Making good work

Ben Green | Colossians 3:22-4:1 

Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to curry their favour, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.

Work of some sort, whether paid or unpaid, is a fact of life for just about all of us. Since we live in a broken world, how can we restore the true God-given nature of work? Ben addresses this question in this short talk. During the service there was additional teaching in a video, produced by the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity, which we can't include here for copyright reasons. A summary is included below.

The recording begins with the reading from Simon Jones.

An edited video recording of the Sunday service can be viewed on YouTube.

Teaching video summary:

Mark Greene, who devised the series we are following, asked why the things we do from day to day matter to God?

Colossians 3:23 says, “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as for the Lord... it is the Lord Christ you are serving“.

Our everyday actions (all of them!) matter because we are doing them for God. If we do something for someone we love, we do it enthusiastically, carefully, as well as we can. If it‘s for God, we also do it worshipfully, for his glory.

Keith is a decorator who, when he first started out, just did it as a job to earn money. A car crash made him rethink his priorities and he decided to earn so that he could give a lot away to the church and other charities.

Only later did Keith realise that his work enabled others to live the lives they were meant to lead. He helped people who could not maintain their own properties. He served God by serving people and improving their lives.

Work is a gift by which we can serve God. Everything can be done in a way which benefits others: stacking goods on shelves so that the labels face outwards, emptying bins in a way that leaves the place tidy, designing computers so that they are easy and pleasant to use.

In the Genesis account of creation, humans are created only when there is a garden for them to look after. A loving God created the context for human flourishing through purposeful work.

The Fall meant that work would become a lot harder, with frustrations and disappointment, but its original purpose survives. Christ died to begin the restoration of whole universe. We participate in this through our daily activities.

You don't have to be a Christian to do a beautiful job. But we seek to consciously do whatever we do for Jesus. Let‘s pray that he will use our work to bless others.

Psalm 90:17 - may God establish the work of our hands.