What s Good about Work? Genesis 1:27-28; 2:1-3,15 9 th August 2015 By Ken Keyte

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1 What s Good about Work? Genesis 1:27-28; 2:1-3,15 9 th August 2015 By Ken Keyte This morning we re going to start a new series called Every Good Endeavor which is all about God s plan and purpose for work. Ge 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. 28 God blessed them and said to them, Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.. 2:1 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array. 2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 2 It s a subject I confess I haven t preached on very much, but it s an important topic to preach on because work is such a big part of most our lives. Something else I want to do each Sunday is introduce you to a worker from our congregation and get them to explain what they do for a job. This morning I ve asked if Paul Turner would be our first worker to be interviewed. Interview questions: Paul Turner 1. What s your line of work? 2. How long have you been doing it for? 3. How would you see God working through you in your work? 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.. 15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. May God transform our hearts and minds and actions through His Word, Amen 3 Prayer. 1 On Monday it finally happened! The Tauranga Eastern Link expressway opened! How many of you cycled or walked it last Saturday before it opened?

2 The TEL project took 4 1/2 years to complete, cost $455 million dollars, for the construction of 21km of new roading, requiring over three million cubic meters of earth works, building of seven bridges, formation of new intersections for Sandhurst Drive, Domain Rd, and Paengaroa junction, the erection of a new over-bridge for Parton Rd, an underpass for Maketu Rd, extensive landscaping involving the planting of 300,000 native plants, massive artistic features representing the local region installed at either end of the TEL, but most exciting of all for me is the completion of a 9km cycle-way from Bell Rd to Tu Tumu Rd which I can t wait to try out on my bike sometime soon! I think Fulton Hogan s Chief Engineer for the project could quite justifiably take a rest from this road construction project, to look over it and satisfyingly say, it is very good! The Tauranga Easter Link is an example of how human work can accomplish incredible projects to improve life for many. I don t know how many work hours went into the project but it must have been hundreds of thousands! So the question I want to explore with you this morning is this: What s good about work? Is work just a necessary evil to earn money to pay the bills so we can enjoy doing the things we really love doing on our days off? Or does the Bible tell us that there s much more to work than that? So what s so good about work according to Genesis 1 & 2? Work is good because God likes work! 4 Work is good because God likes it! The very first words of the Bible are, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth, created is a working word. In fact in Genesis 1 & 2 there are 24 different working words describing how God made the universe and everything in it, some of which are used several times over. From Genesis 1 & 2 we find that: God created, God separated, God made, God gathered, God caused to produce, God let the lights in the sky serve as signs, God set, God worked, God formed, God planted, God said, fill the earth and subdue it, God completed, God finished And God gave Adam the responsibility of working and taking care of the garden. And at the end of God s massive six day construction project of the universe, God paused to look at all he d made and he concluded, that it is all very good! In fact at the completion of every day s work of creation, God paused to look at what he d made and say, it is good! Genesis 1 tells us that not only does God work, but he delights in his work because work is good! So we could say: In the beginning God worked because he likes work! And He certainly likes the end result of his work very much!

3 Actually this understanding of God working, is unique to the Judeo-Christian faith. The gods of all other religions would never stoop to do such a lowly thing as work. They get humans and other beings to do the work for them. Work is good because God created us for work 5 But our Judeo-Christian faith teaches us that God works and he likes it! Think of the last project you did and the satisfaction you felt when you got to the end of it and could take a look at it and say: it s good! Raewyn s always coming up with indoor or out-door home renovation projects which usually require a bit of work. The last one involved clearing out a huge camellia tree and digging out an over grown garden, then clearing a flat area to lay some concrete off our back deck, to make a better barbequing area in the summer and give us more outdoor living space. I can t say I delighted in my part of the work while I was doing it, but I can say, after the job was done and the concrete was laid and the barbeque in place- that it was good, and has made a big improvement to the outdoor living area of our back section. That sense of satisfaction and accomplishment at the completion of some kind or work project, whatever it is, is a reflection of how God delights in work. Work is good because God likes work! But work is also good because God created us for work. God blessed the human beings he created on the sixth day by saying, Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. And God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and take care of it, then a bit later He created Eve as his helper so he didn t have to work on his own. So God made us men and women for work. Which means work is much more than just a means of earning enough to survive, work is much more than how we earn money so we can spend it on the things we enjoy. Work is actually what God made us for, and since God has made us for work, then work must be an important aspect of living a fully human life. But isn t work such a restriction, we could be doing far better things with our time if only we were freed from the need to work? But actually freedom doesn t work that way. We are fully free when we we re doing what God created us to do and be, which means we re liberated to be who God made us to be through work because God made us for work. There was a little boy who had a pet gold fish who he loved very much and would watch the little gold fish swimming around and around in his goldfish tank.

4 I know what would make you really happy, he said to the gold fish, I m going to set you free of the fish tank so you can come for a ride with me on my trike! So he plucked the little gold fish out of the gold fish tank and put him in the tray at the back of his trike and took his little gold fish for the ride of it s life- which soon turned out to be a very short lived life! The little boy didn t understand that when the gold fish was freed from the environment it was made for, it wasn t being freed at all! And so it is with work. It may seem very attractive to win big on lotto so we can put up our feet and take it easy, or work our way into a position so we can take an early retirement so we can begin a life of leisure while we re young enough to enjoy it. But actually if what we re doing is removing ourselves from the environment God made us for- which is for work, then we re doing to ourselves something like what the little boy did in taking his gold fish for a ride on his trike! Work is good because God created us for work! Work is good because it was part of paradise before the fall. 6 Now hang on a minute! Those of you who know what happens in Genesis 3, might be wanting to say. Isn t work a curse God placed on Adam after the fall? Well it s true God did make work much more difficult as a consequence of Adam and Eve s rebellion against him, but God put Adam and Eve to work to care for the garden of Eden before, not after, the fall. Work is therefore just as much a part of what God made us for, as being made to be in relationship with God and with others. In fact when we understand Eden as not only Adam and Eve s dwelling place, but God s dwelling place on earth which is another way of saying God s temple- then we understand that the work of caring for the garden of Eden was just as sacred, as the work of a Levite Priest looking after the temple when the nation of Israel was formed. You know who I think of when I think about Adam and Eve working away caring for the Garden of Eden? They may be a bit elderly to be thought of as Adam and Eve, but I think of Jan & Evan Necklan who have tirelessly weeded and planted, watered and cared for our church gardens. In fact they ve been so good at it, that our church even won Best Community Organization Garden award, a couple of years ago. Sadly age is catching up on them and they ve recently decided to resign from this work after many years of hard gardening for the church. So if you re interested in becoming our church gardener, there is a vacancy! The pay is lousy, but the benefits are divine! See Maree Rauhala if you re interested! So work is good because it was part of paradise before the fall!

5 Work is good because God s work to rest ratio is weighted towards work 7 But work is also good because God s work to rest ratio is weighted towards work! The fourth commandment (Exodus 20:8) says: 8 Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, And the reason why? 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. Now I know that as a pastor I m highly biased towards wanting people to come to church for worship every Sunday. But something I ve noticed in myself, is that whenever we ve been away on holiday and decided not to go to church but to stay at the beach instead, it s felt to me like something important in the rhythm of life has been mucked up. It s like the week s gone all wonky because something significant was missing from the week, I even start losing track of what day it is. But after we ve returned to our usual routine of Sunday being our special day for worship, it feels like balance is restored, and the healthy rhythm of work, worship & rest has been returned to my week. So work is good because God s work to rest ratio is weighted towards work. Work is good because God cares for the world through our work 8 Like it or not, God s work to rest ratio of 6 to 1, is significantly weighted towards more work days than rest days. So work is good because God s work to rest ratio is the basis for our work to rest ratio which is 6 days work to 1 day of rest. It s a modern day privilege we enjoy of having only a five day working week. But the most important reason for taking 1 day off as a rest day after six days of work, is because we are freed from our work to be able to worship the Lord. Yet work is also good because God cares for the world through our work. In Genesis 2 we find God providing everything necessary for life to grow in the garden: He sent streams up from the ground to water the land, He planted a garden in Eden, and made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground, that were pleasing to the eye, and good for food,

6 he sprung up a river providing water for the garden, a river that flowed out from Eden: It is God s providence that brings: sunlight, rain, air, nutrients, warmth, the seasons, the soil, and the multitude of life forms that grow in the right conditions. But after providing all the essentials for fertile plant and animal life, God turns to Adam and says: Now it s your turn, I want you to work this garden and take care of it, fill the earth and subdue it, because I m putting you in charge of looking after the world. Although Adam & Eve were sadly expelled from the garden after rebelling against God, the initial commands God gave them still stand: which are: to fill the earth and subdue it and to work and take care of the land! You see, this world God has made is crammed full of untapped potential, just waiting to be unlocked through work. Now I know we tend to think of giant companies like Fonterra and Zespri, simply as worldly corporations who have little to do with God, but actually they are examples of how God cares for the world through our work. Even when the payout is low: God works through the Dairy farmer (like Greg Martin, Ilkka Rauhala and Fletcher Nichol), as they milk their cows and collect the milk. God works through the tanker driver who transports the milk to the factory. He works through the factory staff who process the milk into milk powder, cheese, butter and many other milk products. God works through the laboratory staff who make sure the products are safe for consumption. God works through the forklift and truck drivers who get the milk powder to the wharf ready for export. He works through the shipping line that transports the milk powder to far-away places like, Sri Lanka, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, other parts of Asia, and all around the world. God works through the sales and marketing teams who sell the milk powder to the customers. He works in the consumer when they drink the reconstituted milk and receive the essential nutrition of our high quality New Zealand milk. And God works through the money that comes back from the customers to Fonterra and finally to the dairy farmers, to provide for their needs (even when the prices are low!). Of course there s plenty of opportunity for humans to spoil this means of God s provision along the way, but in its purist form God, cares for the world through work like this, because it s an extension of the original command given by God to humankind: Fill the earth and subdue it, work and take care of the land and sea and everything in it. What s good about work then? Work is good because God likes work! Work is good because God created us for work Work is good because it was part of paradise before the fall Work is good because God s work to rest ratio is weighted towards work. And ork is good because God cares for the world through our work. (Hands out to receive this blessing)

7 May God bless each and every one of you in the good work you do! May he provide work for those who are without work or not getting enough work at present, May God supply the needs of those who are going through hardship and difficulty and stress in their work. May God shine his light of providence upon your work, that it may be productive and sufficient to meet your needs. May God enable us to see how through our work, God is meeting not only our needs but the needs of others too, And may this bring a fresh sense of God s goodness to the work we do. This I declare in Jesus name Amen