My name is Carlos. I get to preach today about
work, but specifically work is mission.
And so I want to show my cards from the from the jump.
All right, I don't have a lot of technical.
This is how you be on mission at work because my job is not to
show you how to live your life with Jesus.
That's your job with the Holy Spirit.
So what I am going to do is I want to paint broad categories
this morning and I'm going to show us an example of a church
that's just knocking it out the park.
But before I do that, I'm going to throw myself under the bus.
OK, y'all with me? Oh, OK, All right.
I was like, I'm talking to myself up here.
Come on, let me throw myself under the bus.
All right, The year was 2011. I was a new I like these.
I was a new Christian, new ish Christian at Georgia Southern
University. Go Eagles.
Thank you. This is actually part of my No,
it's not. I was a new Christian at Georgia
Southern University and I was an art major.
Any art people in the house? There you go.
I was an art major and I was heavily involved in my campus
ministry at the time. And Jesus had just become like
so sweet to me. And I was like, man, like these
are going to be my people. These are going to be people
that I, I do ministry to, that I do life with.
It was in college that I grew up passion for the loss.
And then I began to see that like my passion for art and then
my passion for Jesus, I could actually like put those things
together. And so I began to get on mission
and things went good. In fact, one of the highlights
of my time and in college doing ministry and and as a vocational
student was in my 3D design class.
It was a highlight of my missional pursuits at Georgia
Southern. See, what had happened was this
small little group of us had formed kind of in the back of
the classroom, and we'd have all these inside jokes, we'd be
teasing each other, we'd be teasing the rest of the class,
and then we'd eventually get into real life conversations
about who we are and then the meaning of life.
And I even got to start a Bible study with that, that little
group. I'm still friends with one of
them, especially to this day. He's the guy who tattooed my
hand. He gave me a couple tattoos, and
he's still a really good friend of mine.
This class was remarkable in many ways because I learned so
much about myself and about how God wanted to use me for His
mission. But it was also memorable
because it was in this class that I learned one of the most
important lessons, one of the most important lessons about
mission. And because my vocation at the
time was a student, and because our sermon series is on work,
and because my sermon today is on being missional at the
workplace, I believe that this memorable lesson will help us as
we seek to marry mission and work together.
But before I do that, we have to ask the question, are we even
supposed to be on mission at work?
Does it make sense to be mission minded in the workplace?
Is it wise to let your faith bleed into your vocational work?
Right? Isn't work just a place where I
like go get my bread and and then go back home?
Is it work? Isn't my job just where I like I
find my ultimate fulfillment, right?
This is this is my purpose in life.
Those are really good questions. And before I share with you my
answer and my sermon, I want to share with you how one preacher
answered that question in the single most important sermon I
think it ever recorded when looking at a crowd and
attempting to give them direction on how they should
live in every aspect of their lives, right, including
vocations. This preacher says this.
He says this in Matthew. He says you are the light of the
world. A city situated on a hill cannot
be hidden. No one lights a lamp and puts it
under a basket, but rather on a lampstand, and it gives light
for all who are in the house in the same way, right?
Just like that lamp. Let your light shine before
others, so that they may do what?
See. See your good works and give
glory to who? Give glory to God your Father in
heaven, Jesus. Spoiler alert, the best
preacher. I think this is my opinion.
Jesus. The best preacher there ever was
and ever will be. In one of his most famous
sermons, the Sermon on the Mount tells a large crowd of his
followers that they are light. They are placed in The Dark
World. To do what?
To shine bright, to shine forth, to illuminate everything around
them. And what is the way that they
accomplish this? What is the way in which The
Dark World that they live in is to be illuminated?
Jesus says through their good works.
Notice he says that you are light.
Everybody say I am light. I am light.
You are light. When Jesus mentions good works,
these works are not works that are used to save you.
No, these are good works because you are already saved, right?
This is the gospel. You have been saved apart from
any works that you could do for God.
Your works cannot save you. Praying can't save you.
Going to church can't save you. Tithing can't save you.
Reading your Bible, that can't save you.
Only God can. You are light, you have been
saved apart from your works. You have been made righteous by
the blood of Jesus. And when you remember Pastor
Cole's sermon from last week, right?
When, when, when, then then it all kind of makes sense, right?
Last week Pastor Cole told us that, that, that we are made in
God's images, that we are God's statues put throughout the whole
earth to, to remind people of who God is.
This is what Jesus is saying. He's saying you are the light of
the world because who, who is who is the ultimate light?
Jesus, Jesus, God, God is light, but our light is a borrowed
light, right? Kind of like the moon.
You know how the moon shines bright in the night, but like it
only shines because the sun is reflecting off of it in the same
way, In the same way, we are reflection of the SON at the
SUN, right? Everybody say I am light, I am
light, you are light and the way that you shine and display the
glory of God is through your good work.
So does it make sense to answer our question right from the
beginning? Does it make sense to be mission
minded in the workplace? Is it wise to let your faith
bleed into your vocational work? Well, my answer and I think what
the answer to the Lord Jesus says is absolutely yes,
Absolutely yes, yes. The workplace is not just there
to provide for you, right? The workplace, your vocation,
you're caught, whatever you want to call it is not there just for
you to simply find ultimate fulfillment.
We aren't just to go through the motions.
No, God says that you are to shine to shine, shine in such a
way that people see and say, Oh my gosh, glory to God, glory to
God and they see they see him through your works.
And this brings me back to my story.
This is the one I'm about to throw myself under the bus.
All right, you see, I had created really, I had created
some really dope friendships. We had a ton of fun in the class
and we even talked about spiritual things.
The lesson that I learned this, this memorable lesson about work
that I learned in this class, was that the reality that before
anyone cares about what I said about God, what I proclaimed
about God, what I declared about God, they will first notice the
quality of my work. I represent Jesus to them in my
workplace. Our work is the first
evangelistic witness that you have of who God is in your
vocation. And unfortunately for me, my
work sucked. I mean, it wasn't terrible.
It wasn't terrible, but I was definitely just coasting.
I had believed the lie that, yeah, work is important, but
really what happened? What was this really important
is I just got to, I just got to let him know about Jesus.
I got to let him know about Jesus.
I cared way, way more about being a good communicator about
my belief in God and more, more than demonstrating my belief in
God through my good works. And this came to the to his head
and one of my biggest projects. So we had to create this like,
man, this was such a hard project.
It was like this big house. We had to create the interior of
a house and it was all white. And I couldn't like I couldn't
keep this thing. I had smudges everywhere on it.
It was it was the worst. And I was like, hey, this is
fine, whatever, I'm going to turn in.
And my professor, she called me out on it, right?
She called me out while I was presenting my project and
getting feedback and whatnot. She pulled me to the side.
She didn't want to embarrass me. Praise her, praise her heart.
Professor Virginia, if you listen, I don't know what she
is, but I appreciate this. This has changed my life.
She says, you know, Carlos, shouldn't the effort of your
work reflect the God that you proclaim?
I was like, Oh my gosh, she was not a believer, by the way.
She says how you work speaks volumes of what you believe in.
And I, I was just like, let me go crawl in a hole right now.
It was as if someone sucked all the air out of the room.
What was the hardest part about this was that she was right.
I let myself give into the lie that my work didn't matter as
much, my words did. I believe that if my words were
full of Jesus, then my work, it just didn't.
It didn't matter that much when in reality she was not just
listening to my words, but she was watching.
She was watching my life. I believe the lie that my works
meant nothing at all. Dorothy Sayers says this.
Dorothy Sayers has this really dope quote that has just haunted
me. She says this quote.
The Church's approach to an intelligent Carpenter is usually
confined to exhorting him not to be drunk and disorderly in his
leisure hours, and to come to church on Sundays.
What the church should be telling him is this.
Y'all listening that the very first demand that his religion
makes upon him is that he should make good tables.
Church, by all means, yes. Decent forms of amusement,
certainly, but what use is all of that if in the very center of
his life and occupation, he is insulting God with bad
carpentry? No crooked table legs or I'll
fitting drawers ever came out of the carpenter's shop in
Nazareth. Nor if they did, could anyone
believe that they were made by the same hand that made heaven
and earth. Or Simply put, your work is a
missional tool that God uses for you to shine bright in the
world. Our work matters.
And as I look back on it, I wish that I could redo that class.
Not the projects, definitely not.
No, because I don't, I don't think that.
Like, it wasn't, it wasn't the fact of me having a perfect
project. It wasn't the fact of me
designing this thing. It was it was the way that I did
it right. I wish that I could do it over,
but I can't. And So what I'm going to do this
morning is I'm going to preach the 21 year old Carlos.
I want to be like, hey bro, get yourself together and I'm just
going to let y'all listen in. All right, That was a long
intro. We're going to go all right.
It is true that we have to open our mouths and and declare who
Jesus is, declare the hope that we have.
But mission begins as soon as you clock in.
It begins as soon as those kids wake up.
It it it happens as soon as your shift begins or as soon as you
walk through the doors of your classroom.
How you work speaks volumes about the God in whom you trust.
All right. And there's one church in the
New Testament that has been such a shining example of for me.
And so I just want to hold them up as an example of what does it
look like to work in such a way that people look at you and they
praise God. All right, this is the church in
Thessalonica. These dudes were killing it.
All right, so we're going to be in First Thessalonians 1/2
through three and then verse 8. So if you're able, let's go
ahead and stand for the reading of God's Word.
This isn't going to be technical.
I think I said that at the beginning.
This isn't going to be technical on how on that the tools of how
to be on mission. We have an e-book that we have
designed for you guys. I'm sure they're around here
somewhere where you get the opportunity to ask those
questions. But this is going to be more
high level, more high level vision.
All right, First Thessalonians 1233, this is the word of the
Lord. We always thank God for all of
you making mention of you constantly in our prayers.
We recall in the presence of of our God and Father, your work
produced by faith, your labor motivated by love, and your
endurance inspired by hope in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Verse 8 says this. I can find it.
Oh, for the word of the Lord rang out from you, not only in
Macedonia and Achaea, but in every place that your faith in
God has gone out. This is the word of the Lord.
You can be seated. Heavenly Father, I pray that
your word will shine bright this morning in a lot of ways.
Lord, everything that I'm about to say from here on out, Lord, I
am. I'm a, I'm a hypocrite, Lord, I
don't live work like this and work like this.
And that's OK because you are slowly and steady making me new.
And so I pray that people will look beyond my hypocrisy, Lord,
and look to you, Lord, you are worthy of our work, our labor
and our endurance. And so I pray that you would
help us to be people who work in our in our vocations like this,
that that display the glory of God.
Lord, empower me with your Holy Spirit.
Yeah, make this just a fragrant offering to you in Jesus name.
Amen. All right, y'all with me, We're
good. OK, All right.
Well, Paul is writing and reminiscing about this church.
The first thing that he recalls about them is their work
produced by faith, their labor that is motivated by love, and
their endurance, which is inspired by hope in the Lord
Jesus. Everybody say work, work, work,
labor, labor, endurance. These three things are the
ingredients that make up the recipe for your vocation being a
myth for for you being a a missional witness in your
vocation, right? Because Paul, because of these
Paul says that that the word of the Lord rang out from them or
as Jesus says in Matthew 5, they shone like the lights that they
are. So let's break this down.
The first thing that we see about this church is that they
are a people who work, right? This work, this word work means
that they have they have a duty, they have a task, they have an
assignment and they actually accomplish it like they do the
job that that was given to them. And on the surface, this seems
simple enough, but you would be amazed at how much of A witness
you would be if you just actually did the job that you
were given, right? If you if after you cleaned the
windows, there were like actually no smudges on the
windows like after you, like you actually submit the report on
time, like stay at home parents, you actually feed and nurture
your kids, right? Doing the task in front of you
speaks volumes. But let's keep going because the
church at Thessalonica, that is a tongue twister.
The church at Thessalonica didn't just have this work
appear out of thin air. No, their work was produced by
something, right? And what was that?
It was faith. Their faith is what produced
this work. Faith is what helped them get
the job done. And faith is going to help you
and your work. But this ain't just like some
whimsical faith. This is not just like pray, eat,
laugh, love faith, right? This faith that Paul is saying
is a particular faith, this word faith refers to the fact that
these people, they have a firm assurance, they have a
confidence not in their work, but in the person and work of
Jesus Christ and all that he has done for them and all that he
has made them to be. You see, this type of work isn't
just produced by putting your head down and grinding.
No, this type of work rings out. That rings out is produced by
what Jesus has done for us. It's produced when you recognize
and remember that you are the work of God that God sent Jesus
to complete the task of ransoming people from every
nation, tribe and tongue. This type of work is produced
when you see that the work of God is sending Jesus actually
paid the penalty for your sins. This type of work is produced
when you see that the work of God that that God had given to
Jesus and giving you his his righteousness, it actually
happened. You are the righteousness of
God. This type of work is produced
when you see that the work of Jesus that it has adopted you
into the family of God, right? This this, this type of work
looking at faith is produced when you realize that man,
because of Jesus, I am the beloved of God.
And when the work of Jesus is the faith that you cling to,
then what results is the type of work in your vocation that
points to the divine reality that God is real and he desires
a people for himself. This is work that is produced by
faith, right? This is this is what was
produced in these people. But let's keep going.
Oh, nice. The second thing that Paul
recalls is that this church had labor now.
When I first studied this, I was like, why is Paul saying the
same thing twice? Work, labor, Like maybe he's
just trying to emphasize that. But then when you, when you look
at the word labor, what Paul, it's a, it's a different word.
It's a completely different word by labor.
What Paul means is that work, this is work that takes effort,
considerable effort. This is not just work.
This is this is toil. It's hard work.
This is the kind of work that that if you, if you work a blue
collar job, this is kind of work that when you come home, your
muscles are sore. You're like, man, like I've been
whatever worse is chatting here, been hanging wires.
I don't know what electricians do.
I think they like hang wires and stuff.
You've been on your feet all day.
It's that type of work. If if you work at a desk job,
I'm trying to who works in the desk?
There you go. If you work in a desk job, this
is the type of work that you've been looking at a screen all day
and you like rub your temples, You're like, Oh my gosh, man,
I'm so tired. This is this is this is what he
means by labor. If you're, if you work at home,
this is the type of work that makes you actually believe that
you have an infinite amount of dishes and laundry.
Like you're like, I'm never going to catch up.
I'm never going to catch up. Like this thing is, is, is going
on forever. This is the type of work that
when we get a large rush in our Cafe and I look up and I see a
line, I'm like, OK, we just put my head down to keep going and
30 minutes left. I'm like, it seems like the line
has not moved. It's just it's hard work.
This is what Paul means when he says labor.
And, and more specifically, this is the type of work by labor.
This is the type of work that that that reduces one strength.
But this labor isn't 1 where people drag their feet toward
it. No, what Paul is saying is that
they ran to this type of work. They ran toward this type of
work. Think about this for a second.
Think about the the vision of seeing a group of people
willingly running toward this hard and and laborers work on
purpose. If I weren't part of this group,
I'd be like, man, like, why do all y'all like embrace this?
To which they would probably probably reply, man, I'm glad
you asked. I'm glad you noticed.
We're motivated because of love. That's what our text says,
doesn't it says that their labor, this hard work that
reduces their strength is motivated by love.
Now this word love isn't just it's kind of off his losses
meeting because I think this this morning I saw a blueberry
donut and I was like, man, I love that.
That's that's not the love that that we're talking about.
Love is kind of lost. It's it's it's it's meaning.
This word love is not general generic liking of something.
This is this word love is agape agape.
And if you don't know what that some of you might know what that
is. But if you don't Agape is used
in two ways in the New Testament.
The first way of this type of love is to talk about like
goodwill or benevolence. It's like this, the charitable
love where you just you freely give of something or yourself
without anything in return. The second way is use or spoke
spoken of and in the New Testament is it's the love of
God, the way in which God is. And in other words, or, and
actually in first John 4, when John says that God is love, he's
literally saying God is agape. So when we read that the labor
of these people is motivated by the love of God, then it makes
sense why they would embrace this type of Labor.
And if we want to be missional in our vocations, then we too
have to embrace this hard work and labor motivated by God's
love. Y'all with me?
OK in Christ, right? God has been so benevolent to
us, hasn't he? In Christ, God has been so
charitable toward us, seeking nothing in return, hasn't He?
The love of God has been made known through the labor of
Christ. In the Gospel, Jesus actually
sweats for you. In the garden Jesus sweats blood
and and water for you, representing right the blood
that will pay for your sins and the the water that will wash you
by the snow when you work hard at work.
People will take notice and when they take notice what an
opportunity to point them to the fact that there is a God in
heaven who laborers for us who laborers for us.
And lastly, we see Paul recall this church's endurance.
Now I'm going to I'm I'm not going to draw.
Can you read my notes here? Now this is admirable just
because we all know what it's like working after the fall,
right? We all know what it's like to
work so long and so hard for years and get tired.
I'm almost sure that everyone in here has aspects of their job or
moments or seasons or days when you're like, I don't want to do
this no more like I'm done. Like let me just, I just leave
right now. But Paul says one of the things
that stands out about this church is that it is full of
people who endure. To endure means to stay, to be
steadfast, to stay the course. It's an inward resolve that
manifests itself outwardly to be inwardly resolved and then
manifests that stuff that outwardly.
And this is what these people had, but their endurance, they
didn't just pull it out of thin air.
This was an inspired endurance, meaning something they look
toward produce this within them. And what is that hope?
By hope, what is meant is not just a general wishing that man,
maybe things will go well. No, this hope is from this Greek
word that I can't pronounce, meaning to anticipate, to
anticipate something, but to anticipate it with pleasure and
confidence. The person inspired by by this
hope anticipates that there will be good that comes to them.
What a cheat code, right? Like, what a cheat code to
endure to, to be convinced that this is hard, but I got
something good coming for me. And this is, this is what gave
these people endurance. They knew that good was coming
their way because we learned that their hope was where?
In Jesus, in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Their hope was that Jesus, yeah, he came, but he's going to come
back again. Their hope when Jesus came is
that he would make all things right.
Their hope was that Jesus would restore all things.
We have to understand that this is a church that probably worked
in a time where not only was Christianity and following Jesus
not cool or popular. Like people were actually like
out to get you because of because of what you believed.
And yet they are described by Paul as a people who did not
give up, who endured, who probably endured, who probably
were the best workers, and they endure probably hostility.
And when this is your hope, when the hope of Jesus is your hope
at your vocation, what is produced in you is an endurance
to remain steady and steadfast in your work.
When the hope of Jesus return is your inspiration, you can't
endure hardship and being overlooked and not being taken
seriously and tons of work and rude customers and kids who are
constantly disobedient and disobeying.
When the hope of Jesus is your inspiration, you can remain
steadfast. And when you remain steadfast,
it witnesses to the world that there is a God who did not give
up on us. When you endure, especially when
things are hard, people will ask you why, and you will have the
opportunity to open up your mouth and tell them, because God
stayed obedient. God didn't get off the cross for
me, so I'm going to endure this. You'll show a God who endured
the garden instead of tapping out.
When you work this way, you will be a witness for Jesus.
So how? How does work admission help us
shine like lights in the world? How can our work help us make
much of God in our workplace? Whether we work inside the home
or outside the home, we can look to this church's example here.
We see that when our faith in Jesus increases, our work
increases, right? This is what you see here.
You see that man, when our love for God increases, our
willingness to to labor in in hard circumstances increases as
well. When we see that when our hope
increases, my God, you're coming back.
There is there is good that is coming to me.
Then you can endure. Being on mission for Jesus in
your life is a requirement for discipleship of Jesus, and this
means your vocations too. But family, never forget that
our witness is simply a reaction to the greatest news ever told,
that there is a God who works on our behalf, who lived the life
that we can never live, who died the death that we deserve, who
lived to work on our behalf. The good news for those who want
to be on mission in their workplace is that there is a God
who so loved the world that he labored to teach people and heal
and cast out demons. He carries a cross up a hill
motivated by his love for you. He sweats water and blood for
you. He gives up his spirit for you.
He laborers even now at the right hand of the Father.
For you can be mission on your vocation.
Because Christ has endured shame, the shame of the cross,
for the hope that was set before him, for the hope that all who's
who would say yes and Amen to His work would be will be
secured forever. Christ endured the joy that lay
beyond the cross. Christ endured because the joy
that lay beyond the cross was you.
It was you. You are the result of the work
of God. Being missionary at work is an
overflow of marinating in God's mission for you and letting that
truth overflow in the way that you work, you labor and you
endure. Then we we have an e-book.
Like I said, I've said this a couple times that that basically
is going to walk you through Daniel, Daniel 6, Daniel 6,
right? Where you get to watch Daniel
literally do everything that this church did and, and you get
to see Daniel be a witness. And so my prayer is that I guess
my prayer is that we would see that being on mission starts
with being excellent workers, with enduring, with looking to
Jesus, with having Jesus at the center of our lives.
And so let me pray and I'll get out of your way.
Heavenly Father, I just pray that.
What do I pray, Lord? I pray that, Lord, when we work
like this, because I'm confident, I know these people.
These are some of the hardest working people I know.
I pray that you would give us the courage, Lord, that when we
work and we labor and we endure in our vocations, that you would
give us the hope, excuse me, the courage to speak of the hope
that we have. If there's anyone under the
sound of my voice who hears this is foreign who's like I, I don't
know what it's like to be motivated by the gospel of Jesus
and to let that bleed into every aspect of my life, even my
vocation. I pray that I pray that you
would maybe made this be the first first step toward that.
And Jesus, I just pray that you will be glorified in our work.
Lord, I thank you that the gospel says that the pressure is
off to perform and be perfect, that we are satisfied and
secured in you. And so for anyone who is
struggling to work, anyone who is struggling to labor, anyone
who is struggling to endure, I pray that you would help us all
because I'm included. Help us all to remember the
gospel that before we work, we labor and we endure.
Lord, we have a God who did that on our behalf.
Yeah, pray that in Jesus name.