Sermon Tone Analysis

Intro

Why do we work?

I am sure you have heard the sayings work to live - live to work.

But is that all there is?

Going back to the Garden of Eden and creation, we were created to work .

We were made to work for more than surviving though.

We were created to work to glorify God.

The work that we do, each and every day, is ultimately meant to glorify our creator.

Our God, our heavenly father who created all things.

So often in life, we let ourselves get in the way.

We aim to serve our selves.

The sin that entered in to this world through Adam and Eve runs rampant in our flesh.

Men, by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.

Rom 1:19-

God has plainly revealed himself to all and yet we place other things, including ourselves in place of him.

It is sin that produces death.

Though we may want to do right, evil lies close at hand.

Rom 7:22-

Sin is ingrained in us.

Sin that causes us to work to please others rather than the Lord.

Sin that causes us to work for others rather than unto the Lord.

That is exactly why we need the grace of God in our lives each and every day.

Our prayer must be along with David

Ps. 51:1-12

In these verses, Paul is reminding Christians, specifically servants/slaves to check what their motives are in serving their work they are assigned.

Are they serving for themselves, or are they serving for their heavenly master.

Our motivation for our work.

Continuing with verse 23

This verse is reiterating verse 17

This again is stating literally, whatever you might do.

Anything and everything.

Whatever expands to include the actions and commitments engaged in beyond what the master required.

James D. G. Dunn, The Epistles to the Colossians and to Philemon: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle: William B. Eerdmans Publishing; Paternoster Press, 1996), 255.

The implication is that one of the chief dangers of the slave status was a lack of personal motivation which made all work a drudgery provided grudgingly, with lack of effort and always with a view to doing as little as one could get away with

The implication is no different for us.

All types of work, those still in school, this includes school work, can often be a drudgery.

The tendency is to do the bare minimum to get by.

I know the running joke when I was in school was that D’s make degrees, and that is the motto some people live by.

I know most schools have switched now to C in order to get credit for the class.

The idea is to be disengaged from what you are doing, lack of caring, complacency.

The alternative to this is personal engagement with everything you do.

To work heartily as the verse tells us.

The idea is to do all that you do, with whole strength of your innermost being.

The word translated heartily points us to our innermost self.

Remember how the New Testament refers to the heart as the more than the seat of emotion but the center of life itself.

The word here is most often translated soul.

They are basically interchangeable in this context because both words refer to the same thing within a person.

It is action done with all of the individuals life force behind it.

This is not in regards to the degree of effort that is put in but rather the motivation behind the effort.

The motivation for this though does not come from ourselves.

This verse sets up a contrast for us between working solely for praise of the earthly master and working in order to praise of our heavenly master.

Our motivation comes from doing everything for the Lord.

The slaves motivation was strengthened through their work for the Lord even though they were also working to please their masters.

Our motivation ought to be no different in dealing with our earthly masters.

We work to please our earthly masters, but ultimately we do all that we do in order to praise our heavenly father.

How do we do this?

We walk with integrity.

Any time there is a human relationship, there is an opportunity for integrity or a lack thereof.

In its most basic sense, integrity means to live out your life in private in the same way you live (or talk about) your life in public.

Christians are called to the highest of ideals.

We believe things like "death to self" and "the last shall be first," but we grapple and struggle almost constantly with living lives of integrity.

There are examples of people who do this well and those who do not.

We desire to live a life that matters.

In attempting to live a life of integrity though, I think we can confuse goodness with greatness.

There are Christians called to do what we would consider important things with integrity, but the truly important things are those that we do every day.

Confusing goodness with greatness can lead to a life or ministry where someone knows all the right things to say, do, or write to gain a following, but everyday life isn't really impacted.

If you are in charge of something, be it a ministry, small group, even leading your family, and everyone around you thinks you are a jerk, you are not living with integrity.

In living with integrity, we are living out the fruits of the spirit.

These qualities are present in our lives.

Work for the Lord, not for men.

Our true reward is our inheritance in heaven.

We serve the Lord Jesus.

There is no room for favorites.

God of course can and does use broken people, broken ministries.

People living with little or not integrity can be used by God, but that doesn’t let us off the hook.

God doesn’t care how big or small our lives are, only that we are living lives that are filled with the integrity that he commands.

Even living here, in the small town of Drummond Mt. it matters how we live.

It doesn’t matter if your’e famous or if the only people that have heard of you are your neighbors.

It means being the best, husband, wife, father, mother, son, daughter, employee that you can be.

It means we accept God’s call to live in his will and walk in the path that Christ blazed.

We must live as Jesus lived, even if, perhaps especially when no one is watching.

We must do as James says in 1:22

The Navigators have developed a wonderful illustration for how this plays out in our lives.

Obviously, God can use broken people and broken ministries however he sees fit.

People living with no integrity can still be used by God for incredible things—even church leaders who have fallen the farthest and hardest have likely still told someone the truth of God.

But that doesn't let us off the hook.

God doesn't care how "big" or "small" our lives are, only that we are living lives that are filled with the integrity he commands.

It doesn't matter to God if you're a famous person or if the only people who have heard of you are in your community.

What matters to God is that you're living with integrity to the commands he has given you.

That might mean you become a great leader with a huge following, or it might mean you live a quiet life being the best wife, father, or employee you can possibly be.

So how can we live a life of integrity?

We must accept God's call to live in his will and walk in the footsteps of Christ.

We must live the kind of life that Jesus lived, even if no one is watching you.

We must obey the command of : "Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves.

Do what it says."

It's simple, and it's difficult.

And it's all that God asks.

If you're in charge of a ministry or a small group, or in any kind of leadership for that matter, but everyone around you thinks you're a jerk, you're not living with integrity.

God asks nothing more of us than to live out the fruit of his Spirit.

Or in the words of , a life consumed with thinking (and, presumably, acting) on "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable."