Your Work Matters To God 12/17/09

My letters in these eNews bulletins, if you haven’t noticed, often revolve around heart issues. “Boarding the Spiritual Mayflower”, “Changing the World”, “Let Your Desires Run”, “What I learned about God from Group Therapy”, etc, all have dealt in one way or another with issues of the heart. My purpose for this is simple: Jesus said, “For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theives, false testmony,
slander. These are what make a man 'unclean” (Matthew 15:19-20). I believe that changing the world in Jesus name will not come about by a focus on policing murderers, thieves, sex offenders and terrorists (although policing is necessary). The world will change when, through a serious consideration of God’s Word, our hearts change.

One way I see our hearts need to change as Christians is in our perspectives on our careers.

For many Christians work and faith have little in common. Work is where we spend most of our time and faith is a weekend hobby. Work is secular. Faith is sacred. Work “has no concern with God. In many ways, it even becomes an enemy to what God really wants done in the world. It takes away from worship, prayer, church activity, evangelism, and family life, which are “sacred” categories. In short, work is something to finish and get out of. There is no inherent dignity in it” (Sherman & Hendricks, 1987, p.46). Work from this perspective is rather purposeless. It also provides easy justification for immoral business practices because it’s not God’s work anyway.

When we fail to simplify all of life into two simple, yet profound, categories (namely loving God and loving people) life becomes complicated and easily unbalanced, especially as it relates to our work. I graduated in 2003 with a BA in Business Management and a BA in Vocational Ministry. Even at the Christian college I attended it was a commonly accepted phrase that one pursues a Business degree in order “to make money” one day. As a manager at Target just a few years back you could have asked me why I worked at Target and I probably would have said “to make money” or some phrase to that effect. Even as you read this, the phrase “to make money” sounds rather common and innocent to you doesn’t it? You might even ask me, “Well obviously one would not start a business for any other reason than “to make money” would they?” Here’s where the heart comes into play.

Since when does a Christian do anything for the purpose of “making money”?

Think about it. When do we see anyone in the bible ever being praised for his/her efforts to acquire money? Never! Quite the contrary. Acts performed in the bible in an effort to “make money” were quickly condemned. Achan lost his life for greedily taking some of the spoil of Jericho (Joshua 7). Judah hung himself out of the guilt of betraying Jesus for thirty pieces of silver (Matthew 27). The rich young ruler in Matthew 10 was told to sell all he had and give to the poor because what he was really after in his life was money. These 3 men were compelled not to serve God or serve people but to “make money” for themselves. Doing something “to make money” is never a good thing. It quickly becomes greedy.

Someone might say, “I am working to make money so that I can feed my family. Is that bad?” No. That’s a good reason to work: to “feed (serve) my family”. Notice the real motive for working is not to “make money” but to serve others. Think about the money changers Jesus put out of business in the temple courts (see Matthew 21). Was Jesus angry at them for being money changers? Was money changing wrong or sinful? No. Money changers served a useful purpose in those days. The problem was that they were not in their profession to “serve” the Jewish community: they were in it to “make money”. And under that motivation they were willing to exploit others monetarily even while standing on God’s toes in the temple courts. Jesus had a keen eye into the heart’s lie and called them what they were: “thieves” (Mt.21:13).

So what does a healthy heart change in regard to our careers look like?

• First of all we must see work as having intrinsic value. If you are a carpenter, you are doing God’s work because your work serves your neighbor well. If you are an accountant you are doing God’s work because your work serves your neighbor well. If you are a teacher you are doing God’s work because your work serves your neighbor well. If you are a liquor store owner, however, you might begin asking yourself if making money off of someone else’s addiction is God’s work. Does it really serve the human community
well? I offer no judgment here, just a question.

• Secondly, if your work can honestly fall under the category of serving the human community well (and therefore serving God well), then the next question is, ‘How does a new perspective of work affect the way you work?’ Christian workers ought to be the best workers. We should not be the ones working “for money”. We should not be the ones standing by watching an employee exploit a customer. We should not be the ones shutting our eyes to management misconduct under the safety-cover of “I’m just here to
get a paycheck”. We should be “working with all of [our hearts] as working for the Lord, not for men” (Col.3:23).

• Thirdly, we must seriously consider how our faith applies at work. God’s work includes service to our neighbor but it also includes turning our neighbors’ hearts to Him. Again the real battle on earth is not against war, poverty and crime- the real battle is against the evil in our hearts which compels us to go to war, leaves impoverished people in poverty and commits hurtful crimes against our neighbors. Ask yourself, “How can God use me at work to turn the hearts of my co-workers heavenward?

I hope as you work today that you will reflect on how your work serves the human community.

Secondly, I hope you will work with all of your heart as you plan for your performance review on Judgment Day.

Lastly, I hope you will be cognizant of the fact that if you are a Chris?an there is a very real presence of God living in you. Let the Spirit of God animate you. May your work be about more than yourself: may it be about accomplishing God’s greater purpose in the world.

Work hard fellow soldiers!
Shaun