WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:11.960 Okay, so we're going to look at the subject of work over the next number of weeks. 00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:16.879 And work is in the first place in our DNA. 00:00:16.879 --> 00:00:20.519 Okay, it's absolutely critical to who we are as human beings. 00:00:20.519 --> 00:00:28.080 It's in our DNA as those that are created by God and it's in our DNA for our lives. 00:00:28.079 --> 00:00:34.839 We've seen it because we are image bearers of the living God ourselves. 00:00:34.839 --> 00:00:40.719 God we're told on the seventh day verse two rested, finished the work that he had done 00:00:40.719 --> 00:00:43.599 and he rested on the seventh day. 00:00:43.599 --> 00:00:51.200 And therefore a very fundamental start starting place for this whole discussion and this whole 00:00:51.200 --> 00:00:55.239 study is recognizing that God himself is a worker. 00:00:55.240 --> 00:00:59.719 Okay, God worked in creation from the very beginning. 00:00:59.719 --> 00:01:02.640 Work is his divine activity. 00:01:02.640 --> 00:01:13.200 He's not a slothful or indigent God where God is revealed in creation as the God who 00:01:13.200 --> 00:01:19.719 brought order and symmetry and imaginative life into the universe. 00:01:19.719 --> 00:01:27.159 So God worked that as we read briefly there and also obviously from Genesis chapter one. 00:01:27.159 --> 00:01:30.920 And the work that God engaged in was perfect. 00:01:30.920 --> 00:01:33.560 It was of the highest standard. 00:01:33.560 --> 00:01:35.239 It was glorious. 00:01:35.239 --> 00:01:43.120 Every atom, every inch, every unseen corner of the creation, there's nothing shoddy and 00:01:43.120 --> 00:01:47.120 nothing half-hearted in the creative work of God. 00:01:47.120 --> 00:01:55.640 And you know we're still finding that out as cameras get to the deepest parts of the 00:01:55.640 --> 00:01:58.560 ocean that have never before been seen. 00:01:58.560 --> 00:02:07.920 And there are creatures there of great intricacy and just a reminder of the creative work of 00:02:07.920 --> 00:02:09.439 the living God. 00:02:09.439 --> 00:02:13.800 And it's work that he delighted in on the seventh day he rested. 00:02:13.800 --> 00:02:15.480 He saw that he had made. 00:02:15.479 --> 00:02:25.000 It was good and it was something that he could luxuriate in at one level because it was so 00:02:25.000 --> 00:02:26.000 perfect. 00:02:26.000 --> 00:02:32.639 And I think probably we all know that feeling ourselves to a degree certainly. 00:02:32.639 --> 00:02:37.799 Maybe we've built something or we've painted something or we've made something and it hasn't 00:02:37.799 --> 00:02:42.000 fallen apart when we've gone to the next day and we look at it and go back and we look 00:02:42.000 --> 00:02:44.479 at it and say, that's quite good. 00:02:44.479 --> 00:02:45.639 I do it all the time. 00:02:45.639 --> 00:02:51.120 I go back to things for weeks, things that I've done because I don't do things very often 00:02:51.120 --> 00:02:52.120 when I do that. 00:02:52.120 --> 00:02:53.120 Enjoy that. 00:02:53.120 --> 00:02:54.280 That was nice. 00:02:54.280 --> 00:03:03.359 And it's something that is intrinsic within us when we create or when we achieve, when 00:03:03.359 --> 00:03:09.759 we do something of value, we like to go back and consider it and meditate on it. 00:03:09.759 --> 00:03:17.599 So God is a God who works, he worked in creation and he's also a God who continued to work 00:03:17.599 --> 00:03:21.879 and continues to work sustaining that creation right from the very beginning. 00:03:21.879 --> 00:03:29.479 He appointed humanity to have a duty of care over the world that he had made and he provides 00:03:29.479 --> 00:03:30.479 for them. 00:03:30.479 --> 00:03:34.039 He provides for them a garden and he provides for Adam company. 00:03:34.039 --> 00:03:38.919 And even when they're expelled from the garden, he's the God who keeps on working. 00:03:38.919 --> 00:03:46.599 We were going to sing, if we had a presenter tonight, some verses from Psalm 104 which 00:03:46.599 --> 00:03:51.519 speaks about the creation and how God sustains and keeps working in that creation, giving 00:03:51.519 --> 00:03:58.119 food to all or Psalm 145 caring for the needs of all, even those who reject him. 00:03:58.119 --> 00:04:03.560 And Matthew 5, 45 tells us, he causes the sun to rise and the evil and the good and 00:04:03.560 --> 00:04:06.399 sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. 00:04:06.400 --> 00:04:11.439 So there's this ongoing providential work and care of God, not just in creation but 00:04:11.439 --> 00:04:13.640 in sustaining that creation. 00:04:13.640 --> 00:04:20.280 So just by way of introduction, we've got that reality that God is a work in God. 00:04:20.280 --> 00:04:29.560 And that is as image bearers where we recognise the significance and importance of work for 00:04:29.560 --> 00:04:30.560 us. 00:04:30.560 --> 00:04:37.120 In Genesis 1, 27, we're told that we are made in this image and he goes on to encourage 00:04:37.120 --> 00:04:44.000 humanity to subdue the earth, to work in the created world. 00:04:44.000 --> 00:04:52.879 Now there by way of recognition, we're reminding ourselves that work at that basic level is 00:04:52.879 --> 00:04:56.000 not unnecessary evil. 00:04:56.000 --> 00:05:03.600 Work reflects the character of God but also it was instituted before the fall. 00:05:03.600 --> 00:05:10.639 So it's something that is significant and important to us as human beings, hugely significant 00:05:10.639 --> 00:05:16.480 to us as human beings, the concept and the reality and the importance of work. 00:05:16.480 --> 00:05:25.360 And I think even the life work balance that is given to us in creation of six and one, 00:05:25.360 --> 00:05:33.360 the proportionality of that suggests the significance of work as a percentage of the whole of our 00:05:33.360 --> 00:05:35.439 lives as it were. 00:05:35.439 --> 00:05:42.439 And that six to one ratio goes right through the commands of God that he gives us. 00:05:42.439 --> 00:05:46.160 And in the Old Testament, we see that with the addition of festivals and Sabbath weeks 00:05:46.160 --> 00:05:48.240 and Sabbath years. 00:05:48.240 --> 00:05:57.519 He gives us that fundamental value and significance in being those who are workers. 00:05:57.519 --> 00:06:07.000 We're delegated stewards or vice-regents of this created order that he made at the beginning. 00:06:07.000 --> 00:06:14.079 Subduing the earth, chapter 1 verse 28, it's an interesting word. 00:06:14.079 --> 00:06:20.839 It's a word we would associate actually with enslavement. 00:06:20.839 --> 00:06:28.159 There's I think ideas there of making the ground, making the earth work for you, being 00:06:28.159 --> 00:06:32.279 sovereign over it, having a good authority over it. 00:06:32.279 --> 00:06:39.360 And maybe that is highlighted further in the verse we read, the last verse we read, or 00:06:39.360 --> 00:06:44.160 the second last verse we read there, the Lord commanded the man saying, you shall, sorry, 00:06:44.160 --> 00:06:48.879 the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of him to work it, to keep it, to care 00:06:48.879 --> 00:06:50.600 for it. 00:06:50.600 --> 00:06:57.800 So there was both a sense of protective care and oversight and also a real sense of genuine 00:06:57.800 --> 00:06:58.800 labour. 00:06:58.800 --> 00:07:05.680 It's going to use sweat, but maybe we think more of sweat coming from the sweat of your 00:07:05.680 --> 00:07:07.280 brow with the curse. 00:07:07.279 --> 00:07:13.759 But there's a real sense in which that making the land work, subduing the earth, gives the 00:07:13.759 --> 00:07:17.000 idea that there was much still to be done. 00:07:17.000 --> 00:07:23.879 God created this prototypical universe and yet he gave man the delegated power and authority 00:07:23.879 --> 00:07:36.719 to further develop and build that world in which he set us. 00:07:36.720 --> 00:07:44.120 And beyond that, not only humanity and reflecting God, we see maybe in the perfect example of 00:07:44.120 --> 00:07:51.960 Jesus Christ who said in John 5, 17, my father is always at work to this very day, providential 00:07:51.960 --> 00:07:56.080 care and I too am working. 00:07:56.080 --> 00:08:04.000 And there's that sense in which Christ himself recognises he comes with a specific work to 00:08:04.000 --> 00:08:05.000 do. 00:08:05.000 --> 00:08:10.240 He comes physically and manually, but we also know he came with a salvivic work to do. 00:08:10.240 --> 00:08:20.920 And it seems all fused together that God himself in work and God himself in salvation, not 00:08:20.920 --> 00:08:31.959 in creation, but in recreation continues to be a working God and Christ hints at that 00:08:31.959 --> 00:08:35.159 in what he says in that verse. 00:08:35.159 --> 00:08:43.519 So if there's that reality that God is a working God, even in Simon, and that we are 00:08:43.519 --> 00:08:51.679 made in this image and work was given to us before the fall is not a necessary evil, it 00:08:51.679 --> 00:08:54.720 is fundamental to our make up and to our being. 00:08:54.720 --> 00:08:57.079 What can we say about work? 00:08:57.080 --> 00:09:03.560 Well, we can appreciate it as being something that is fundamentally good. 00:09:03.560 --> 00:09:09.680 We will look in later weeks at the effect of the fall and of sin on our ability to work 00:09:09.680 --> 00:09:13.320 and our enjoyment of work. 00:09:13.320 --> 00:09:20.000 But work is critical to our humanity as image bearers and I'm not just necessarily always 00:09:20.000 --> 00:09:27.759 speaking there obviously about employment, but it's about being useful, serving in whatever 00:09:27.759 --> 00:09:33.399 context that we find ourselves in using our life and our time effectively for the benefit 00:09:33.399 --> 00:09:37.240 and the good of others and to the glory of God. 00:09:37.240 --> 00:09:42.720 And you know what it's like not to have any kind of purpose and direction in life. 00:09:42.720 --> 00:09:46.360 There's a great inner sense of loss and emptiness. 00:09:46.360 --> 00:09:50.360 If we don't have that direction and purpose in our lives. 00:09:50.360 --> 00:09:56.560 So we appreciate work as a fundamentally God-given good thing for us. 00:09:56.560 --> 00:10:02.360 I think we also recognize, touched on this, the structure of work and rest is a God-given 00:10:02.360 --> 00:10:03.360 one. 00:10:03.360 --> 00:10:12.399 So that I think that six in one pattern reflects the kind of model of a life work balance that 00:10:12.399 --> 00:10:18.519 we should consider and value. 00:10:18.519 --> 00:10:24.199 Work therefore is not something Dorothy Sayers says work is not primarily a thing one does 00:10:24.199 --> 00:10:29.919 to live, but the thing one lives to do. 00:10:29.919 --> 00:10:33.919 And that's a significant and important reality for us. 00:10:33.919 --> 00:10:41.799 We don't simply work to earn in order to live our best life, which would be the opinion 00:10:41.799 --> 00:10:44.039 of many people today. 00:10:44.039 --> 00:10:52.719 Work is the best part of our life because that is the life that God has designed us to live. 00:10:52.719 --> 00:10:55.240 We don't work for the weekends. 00:10:55.240 --> 00:10:57.759 We don't work to live for pleasure. 00:10:57.759 --> 00:11:03.519 We don't work to fund a lavish lifestyle that allows us to luxuriate. 00:11:03.519 --> 00:11:08.679 We work for the glory of God and we work because we were created to do so. 00:11:08.679 --> 00:11:14.319 And his structure for us highlights that. 00:11:14.319 --> 00:11:18.959 Going on to become God's command for us is in the sacred manment to work and rest. 00:11:18.959 --> 00:11:25.879 And rest itself, of course, is to be enjoyed in and of itself for God's glory and for our 00:11:25.879 --> 00:11:26.879 good. 00:11:26.879 --> 00:11:31.879 It's not just for re-energization, which is significant, of course, for us, but we know 00:11:31.879 --> 00:11:36.439 that God rested on the seventh day, giving us a model and a pattern. 00:11:36.440 --> 00:11:38.880 And he didn't do it in a utilitarian way. 00:11:38.880 --> 00:11:46.440 He didn't need to rest simply for a blessed enjoyment of all that had been created. 00:11:46.440 --> 00:11:52.320 And therefore we rest not simply to have more energy to work. 00:11:52.320 --> 00:11:56.560 We recognize the value and the significance and the importance of rest and worship in 00:11:56.560 --> 00:12:05.080 our lives also so that work doesn't become an idol to us, which it can easily do. 00:12:05.080 --> 00:12:08.560 So the structure of work is God-given. 00:12:08.560 --> 00:12:16.800 Therefore when we think of who God is and who we are, we recognize that all work has 00:12:16.800 --> 00:12:27.320 dignity with the caveat of work that is legitimate and legal, obviously not exploitative and 00:12:27.320 --> 00:12:28.920 not sinful in any way. 00:12:28.920 --> 00:12:34.840 But all work is and has dignity. 00:12:34.840 --> 00:12:41.920 And this is where I think sometimes we can challenge ourselves a little bit. 00:12:41.920 --> 00:12:48.879 I would argue that Christianity in the West has two historical hangovers. 00:12:48.879 --> 00:12:58.960 And the first is that of Greek philosophical thought, where in the Greek mindset, the material 00:12:58.960 --> 00:13:04.879 world was temporary and therefore work was really a curse. 00:13:04.879 --> 00:13:13.080 And work that required the mind rather than the body was more noble and more significant. 00:13:13.080 --> 00:13:18.440 Slaves, lesser people did the manual work. 00:13:18.440 --> 00:13:25.280 The elite devoted themselves to exercising the mind in art and philosophy and politics. 00:13:25.279 --> 00:13:31.600 Aristotle said some people are born to be slaves. 00:13:31.600 --> 00:13:39.759 And I think that there's a hangover of that mindset in Western thinking and sometimes 00:13:39.759 --> 00:13:47.360 in our Christian thinking as well, where we think that low status work is undignified 00:13:47.360 --> 00:13:53.639 and looked down on as if it's lesser and more insignificant. 00:13:53.639 --> 00:14:03.199 I think the division in the knowledge classes and the poorly renumerated service sector 00:14:03.199 --> 00:14:06.120 is something that's very evident in the society in which we live. 00:14:06.120 --> 00:14:11.919 And sometimes the thinking behind that spills into our own thinking as Christians, where 00:14:11.919 --> 00:14:20.319 we think some work is much more significant and much more important than other works. 00:14:20.320 --> 00:14:27.000 I can think of some churches in different parts of the world. 00:14:27.000 --> 00:14:35.720 And this may spill over into a racial misunderstanding also, of course, where if you look on our 00:14:35.720 --> 00:14:42.800 website and see all the significant and important jobs in the church, they're all done by white 00:14:42.800 --> 00:14:48.840 people until you come to the cleaner or the caretaker. 00:14:48.840 --> 00:14:55.920 And that is either someone who's black or Hispanic, as if there's some kind of value 00:14:55.920 --> 00:15:00.759 division in the race and in the job itself. 00:15:00.759 --> 00:15:06.560 And indeed in our own denomination and our own background, I certainly grew up with the 00:15:06.560 --> 00:15:13.519 assumption, just with the unspoken assumption that you would go to university, you would 00:15:13.519 --> 00:15:18.440 strive to go to university to better yourself. 00:15:18.440 --> 00:15:22.120 But that was simply an unspoken assumption. 00:15:22.120 --> 00:15:25.520 Well, look where I ended up. 00:15:25.520 --> 00:15:26.520 Disaster. 00:15:26.520 --> 00:15:33.440 But you know, there's that, an apprenticeship was never considered, was never offered, was 00:15:33.440 --> 00:15:39.800 never something that was regarded as having value or significance. 00:15:39.800 --> 00:15:41.960 When we ask people, what's your job? 00:15:41.960 --> 00:15:44.640 Oh, you're just a nanny. 00:15:44.639 --> 00:15:51.199 A street cleaner, a labourer, as if it's somehow less significant and less important. 00:15:51.199 --> 00:15:58.279 How many joiners are plumbers or scaffolders do we have in St Seas? 00:15:58.279 --> 00:16:01.480 We're a middle class educated people. 00:16:01.480 --> 00:16:09.840 And I think sometimes that's just socioeconomic, the way that we mix with one another. 00:16:09.840 --> 00:16:16.280 But sometimes it may be because we've assumed that these jobs and the advancement of these 00:16:16.280 --> 00:16:21.680 kind of jobs and these kind of careers are more honouring to God. 00:16:21.680 --> 00:16:22.680 And that's unhelpful. 00:16:22.680 --> 00:16:25.360 And I think it's unbiblical. 00:16:25.360 --> 00:16:29.800 It's all work as dignity. 00:16:29.800 --> 00:16:34.440 And the Bible makes that clear. 00:16:34.440 --> 00:16:42.040 A second hangover, and I'm not sure where this comes from because I'm not great at working 00:16:42.040 --> 00:16:46.720 out where these things come from. 00:16:46.720 --> 00:16:50.800 But it might be one that's useful for discussion. 00:16:50.800 --> 00:17:02.160 Where we do recognise that the Bible values all work, whether it's professional or manual, 00:17:02.159 --> 00:17:07.039 in terms of employment, all work is dignified. 00:17:07.039 --> 00:17:14.599 And I think there's a misconception that full time Christian work is more important than 00:17:14.599 --> 00:17:15.599 other work. 00:17:15.599 --> 00:17:20.839 That it's more significant than other work. 00:17:20.839 --> 00:17:25.680 And I would question whether that's the case. 00:17:25.680 --> 00:17:30.240 We may be able to argue it from different places. 00:17:30.240 --> 00:17:37.160 But I think God in creation was a manual worker, a labourer, fashioning as it were. 00:17:37.160 --> 00:17:40.359 Jesus was a carpenter. 00:17:40.359 --> 00:17:46.799 And Katrina will tell you how often I crave manual labour and to spend some time doing 00:17:46.799 --> 00:17:50.519 physical activity in that way. 00:17:50.519 --> 00:17:55.799 But I'm not sure if it's justified biblically to say that full time Christian service is 00:17:55.799 --> 00:18:00.839 more important or more significant in God's eyes than any other work. 00:18:00.839 --> 00:18:02.839 It's certainly a greater privilege. 00:18:02.839 --> 00:18:07.839 And with greater privilege comes greater responsibility. 00:18:07.839 --> 00:18:13.440 But I think that's true of you all, whatever gifts God has given you, to whom more has 00:18:13.440 --> 00:18:15.879 been given, more will be required. 00:18:15.879 --> 00:18:24.680 And that would be true for someone in the higher echelons of business or education as 00:18:24.680 --> 00:18:27.039 it would be for ministry. 00:18:27.039 --> 00:18:37.200 I don't think jobs outside of the church are any less significant in God's eyes. 00:18:37.200 --> 00:18:41.200 I would argue all work is a calling. 00:18:41.200 --> 00:18:47.279 And the dignity of our work comes from the gifts we've been given and the fact that God 00:18:47.279 --> 00:18:51.279 has us working for him in his kingdom. 00:18:51.279 --> 00:18:58.079 And so the reality, I think, is the dignity of our work comes from that and should come 00:18:58.079 --> 00:18:59.680 from that as Christians. 00:18:59.680 --> 00:19:09.440 But as often, I think, we find ourselves looking for dignity in our work because of its status 00:19:09.440 --> 00:19:14.599 or the renumeration that we get from it or the respect that gives us in the community 00:19:14.599 --> 00:19:19.000 or the advancement that we might be able to achieve from it or the influence that we 00:19:19.000 --> 00:19:26.680 feel we have, rather than recognizing that the dignity of our work comes from who we 00:19:26.680 --> 00:19:35.559 are in Christ and recognizing his place in our hearts. 00:19:35.559 --> 00:19:40.920 One Corinthians 10, 31, so whether you eat or whether you drink, whatever you do, do 00:19:40.920 --> 00:19:43.480 it all to the glory of God. 00:19:43.480 --> 00:19:47.720 Whatever you do, Colossians 3 and Word, indeed do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, 00:19:47.720 --> 00:19:50.880 giving thanks to God the Father through him. 00:19:50.880 --> 00:20:00.480 I don't think caring and cultivating for the material world has any less worth to God 00:20:00.480 --> 00:20:04.000 than anything else that we might do. 00:20:04.000 --> 00:20:11.039 Because we recognize, unlike our Greek philosophical forefathers, that the ultimate fulfillment 00:20:11.039 --> 00:20:18.279 of redemption is both spiritual and physical, as is the redemption of a physical universe, 00:20:18.279 --> 00:20:22.039 as well as our souls. 00:20:22.039 --> 00:20:30.240 Secular, therefore, no less than sacred, if you want to use that rather unhelpful divide, 00:20:30.240 --> 00:20:36.879 doesn't exist in the eyes of God in terms of significance and importance. 00:20:36.880 --> 00:20:44.920 Because I think the subtext of that is if you're not in full-time Christian work, it's 00:20:44.920 --> 00:20:54.120 not that important, or it's not a calling, or I'm not a missionary in that environment. 00:20:54.120 --> 00:21:04.080 And yet, practically, as I see it in reality, your positions in the workplace and in the 00:21:04.079 --> 00:21:14.399 academy and in the home and everywhere else has as much or if not much more influence 00:21:14.399 --> 00:21:20.240 in terms of spreading the gospel and being light in darkness than a full-time Christian 00:21:20.240 --> 00:21:29.039 worker who hides behind the walls of the church or within the Christian community. 00:21:29.039 --> 00:21:36.119 The Holy Spirit is both a gardener in Psalm 104 verse 30, Psalm 65, talks about renewing 00:21:36.119 --> 00:21:42.480 the ground by watering it, and also a preacher, John 16, 8, to allow anybody to convict the 00:21:42.480 --> 00:21:47.000 world of sin, righteousness, and judgment to come. 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:52.639 So I think these are two hangovers that will be worth all of your time discussing at Citigroup 00:21:52.639 --> 00:21:54.159 and involving others in that. 00:21:54.160 --> 00:22:03.640 I just want to finish with some facts, some gospel facts that I got from the London Institute 00:22:03.640 --> 00:22:15.360 of Contemporary Christianity, that Jesus told 52 parables, 45, at a workplace context. 00:22:15.359 --> 00:22:24.519 That records 40 divine interventions, 39 of them were in the marketplace. 00:22:24.519 --> 00:22:31.719 Jesus spent his adult life as a carpenter until the age of 30 when he began a public 00:22:31.719 --> 00:22:36.039 preaching ministry in the workplace. 00:22:36.039 --> 00:22:46.119 Jesus called 12 workplace individuals, not clergy, to build his church. 00:22:46.119 --> 00:22:53.079 You can argue they became clergy, but the fact is there nonetheless. 00:22:53.079 --> 00:22:55.559 Work is worship. 00:22:55.559 --> 00:23:03.119 In the summer we're going to look in our morning worship at one chapter the whole summer, 00:23:03.119 --> 00:23:07.559 Romans 12, about living sacrifices, whole and acceptable to God. 00:23:07.559 --> 00:23:14.239 This is your spiritual act, the worship service, and we recognize that the Hebrew word avoda 00:23:14.239 --> 00:23:17.679 is the root word both for work and for worship. 00:23:17.679 --> 00:23:22.159 So all our lives, you know, it's this whole divide that you come to church and you worship 00:23:22.159 --> 00:23:28.319 and you do Christian things, but that gives you the six days of the week to just do your 00:23:28.319 --> 00:23:29.319 own thing. 00:23:29.319 --> 00:23:37.519 And that is often been, I think, in our tradition, sometimes the way we've thought. 00:23:37.519 --> 00:23:41.720 Work in its different forms is mentioned more than 800 times in the Bible, more than all 00:23:41.720 --> 00:23:46.359 the words used to express worship, music, praise and sign combined. 00:23:46.359 --> 00:23:53.720 54% of Jesus' reported teaching ministry arose out of issues posed by others in the 00:23:53.720 --> 00:23:58.000 scope of daily life experience. 00:23:58.000 --> 00:24:05.960 But I think we're designed by God for work and God gives our work dignity. 00:24:05.960 --> 00:24:13.480 And I think there's a lot of things to discuss within that and you need to agree with everything 00:24:13.480 --> 00:24:14.480 that I said. 00:24:14.480 --> 00:24:21.519 But the challenge is to think a little bit about the significance and importance of work 00:24:21.519 --> 00:24:30.160 in your lives and your calling, your gifting where God has placed you, why he's placed 00:24:30.160 --> 00:24:41.720 you there and how you can serve him best there as Christian workers in this kingdom. 00:24:41.720 --> 00:24:45.599 Amen. 00:24:45.599 --> 00:24:46.599 Okay. 00:24:46.599 --> 00:24:52.599 Anyone get any questions? 00:24:52.599 --> 00:25:00.879 Come on, I'm sure you have. 00:25:00.879 --> 00:25:07.319 Sure you didn't agree with me. 00:25:07.319 --> 00:25:08.959 I could see some tight faces. 00:25:08.959 --> 00:25:11.279 I'm not sure about that. 00:25:11.279 --> 00:25:18.279 I've had that before. 00:25:18.279 --> 00:25:44.279 I think there's a new system of work in the labor. 00:25:44.279 --> 00:25:56.879 I think there may be a difference, particularly since the fall, that has made work cursed 00:25:56.879 --> 00:26:00.680 like everything else. 00:26:00.680 --> 00:26:13.720 But I guess sometimes the labor can be just as intense in a professional, warm, exclusive 00:26:13.720 --> 00:26:19.000 environment as it can in digging a ditch in the wet. 00:26:19.000 --> 00:26:27.759 But I used to talk about these guys that, stone masons of the churches in Edinburgh, 00:26:27.759 --> 00:26:33.000 remember the apocryphal story, I don't know if it is or not, about one of them who's asked, 00:26:33.000 --> 00:26:38.440 why do you bother going into such detail with these stone carvings that are going to be 200 00:26:38.440 --> 00:26:40.600 feet up in the air and no one will see? 00:26:40.599 --> 00:26:46.319 I'm not doing it to be seen, I'm doing it for the glory of God. 00:26:46.319 --> 00:26:53.119 It's that whole attitude of working, whether we're seen or not, to the glory of God. 00:26:53.119 --> 00:26:56.119 We do our best. 00:26:56.119 --> 00:26:58.319 We don't skimp and save. 00:26:58.319 --> 00:27:06.240 We don't do things half-heartedly because the boss isn't watching or because we're looking 00:27:06.240 --> 00:27:11.480 to get home early for whatever reason, we want to glorify God in all that we do and do our 00:27:11.480 --> 00:27:19.120 very best, whether it's seen or not, by our colleagues or our family or by people around 00:27:19.120 --> 00:27:27.240 us we do it because the eye of God is on us and everything that we do. 00:27:27.240 --> 00:27:36.880 And that's, I think, part of this kind of introductory thought this evening.