00:06:07.040 --> 00:06:09.840 Eden is bigger than the garden. 00:06:09.840 --> 00:06:15.800 So it says there's Eden and then there's a garden within Eden. 00:06:15.800 --> 00:06:20.400 And inside that garden, it says there's a center and that center is the tree of life. 00:06:20.400 --> 00:06:26.400 And you see the temple is mapped out on the basis of the Garden of Eden. 00:06:26.400 --> 00:06:30.040 There's the outer court, which is Eden itself, the inner court, which is the garden in the 00:06:30.040 --> 00:06:35.080 center, which is the tree, which is the outer court, inner court, and Holy of Holies, Ark 00:06:35.080 --> 00:06:36.080 of the Covenant. 00:06:36.080 --> 00:06:39.560 The garden is the Holy of Holies, the Ark of the Covenant. 00:06:39.560 --> 00:06:43.640 And so God puts His first people, who's in this kingdom? 00:06:43.640 --> 00:06:45.860 It's people, right? 00:06:45.860 --> 00:06:48.360 And we learn Genesis 1, 26 to 28. 00:06:48.360 --> 00:06:51.080 In this temple, the people are the image of God. 00:06:51.080 --> 00:06:53.620 They are different from the rest of the creation order. 00:06:53.620 --> 00:06:56.040 They are the Imago, the image of God. 00:06:56.040 --> 00:07:00.280 Okay, now what I want to focus on for a few minutes is these commands that God gives. 00:07:00.280 --> 00:07:07.000 He says to the image in the middle of this holy temple, take dominion over the land, 00:07:07.000 --> 00:07:09.640 subdue the land, be fruitful and multiply. 00:07:09.640 --> 00:07:14.439 He gives us these different commands. 00:07:14.439 --> 00:07:15.800 What's dominion? 00:07:15.800 --> 00:07:21.200 Dominion is the command to be royal agents. 00:07:21.199 --> 00:07:26.159 In other words, he's saying dominion is royal language, it's sovereignty language. 00:07:26.159 --> 00:07:31.120 So it's saying God is king of the world, and you are the vice regent, the little kings 00:07:31.120 --> 00:07:34.680 and queens of the world, the garden that I've put you in. 00:07:34.680 --> 00:07:38.959 So take dominion over the animals, over the land, you're to rule it, you're royal. 00:07:38.959 --> 00:07:43.879 So there's sonship in that, there's inheritance language in that, there's command and power 00:07:43.879 --> 00:07:45.279 in that, it's royal. 00:07:45.279 --> 00:07:51.039 But then he also says subdue, and subdue is the command to work. 00:07:51.040 --> 00:07:57.080 So he says take dominion, you have authority over the creation order, nature itself, and 00:07:57.080 --> 00:08:00.879 now subdue it, meaning work it. 00:08:00.879 --> 00:08:02.640 Subdue means to cultivate. 00:08:02.640 --> 00:08:08.520 So in the Latin translation of the Bible, the word there is used, the word that we get 00:08:08.520 --> 00:08:12.960 culture from to subdue to cultivate. 00:08:12.960 --> 00:08:15.920 And so there's a command right there in the beginning that you have authority over the 00:08:15.920 --> 00:08:18.840 land, you have authority over nature and the things that have been made, and you are to 00:08:18.840 --> 00:08:20.200 work it. 00:08:20.199 --> 00:08:24.920 You're to subdue it, you're to cultivate it, you're to take power over it. 00:08:24.920 --> 00:08:27.719 So multiple ways, one he says be fruitful and multiply. 00:08:27.719 --> 00:08:34.240 So you're to subdue it by building a society, by multiplying people, right, be fruitful and 00:08:34.240 --> 00:08:35.240 multiply. 00:08:35.240 --> 00:08:43.519 You're to cultivate it into a garden we learn in Genesis 2 that it's their work to beautify 00:08:43.519 --> 00:08:45.519 it, to make it into a garden. 00:08:45.519 --> 00:08:49.360 In other words, what's the difference in, what's a garden? 00:08:49.360 --> 00:08:53.240 A garden is what humans make out of wildernesses, right? 00:08:53.240 --> 00:08:56.200 So you have wildernesses and you have gardens. 00:08:56.200 --> 00:09:02.279 And gardens can be beautiful or more beautiful, but all a garden is is a cultivated wilderness, 00:09:02.279 --> 00:09:04.759 something that's been crafted by human hand, right? 00:09:04.759 --> 00:09:09.960 And so he's saying that your job is to be a crafter, a cultivator, a culture maker. 00:09:09.960 --> 00:09:14.159 That means building society, building more people, creating more people and making this 00:09:14.159 --> 00:09:17.320 space into a garden, cultivating it. 00:09:17.320 --> 00:09:24.879 So you can imagine Adam and Eve, you know, maybe they're laying on their backs as the 00:09:24.879 --> 00:09:28.400 sun goes down in the Garden of Eden looking up at the stars. 00:09:28.400 --> 00:09:34.280 And all of a sudden Eve starts to, for the first time in human history, I'm not going 00:09:34.280 --> 00:09:41.080 to try, but hum a little tune, something like, you know, twinkle, twinkle little star, maybe, 00:09:41.080 --> 00:09:44.320 because she's looking up at the stars and there it was, Adam said, I like that. 00:09:44.320 --> 00:09:46.840 That is nice. 00:09:46.840 --> 00:09:49.120 These are the things that are happening. 00:09:49.120 --> 00:09:50.320 This is very selective text. 00:09:50.320 --> 00:09:53.800 We don't know what all happened, but these are the types of things that are happening. 00:09:53.800 --> 00:09:59.240 Music is being cultivated because they're gardeners. 00:09:59.240 --> 00:10:06.040 And this idea of gardening, subduing, taking dominion is the command towards culture, towards 00:10:06.040 --> 00:10:11.600 cultivation at every level, which is just taking the raw materials that God has given 00:10:11.600 --> 00:10:16.200 you and making something of it, all the way to the point of ultimately making society. 00:10:16.200 --> 00:10:18.000 Okay, so that's one thing. 00:10:18.000 --> 00:10:26.560 What we learned, what we learned from that is that one work is prior to the fall. 00:10:26.560 --> 00:10:33.280 And I want to suggest to you, I think the Bible wants us to think that work is everlasting. 00:10:33.280 --> 00:10:37.680 God does not cease to work when he enters Sabbath, not at all. 00:10:37.680 --> 00:10:41.200 Sabbath for God is not a ceasing of his power, his exercise of power. 00:10:41.200 --> 00:10:45.280 It's a transition from creation to providence to preservation. 00:10:45.279 --> 00:10:48.399 But in the end of history, we have the same idea as being brought forward in the book 00:10:48.399 --> 00:10:54.319 of Revelation that we carry on the work of cultivation, that work is everlasting. 00:10:54.319 --> 00:10:55.319 It's never going to stop. 00:10:55.319 --> 00:10:56.639 It's never going to cease. 00:10:56.639 --> 00:10:58.240 Cultivation will never stop. 00:10:58.240 --> 00:11:00.399 Producing of crops will never cease. 00:11:00.399 --> 00:11:04.839 This is going to be the human work for all of eternity, for all of the everlasting life 00:11:04.839 --> 00:11:06.480 that we're going to have. 00:11:06.480 --> 00:11:08.039 And that's because why? 00:11:08.039 --> 00:11:13.439 Because it is essential to what it means to be the image. 00:11:13.440 --> 00:11:19.600 And that's the big idea today, is that to work is essential to the concept of the image 00:11:19.600 --> 00:11:21.400 of God. 00:11:21.400 --> 00:11:22.920 If you're human, you're the image of God. 00:11:22.920 --> 00:11:25.360 And if you're the image of God, then you're made to work. 00:11:25.360 --> 00:11:26.360 It's essential. 00:11:26.360 --> 00:11:30.360 Derek was making that point last week, but we reiterate it here when we look at the image 00:11:30.360 --> 00:11:31.360 itself. 00:11:31.360 --> 00:11:33.080 God is a worker. 00:11:33.080 --> 00:11:34.680 He makes us in his image. 00:11:34.680 --> 00:11:38.000 And it's essential to our being that we do the same, that we work the same, that we create 00:11:38.000 --> 00:11:39.000 culture. 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:44.879 Secondly, 2, 15, then he puts them in the garden, he places them. 00:11:44.879 --> 00:11:50.519 By the way, that phrase there when it says, God took man, Adam, and put him in the garden 00:11:50.519 --> 00:11:52.960 is a planting verb. 00:11:52.960 --> 00:11:59.759 So it's saying that God even plants Adam in the garden and then makes him into the plant 00:11:59.759 --> 00:12:02.080 master, the gardener. 00:12:02.080 --> 00:12:08.799 And it says he tells Adam, he tells the man to work and to keep. 00:12:08.799 --> 00:12:15.599 Now the second command we see from God, take dominion, subdued, be fruitful. 00:12:15.599 --> 00:12:18.399 Chapter two, work and keep the garden. 00:12:18.399 --> 00:12:24.000 Okay, so you have the command to work there, but more substantially, these verbs show up 00:12:24.000 --> 00:12:27.639 in really significant ways across the first five books of the Bible. 00:12:27.639 --> 00:12:33.000 So on several occasions like Deuteronomy 4, work and keep are the verbs that are used 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:36.000 typically for who? 00:12:36.000 --> 00:12:37.679 The priests. 00:12:37.679 --> 00:12:43.399 So this is the same little couple of verbs that we see God use when he tells the priests 00:12:43.399 --> 00:12:47.120 to work and to keep the temple. 00:12:47.120 --> 00:12:51.279 Now there's no surprise in that because this is the temple. 00:12:51.279 --> 00:12:54.719 And so it's not that Adam and Eve are receiving the verbs of the priesthood, it's that the 00:12:54.719 --> 00:12:58.759 priesthood are receiving the verbs of Adam and Eve, the first temple, the Garden of Eden, 00:12:58.759 --> 00:12:59.759 to work and to keep. 00:12:59.759 --> 00:13:05.479 So one scholar writes this, the Hebrew word of God can be translated as to work, to serve, 00:13:05.479 --> 00:13:07.659 or to worship. 00:13:07.659 --> 00:13:12.240 It's the common verb used for cultivating the soil, but it's also commonly used in the 00:13:12.240 --> 00:13:16.759 religious sense of serving God and in all the priestly texts, especially regarding the 00:13:16.759 --> 00:13:18.759 tabernacle duties of the Levites. 00:13:18.759 --> 00:13:24.120 The second word to keep is Shamar, which is commonly used for the priestly service of 00:13:24.120 --> 00:13:30.120 worship as well as in legal texts observing religious commands. 00:13:30.120 --> 00:13:36.600 That means that the first to work is typically used in the rest of the five books to tell 00:13:36.600 --> 00:13:42.399 the priest how to protect the temple. 00:13:42.399 --> 00:13:49.120 The second to keep is a word that is sometimes just simply translated in the context of worship 00:13:49.120 --> 00:13:51.800 commands. 00:13:51.800 --> 00:14:02.240 So he's very literally saying that your job in work is to worship and to guard, to worship 00:14:02.240 --> 00:14:07.799 and protect, to worship and to work. 00:14:07.799 --> 00:14:14.600 So cultivate the land, make a culture, build a society in this space, extend the population 00:14:14.600 --> 00:14:23.120 and the geography, work it, protect it, and worship, but that's what you're made for. 00:14:23.120 --> 00:14:30.519 Worship God in his holy temple, be with God in his holy temple, and protect the temple. 00:14:30.519 --> 00:14:36.639 To make the temple beautiful, protect it at all costs, maintain that beauty, and worship 00:14:36.639 --> 00:14:38.720 all along the way at the very same time. 00:14:38.720 --> 00:14:44.240 Those are the two central commands that humanity is given in the very beginning. 00:14:44.240 --> 00:14:45.799 So what were we made to do? 00:14:45.799 --> 00:14:50.759 We were made to worship and to work in the holy temple of God. 00:14:50.759 --> 00:14:52.679 That's what we see here at the very beginning. 00:14:52.679 --> 00:14:56.879 And those two things are completely integrated. 00:14:56.879 --> 00:15:02.360 In other words, let's put it this way, to give you some takeaways. 00:15:02.360 --> 00:15:10.799 Humanity we today still are made to build God's world, the kingdom. 00:15:10.799 --> 00:15:20.240 This was Adam and Eve's command, in the beginning, into a space that honors God and honors particularly 00:15:20.240 --> 00:15:23.039 his presence. 00:15:23.039 --> 00:15:29.759 So when we work for the good in our lives today, as God defines it, as Christians, we 00:15:29.759 --> 00:15:31.679 do that. 00:15:31.679 --> 00:15:38.319 We seek to go out into the world and as Christians witness to the fact that we were made to build 00:15:38.319 --> 00:15:43.559 a space that is fit for God's presence. 00:15:43.559 --> 00:15:47.399 It's impossible to ask on the one hand in this life, and nevertheless it still remains 00:15:47.399 --> 00:15:51.399 the command that we've been given. 00:15:51.399 --> 00:15:53.519 Their work in the beginning was what? 00:15:53.519 --> 00:15:55.959 Kick evil out. 00:15:55.959 --> 00:15:59.480 Work and keep, meaning protect while you worship. 00:15:59.480 --> 00:16:05.879 And so their job was if any evil enters into this space, you've got to kick it out. 00:16:05.879 --> 00:16:12.959 And so as a worker, as a Christian worker, you are honoring the Amago dei in you. 00:16:12.959 --> 00:16:16.120 You are fulfilling your vocational call as a human. 00:16:16.120 --> 00:16:20.399 When you go to work and you kick evil out. 00:16:20.399 --> 00:16:29.759 So if you're a medical professional and you go every day and work till you drop, as I 00:16:29.759 --> 00:16:39.480 know you do, and you push back the chaos that is unhealth, that is disease, you are doing 00:16:39.480 --> 00:16:45.279 exactly what the image of God was made to do. 00:16:45.279 --> 00:16:48.519 And you can think of a thousand other professions, how this works. 00:16:48.519 --> 00:16:52.199 The question in your profession, one of the first ways that you've got to ask, am I doing 00:16:52.199 --> 00:16:55.000 Christian, Christian work? 00:16:55.000 --> 00:17:00.240 The type of work that God made me for is simply one of the ways are you pushing evil back 00:17:00.240 --> 00:17:03.159 and bringing in the common good. 00:17:03.159 --> 00:17:08.400 You are made to actually build a society that is fit for the condescension of the presence 00:17:08.400 --> 00:17:09.400 of God. 00:17:09.400 --> 00:17:13.000 To build a great city, you might say. 00:17:13.000 --> 00:17:16.519 And Christians have the power and ability to do that in a way that honors God in any 00:17:16.519 --> 00:17:22.279 sphere of life and any domain of life and any type of work capacity. 00:17:22.279 --> 00:17:27.480 Now let me, we don't have too long left. 00:17:27.480 --> 00:17:31.639 When we come to faith in Jesus Christ and we're found in Christ, our salvation, our justification 00:17:31.639 --> 00:17:35.720 being found in Christ restores human beings to their original purpose. 00:17:35.720 --> 00:17:43.000 So here's a little helpful phrase I think, grace, the grace of Jesus restores us to our 00:17:43.000 --> 00:17:45.559 nature. 00:17:45.559 --> 00:17:49.919 So when Jesus Christ comes and meets you and you're saved by him, what's happening? 00:17:49.919 --> 00:17:52.039 He is restoring you. 00:17:52.039 --> 00:17:56.960 That's what sanctification is, the process of restoring you to what a human really is, 00:17:56.960 --> 00:17:58.960 the image of God. 00:17:58.960 --> 00:18:02.759 Grace restores to nature, unto nature. 00:18:02.759 --> 00:18:06.559 Grace restores us to be what we're supposed to be. 00:18:06.559 --> 00:18:14.319 And so when we come to a passage like Peter, 1 Peter 2, Peter says, let me define who the 00:18:14.319 --> 00:18:15.799 people of God are. 00:18:15.799 --> 00:18:18.839 And what does he say? 00:18:18.839 --> 00:18:28.240 They are a royal priesthood because grace restores nature. 00:18:28.240 --> 00:18:32.159 Grace brings you back to what you were meant to be. 00:18:32.159 --> 00:18:38.159 And in the beginning you were meant to be a dumb humanity was meant to be the royal sons 00:18:38.160 --> 00:18:46.759 and daughters of the king in his holy land and at the same time his priests who work, 00:18:46.759 --> 00:18:51.880 who cultivate a beautiful society, who kick any evil serpents that might come in, they 00:18:51.880 --> 00:18:53.800 knock them right out. 00:18:53.800 --> 00:18:54.800 That was their job. 00:18:54.800 --> 00:18:56.400 That's what it means to be a royal priest. 00:18:56.400 --> 00:18:59.560 And Peter says, because you're in Christ, you are now a royal priest. 00:18:59.560 --> 00:19:00.560 You're a priesthood. 00:19:00.560 --> 00:19:04.080 You're a body of atoms and eaves all over again. 00:19:04.079 --> 00:19:09.480 Christ has restored you and is restoring you unto that great end, unto the original purpose 00:19:09.480 --> 00:19:11.519 for what you were made. 00:19:11.519 --> 00:19:15.960 And so that means our duty and work is to witness actually, this is the language of Acts 1, 00:19:15.960 --> 00:19:22.199 to witness to the coming kingdom of God in the way we work as if we were cultivating 00:19:22.199 --> 00:19:25.519 God's garden all over again. 00:19:25.519 --> 00:19:28.919 Pushing back chaos, kicking the serpent out of the land. 00:19:28.919 --> 00:19:31.359 Now are we going to win that battle? 00:19:31.359 --> 00:19:32.960 On our own, absolutely not. 00:19:32.960 --> 00:19:34.680 So on the one hand, we can never do it. 00:19:34.680 --> 00:19:36.079 We can never build this kingdom. 00:19:36.079 --> 00:19:39.680 We can never knock evil out of the park, not at all. 00:19:39.680 --> 00:19:45.120 But it's exactly the command we're given because it's a witness to the future where 00:19:45.120 --> 00:19:46.880 one day God will. 00:19:46.880 --> 00:19:48.680 One day work will be fully restored. 00:19:48.680 --> 00:19:54.079 One day work will be good, tov, completely good again. 00:19:54.079 --> 00:19:56.440 So Christ saves us. 00:19:56.440 --> 00:19:57.440 Christ saves us. 00:19:57.440 --> 00:19:59.240 Another way to say it would be this as we started to close. 00:19:59.240 --> 00:20:05.720 Christ saves us not from culture, but unto it. 00:20:05.720 --> 00:20:08.720 And that's a really important distinction for Christians. 00:20:08.720 --> 00:20:13.319 Christ does not save us from cultivation, which is all culture is. 00:20:13.319 --> 00:20:15.519 He saves us to it. 00:20:15.519 --> 00:20:21.240 He puts a humanity into the world so that they can be the preserving agent, salt. 00:20:21.240 --> 00:20:23.120 He saves us to culture. 00:20:23.120 --> 00:20:29.160 He saves us for the life of the world, not to get away from the life of the world. 00:20:29.160 --> 00:20:34.040 And so that's because we in salvation are restored to what we were made to be the image 00:20:34.040 --> 00:20:35.040 of God. 00:20:35.040 --> 00:20:38.640 All right, so let me give you just a few practical takeaways. 00:20:38.640 --> 00:20:45.000 I'm just going to list these off for us to get a little more specific here, a few little 00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:47.680 things. 00:20:47.680 --> 00:20:49.040 First order of business. 00:20:49.040 --> 00:20:53.920 How does a Christian go then and do work well in the light of their maker and the light 00:20:53.920 --> 00:20:55.279 of being in the image of God? 00:20:55.279 --> 00:21:02.680 Number one, the way to serve God at work first is to do skillful, excellent work. 00:21:02.680 --> 00:21:04.359 That is the first way to honor God. 00:21:04.359 --> 00:21:06.279 That's the first way to be the image of God. 00:21:06.279 --> 00:21:07.279 Right. 00:21:07.279 --> 00:21:08.279 You are the image of God. 00:21:08.279 --> 00:21:09.279 You're to be the image of God. 00:21:09.279 --> 00:21:14.200 It's both as an existential or sorry, essential reality and a command. 00:21:14.200 --> 00:21:15.480 First thing to do do excellent work. 00:21:15.480 --> 00:21:20.879 So you know, there's the famous line from, I think it's an every good endeavor. 00:21:20.880 --> 00:21:25.920 The other famous talk that he gave when he first launched that book. 00:21:25.920 --> 00:21:29.280 How does a Christian be a Christian pilot? 00:21:29.280 --> 00:21:31.480 Some of you know the answer. 00:21:31.480 --> 00:21:36.040 What's his first, what's the first way that a Christian is a pilot and it's he lands the 00:21:36.040 --> 00:21:38.080 plane. 00:21:38.080 --> 00:21:39.760 Nobody dies. 00:21:39.760 --> 00:21:42.720 And that's the way a Christian acts as a pilot. 00:21:42.720 --> 00:21:44.360 He just lands it. 00:21:44.360 --> 00:21:45.720 Right. 00:21:45.720 --> 00:21:48.400 And that's exactly the same for all of us. 00:21:48.400 --> 00:21:49.400 That's the first order of business. 00:21:49.400 --> 00:21:50.760 Do skillful, excellent work. 00:21:50.759 --> 00:21:57.440 And finally, the way to serve God at work is then to have a vision to serve the common 00:21:57.440 --> 00:21:59.079 good. 00:21:59.079 --> 00:22:04.400 So to do work in such a way that it matters for helping society, even in the smallest 00:22:04.400 --> 00:22:05.599 of ways. 00:22:05.599 --> 00:22:06.759 Right. 00:22:06.759 --> 00:22:10.839 So this can happen in all sorts of ways. 00:22:10.839 --> 00:22:11.839 One of the obvious things. 00:22:11.839 --> 00:22:16.000 So back to the medical professional, it's very obvious that every single medical professional 00:22:16.000 --> 00:22:20.720 can choose and is serving the common good as soon as they treat somebody that a lawyer 00:22:20.720 --> 00:22:25.720 can and does serve the common good when they exercise their profession in the right way 00:22:25.720 --> 00:22:30.640 by upholding the law, by seeking the good, by protecting the innocent and judging the 00:22:30.640 --> 00:22:32.720 guilt and seeking judgment for the guilty. 00:22:32.720 --> 00:22:33.720 They're serving the common good. 00:22:33.720 --> 00:22:34.720 Right. 00:22:34.720 --> 00:22:39.240 The school teacher is doing amazing work to serve the common good, to build a great city, 00:22:39.240 --> 00:22:40.640 to build a great society. 00:22:40.640 --> 00:22:41.640 Right. 00:22:41.640 --> 00:22:46.440 Christianity tells us why Christianity tells us why we've got to get away from our individualism 00:22:46.440 --> 00:22:50.039 and serve the corporate and serve the common good that we were actually put in the world 00:22:50.039 --> 00:22:52.399 assault and light to build a great city. 00:22:52.399 --> 00:22:54.159 That's one of our commands. 00:22:54.159 --> 00:22:58.839 This is very clear in the book of Jeremiah in the Babylonian narratives. 00:22:58.839 --> 00:22:59.839 Right. 00:22:59.839 --> 00:23:04.200 What does God say through Jeremiah to the Israelites? 00:23:04.200 --> 00:23:08.519 Do not go build your town, your enclave outside the walls of Babylon. 00:23:08.519 --> 00:23:12.200 No, seek the prosperity of the city. 00:23:12.200 --> 00:23:16.440 Seek the prosperity of every Babylonian, those pagans as they are. 00:23:16.440 --> 00:23:18.119 Most of them hate you. 00:23:18.119 --> 00:23:19.119 Seek their good. 00:23:19.119 --> 00:23:20.119 Seek their peace. 00:23:20.119 --> 00:23:21.119 Seek their prosperity. 00:23:21.119 --> 00:23:22.119 Serve the common good. 00:23:22.119 --> 00:23:25.119 That is the Christian approach, the Christian way to doing work. 00:23:25.119 --> 00:23:30.599 Third, the way to serve God at work a little more acutely is to create beauty and to add 00:23:30.599 --> 00:23:32.239 to God's creation. 00:23:32.239 --> 00:23:39.000 So I was talking earlier today at ETS with some pastors who were doing the revitalization 00:23:39.000 --> 00:23:44.239 program about recovering the spiritual disciplines in the local church. 00:23:44.240 --> 00:23:49.559 And one of the things we were talking about was recovering the spiritual discipline of 00:23:49.559 --> 00:23:55.039 something like, you can call it anything you want, but cultivation, the spiritual discipline 00:23:55.039 --> 00:24:00.920 of gardening, we could say very concretely, very literally, which is that it's been recognized 00:24:00.920 --> 00:24:07.200 throughout 2000 years of church history and beyond that is very important to create beauty 00:24:07.200 --> 00:24:09.039 in some way in the human life. 00:24:09.039 --> 00:24:14.879 And that's actually a discipline, a way of following our Lord, I think. 00:24:14.879 --> 00:24:18.359 So work, remember, we're defining work incredibly broadly. 00:24:18.359 --> 00:24:24.359 Work is not, you know, your employment, work is mothering and fathering, work is gardening, 00:24:24.359 --> 00:24:31.000 work is grocery shopping, work is any activity that's participating in cultivation, cultivation 00:24:31.000 --> 00:24:37.200 that feeds, cultivation that develops, you know, new words, the development of language, 00:24:37.200 --> 00:24:40.720 that's cultivation, thinking is cultivation. 00:24:40.720 --> 00:24:43.779 All of these things are culture making, right? 00:24:43.779 --> 00:24:47.799 One of the things I think we're called to do from Genesis 1 as the image bearers is 00:24:47.799 --> 00:24:55.000 have physical activity in our lives that's productive in some way. 00:24:55.000 --> 00:25:01.799 Whether that is planting flowers or painting or doing anything, fishing, I don't know, 00:25:01.799 --> 00:25:06.039 could be anything, but getting out in the world and getting our hands dirty a little 00:25:06.039 --> 00:25:07.039 bit. 00:25:07.039 --> 00:25:12.599 I mentioned last Sunday that every single rabbi, sorry, every single child in the first 00:25:12.599 --> 00:25:20.279 century, tier one of education is you memorize the Torah, okay, think about that. 00:25:20.279 --> 00:25:24.879 Memorize the Torah word for word, they would chant it, they would sing it to memorize it, 00:25:24.879 --> 00:25:26.519 and learn a physical trade. 00:25:26.519 --> 00:25:30.799 Okay, if you didn't do those two things, you couldn't move on to the next tier of education. 00:25:30.799 --> 00:25:33.440 That was childhood, that was Jesus, that's what Jesus would have done. 00:25:33.440 --> 00:25:38.400 You would have memorized the Torah as a boy and learned to be a handyman, a tecton, right? 00:25:38.400 --> 00:25:40.880 There's something in that, there's a spiritual discipline in that. 00:25:40.880 --> 00:25:45.440 We're made to make beauty, and I think so that's the third. 00:25:45.440 --> 00:25:47.120 Fourth, fourth of six. 00:25:47.120 --> 00:25:55.360 The way to serve God at work is to do everything from the motivation to glorify God in a way 00:25:55.360 --> 00:25:59.519 that relativizes your boss. 00:25:59.519 --> 00:26:05.119 So we'll get into this more next time, but if you don't like your boss, some of you don't 00:26:05.119 --> 00:26:11.440 like your boss, not me. 00:26:11.440 --> 00:26:17.319 But some of you don't like your boss, and it's very important for a Christian who's 00:26:17.319 --> 00:26:24.599 united to Jesus, who's reclaimed their status as developing into full humanity, emago de 00:26:24.599 --> 00:26:31.439 yin, all that it means vocationally to realize that your boss is incredibly relative when 00:26:31.439 --> 00:26:38.079 you have a Christian vision for work, that you work for the Lord, that you do your best 00:26:38.079 --> 00:26:45.240 for the Lord's sake, that you persevere in tough times because of God as your true boss. 00:26:45.240 --> 00:26:48.000 You stand quorum deo before the face of the Lord at all times. 00:26:48.000 --> 00:26:49.879 He sees everything from top to bottom. 00:26:49.879 --> 00:26:51.240 You work for Him. 00:26:51.240 --> 00:26:53.199 You work for Him in your vocation. 00:26:53.200 --> 00:26:59.360 So as jerky as your boss may be, it's important that that gets addressed, but it's also important 00:26:59.360 --> 00:27:04.120 to see that it's relative because you work for the glory of God. 00:27:04.120 --> 00:27:10.880 Fifth, the way to serve God at work is to work with a grateful, joyful, gospel-changed 00:27:10.880 --> 00:27:17.319 heart through all the ups and downs with virtue that's distinct in a way that your 00:27:17.319 --> 00:27:19.160 colleagues notice. 00:27:19.160 --> 00:27:22.480 So a small step towards evangelism, I don't want to talk about evangelism at all today, 00:27:22.480 --> 00:27:24.559 but a small step is this. 00:27:24.559 --> 00:27:29.799 A Christian approach to work is to take the fruit of the spirit into the workplace. 00:27:29.799 --> 00:27:37.200 Love, which is joy, peace, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control, to work in a way 00:27:37.200 --> 00:27:41.839 where gossip no longer pervades your workspace. 00:27:41.839 --> 00:27:46.440 So first Timothy 4, a lot of people don't like this language, but I do. 00:27:46.440 --> 00:27:48.720 Can things be redeemed in this life? 00:27:48.720 --> 00:27:50.120 Absolutely they can. 00:27:50.119 --> 00:27:55.239 Paul says food can be sacrificed to idols dedicated to a pagan God, and then with prayer 00:27:55.239 --> 00:27:58.039 and thanksgiving you can bring it back again. 00:27:58.039 --> 00:28:00.639 Bring it back to its creation purpose. 00:28:00.639 --> 00:28:02.199 Can work be redeemed? 00:28:02.199 --> 00:28:03.279 Absolutely. 00:28:03.279 --> 00:28:07.599 You can take a toxic work environment and bring it back to its creational purpose. 00:28:07.599 --> 00:28:15.519 You can take a broken legal office, a broken medical, a broken hospital, a broken school, 00:28:15.519 --> 00:28:20.079 and a Christian has the power by the Holy Spirit to work in such a way into that space 00:28:20.079 --> 00:28:23.400 where they bring it back to what? 00:28:23.400 --> 00:28:29.599 Not bring it into the glorification, not make Jesus return, sanctify, no, instead what? 00:28:29.599 --> 00:28:32.119 Bring it back to its creation purposes. 00:28:32.119 --> 00:28:35.920 The purposes it's truly made for, to serve the common good. 00:28:35.920 --> 00:28:39.039 The redemption of small things in life, and that's our calling. 00:28:39.039 --> 00:28:45.319 We do that I think in small ways by displaying the virtues, the virtues of Christ Himself. 00:28:45.319 --> 00:28:49.799 So not only following Jesus, but becoming like Him in the way we work. 00:28:49.799 --> 00:28:53.279 Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness. 00:28:53.279 --> 00:28:58.519 Not seeking profit when we're around the table with the board members. 00:28:58.519 --> 00:29:02.359 Not seeking profit at every expense. 00:29:02.359 --> 00:29:03.359 Right? 00:29:03.359 --> 00:29:06.079 Not doing water, cooler, gossip. 00:29:06.079 --> 00:29:08.200 The drama of the workplace. 00:29:08.200 --> 00:29:09.200 Whatever it may be. 00:29:09.200 --> 00:29:13.399 These are little ways that a Christian enacts faithful work. 00:29:13.400 --> 00:29:18.840 I want to mention too, maybe the last one, in the light of being the image of God and 00:29:18.840 --> 00:29:25.800 being renewed into that image, God does want every one of us to seek our God-given joys 00:29:25.800 --> 00:29:31.920 and passions to use your gifts in such a way that you're working for God's glory. 00:29:31.920 --> 00:29:32.920 Right? 00:29:32.920 --> 00:29:36.840 So some of you, we'll talk more about this in the future, and this is the last thing. 00:29:36.840 --> 00:29:42.440 Some of you have found your vocational calling, and you're really satisfied in it. 00:29:42.440 --> 00:29:47.279 And some of you haven't, and you're frustrated in that. 00:29:47.279 --> 00:29:51.960 And we'll get into the details of pastorally of how to deal with that, and probably two 00:29:51.960 --> 00:29:54.080 times from now. 00:29:54.080 --> 00:29:57.799 But let me say that it is a calling in life, even when you're frustrated in the midst of 00:29:57.799 --> 00:30:03.759 your employment, to know that your work is much broader than your employment. 00:30:03.759 --> 00:30:08.400 And that God really has given you particular vocational gifts. 00:30:08.400 --> 00:30:14.560 That vocational gift might be the gift of mercy, the gift of generosity, the gift of 00:30:14.560 --> 00:30:20.080 counsel and encouragement, the gift of service, the gift of teaching. 00:30:20.080 --> 00:30:21.080 Right? 00:30:21.080 --> 00:30:25.840 So you can be employed and at the same time also be seeking your vocational passions, 00:30:25.840 --> 00:30:29.780 your spiritual gifts, and exercising them in any domain of life. 00:30:29.780 --> 00:30:32.440 That is working to God's glory. 00:30:32.440 --> 00:30:35.340 Work is so much bigger and broader than employment. 00:30:35.340 --> 00:30:38.280 And that's one of the many ways that we can do this. 00:30:38.279 --> 00:30:40.960 We've got to stop. 00:30:40.960 --> 00:30:41.960 Let me pray for us. 00:30:41.960 --> 00:30:43.960 Lord, we ask for help. 00:30:43.960 --> 00:30:49.000 For frustrated workers tonight, help us to see the beauty of the call. 00:30:49.000 --> 00:30:55.200 For workers that are satisfied and appreciative and enjoying their work, Lord, we spur them 00:30:55.200 --> 00:30:59.839 on and give us all in both contexts a few things we ask for. 00:30:59.839 --> 00:31:04.519 We ask that you would help us to see the relativity of our boss, that you would help us to see 00:31:04.519 --> 00:31:10.720 that we've been restored to our creation purposes and Christ made able to truly glorify you 00:31:10.720 --> 00:31:16.879 in the way we work, that we are royal and we're priestly, that we're in the world to 00:31:16.879 --> 00:31:21.559 cultivate, to keep, to guard, to protect, to push back the chaos, to witness to your 00:31:21.559 --> 00:31:25.799 great kingdom by kicking out the darkness ourselves. 00:31:25.799 --> 00:31:31.879 And finally, Lord, we ask that you would bring the kingdom to come. 00:31:31.880 --> 00:31:37.080 The space in which we will work and be satisfied, where the thorns and thistles will not push 00:31:37.080 --> 00:31:43.760 back against us, where it will be delightful work and never again labor. 00:31:43.760 --> 00:31:45.560 And so we ask for that in Christ's name. 00:31:45.559 --> 00:32:07.759 God bless.