T.G.I.F. – T.G.I.F. (Thank God Its Friday)

Welcome to February 2014. What was your first month of 2014 like? Did it feel like a Monday or a Friday? Or a Wednesday?

We have been talking about Stepping Out to make a difference at home, at work in the community generally. We want to focus on the workplace and get to understand what stepping out means in what you do between Monday and Friday.

This series is for you, wherever you are. You may be in between jobs. You will get to learn how to prepare for your next job. As an entrepreneur or self-employed person, this series is most relevant. As an employee, you will learn principles to apply at work. As a government official or politician, you are in the right place.

Are you bored by your work and wondering what lasting value there is to it? Are you skeptical as to the relevance of faith in the rigors of secular work or the business world? Do you struggle with the cost of integrity and need inspiration to keep your ethical edge? Have you wondered how you can positively influence your coworkers and change the workplace? This is your series. You do not want to miss any of the four weeks.

How would you describe your workplace?

How many of you would say the workplace feels like: Pressure cooker? Hospital ceiling (boring)? Battle zone? Roller coaster? ATM machine (it’s about the check)? Gym (stretch, pain and satisfaction)?

T.G.I.F – the celebration of Fridays shows that either most people do not love their workplace (specifically deadlines and targets and supervisors) or they just love rest.

Facts about work

• You spend about 60-80 % of your productive time at work
• Less that 20% of the people are excited to go to work
• For most people work is not meaningful or connected to one’s purpose
• Work will either make you miserable or fulfilled
• Life without work is depressing – work is central to who we are
• For most people work is mainly about the money

4 Myths about Work

1. Work is cursed!

Most people believe that work is hard and frustrating because God cursed it in Genesis. And we can do nothing about it.  After Adam and Eve disobeyed, God told the man:

“Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground.” (Genesis 3:17-19)

Is it true that work is cursed? Well, the ground was cursed and work attracted sweat and toil.  But before the fall, man was intended to work and to eat the fruit of his labor. Genesis 2:15-16: The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the LORD God commanded the man, ‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden.’”

Man was placed in the Garden of Pleasure to work and get fruit out of him labor. God worked for six days before he rested. Jesus was a carpenter for many years. The disciples Jesus invited to work with him were fishermen and tax collectors and a politician (zealot).  I love the way Bill Hybels puts it: “Labor was not punishment; neither was it an afterthought. Labor was the design. It was God’s way of filling man’s days with pleasant, meaningful activity.”

God places value in work. “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” (Ephesians 2:10) There is a potential for work to be deeply satisfying, but also for it to be full of despair and futility.

2. Work is secular and there is no place for faith!

In church we get to worship God and do ministry. Between Monday and Saturday we get to serve Caesar. There is nothing spiritual about engineering, medicine, teaching, accounts, carpentry and farming. In fact, it is without God.

The dualism tends to put ministry at church at a higher spiritual level. So people volunteer and give in church as a way of gaining favor before God and covering for the sins at work. It was Greek philosophy that introduced this dualism to Christianity. Plato considered the spiritual higher and the material lesser. Western thought and education embraced that. Ministry was only seen as what we do in church and for the poor.

In the Bible, all is life is lived before God. Paul did tent-making and preaching as both ministry. When Zachueus coverted, we are not told Jesus asked him to quit Jerusalem Revenue Services. Some of the most celebrated heroes of the Bible were not church priests. Joseph was a manager and a public servant. Daniel a public official. Nehemiah a governor.  Noah was a farmer. Luke was a medical practitioner.

You can be just as spiritual at work as in church. Your work is ministry as well.

3. Life is all about Career.

Many people idolize career. They will do anything to advance their career – work late, work out of town away from family for days on end, compromise on ethics if that is what it takes, endure lots of pain and humiliation and even denounce marriage. Career at all cost.

Life is about purpose. Your vocation is broader than a career. God wants to do a whole lot through you. Your career is only one of those expressions. You could be great in the kingdom anywhere, and greatness is not equals to career. It is the calling that drives work or career. Career could be set apart for a greater work.

4. One cannot find their calling or purpose at work.

The Nazis in one concentration camp made men carry soil from one part of the field to another. And then right back. All day, all week. What happened? The men lost meaning to life. They were ready to die.”

This fourth myth will be at center of our discussion this month. The truth is, you can and must find your purpose and calling in and beyond work.

The story of Daniel and his friends  is relevant to our investigation. We will refer to this biblical story all month to find guidance.  Today we start by reading… Daniel 1: 1 – 9

Daniel and his friends found themselves in a foreign country for no fault of their own. Their ancestors had rebelled against God and now they were in exile as a result. Babylon was a different place. The people did not have faith in the God of Israel. Their values were different, as we shall see next week. It was like hell for the children of Israel.

We see three things from this text:

One: It was in this place that God placed the young Jewish men. Notice verse 2: “And the Lord delivered…” However you got to your position, you can make it a God-posting! In Babylon – a wicked and idolatrous system, God placed his choice young men. You are placed or positioned by God for a purpose.

Are there some placements that are clearly not of God? Yes.

• If the nature of job or business is innately sinful e.g. Rahab’s profession, illegal trade or destructive work.

• If the placement contradicts your core values and there is no way around it. Examples – If it takes you away from family or compromises your ability to tell the truth or live upright.

Believers live in the marketplace; they visit their local congregations only once or twice a week. God has placed you in your workplace for a reason. It is God’s posting.

Two: These young men had been wired for the job. Verse 4: They had the gift mix and potential to enter the King’s service. You have been gifted and wired in a certain way to find your purpose in work. It is possible to do a job that satisfies you and calls you out.

Purpose may be in the job or the way you do it. For example, you may sell for an insurance firm and be gifted in connecting with people. Your purpose may be connecting with people and reaching out to them and the insurance job becomes an excuse. Work is thus a platform for you to find fulfillment and fulfill purpose.

To find one’s work is to find one’s place in the world. – Richard C. Cabot

Work is not primarily a thing one does to live, but the thing one lives to do. It is, or should be, the full expression of the worker’s faculties, the thing in which he finds spiritual, mental, and bodily satisfaction, and the medium in which he offers himself to God. – Dorothy L. Sayers

Three: The young men were trained so as to grow into their position. We can only grow to fully express what God has given us as we train and stretch. They were trained for 3 years. (Verse 5)

Your work is a very scared matter. God delights in it, and through it, he wants to bestow his blessings on you. This praise of work should be inscribed on all tools, on the forehead and the faces that sweat from toiling. – Martin Luther

This is the key lesson for us today:

Work is a platform to live out your purpose and to honor God!

John Stott said it: “ Work is the expenditure of energy (manual or mental or both) in the service of others, which brings fulfillment to the worker, benefit to the community and glory to God.”

Monday can and should make lots of sense. For that to happen, you need to do 3 things (ABCs):

1. Attitude change – Begin to see work not as meaningless or only worth the check, but as a placement by God!
2. Bring God in – Surrender your work and time at work to God. Realize he is interested in every bit of what you do.
3. Commit to growth – You honor God as you unleash all the potential and gifting that God gave you. If it’s in music, be the best. In leadership, grow and stretch. In business, show what God gave you.

Work is a platform to live out your purpose and to honor God!

Paul encouraged the Colossians to give their best to work. “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ Jesus you are serving.” (Colossians 3:23 – 24)

Work with all your heart. God is your boss. Serve him with your work.

What if we saw work as ministry posting, a platform God gives us. What if we resolved every Monday morning to fulfill purpose and honor God? I believe there would be centers for this wonderful kingdom across the city. And the workplace would be a better place for everyone.

Remember: Work is a platform to live out your purpose and to honor God!

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