God worked 6 days and rested on the seventh (Gen. 2:2).  He asks us to follow the same pattern and in Ex. 20:11 the 4th of the 10 Commandments declares:  “Six days you shall labor and do all your work” and rest on the seventh.  So the priority is 6 work days to 1 day of rest.  At creation mankind was given the charge to have dominion or rule over the world.  We were made to work!

Paul in Colossians 3:23 says to slaves (employees of that day) to “work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not men.”  What if we approached our work as if working directly for Jesus!  Paul openly condemns laziness and those who refuse to work (2 Thessalonians 3:6-15).
Proverbs and many other passages commend good hard honest work.

We are doing a teaching series about heaven right now.  With all my heart I believe I’ll be doing work in heaven.  It won’t be tedious, stupid, unimportant work.  The Bible says we will reign with Christ (Rev. 20:6).  Reigning means ruling or working in the heavenly world that we’ll spend eternity in.  The work in heaven will be totally fulfilling and absent of the common frustrations we experience here.  It will be totally satisfying work.

So, my point is that there are not enough voices today that celebrate work.  When we do our work as for the Lord, it can be incredibly meaningful.  Work is one place key place we serve others and live out our lives for Jesus.  May our conversations at work honor Jesus.  May our actions reflect well on Jesus and put others first.  May our decisions at work further God’s influence in this world.  Work is holy.  Those of us who follow Jesus, of all people, should celebrate this holiday.

By the way, work isn’t limited to regular full time work.  Many moms choose to stay at home and they work very hard and add huge value to their families and others.  Students work through their studies. Those who are retired have the freedom to devote time and energy to God’s work.  Many of the retired folks at our church invest huge amount of time volunteering and serving in many vital ways.

On another subject, we start the new Mythbusting series this week.  We’ll look at life after death, heaven and hell.  I’ll be teaching at Going Deeper on Wednesday nights (7pm – Volleyball Court) starting September 8th.  I’ll be taking the weekend message and going much deeper and farther.  Join us!

Working together to make a difference;

Glen

This is one of those series that might be of interest to folks you are trying to connect to God and a spiritual life.  Think about a person or family you might invite to join you for this series.  By the way, as we prepare our weekend services, we always keep in mind that you will be bringing your guests and we don’t want to disappoint you or your guest.

Leadership Community
Twice a year I like to meet with all our leaders so we can all be on the proverbial same page.  Our Sierra Vista leaders met this week already.  The E. Tucson campus will meet at 3pm in Coop Court this Sunday (8/29).

I want to use this time to keep you in the know about some key things that have happened and that are coming up.  And in fact I need your help.  I need you to help me pass the word of what’s happening to others.  I also would like to get feedback on some new things we are looking at but have not yet made a decision about yet.

Together to make a difference;
Glen

If you truly set out to be useful you can never capitulate, never give in, never ever, ever, ever. Never give up on the idea of building a great Church.  Never give up on the discipline to create our own future.  Be willing to embrace loss, endure pain, but never give up the faith to prevail.  Never give up on your core values.

I resonate with this.  I want to be truly useful.  I want to make a difference.  I want the kingdom of God to grow and advance and influence more and more lost people.  And I need to hear the wisdom of God – never give up.  As I listened to Collins, the words of the Apostle Paul came to me.  In Galatians 6:9 he says; “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”

This past weekend in my teaching “Live it!” I referred to the declaration of Jesus about our true identity as his followers (Matthew 5:14-16).  We are the light in the dark world. There is no other light!  We are it.  And we are light, Jesus says, as we do good to others and as they see it.  They recognize that our good deeds emanate from the living God in us who moves us to do good.  When the one in us is Good, we are moved to do good.  So, if we do good, if we are faithful to Jesus, if we don’t become weary we WILL reap a harvest….if we don’t give up!

Taking the words of Jim Collins applied to our faith I say; never, ever, ever give up in doing good.  Never, ever, ever give up in loving people to Jesus.  Never, ever, ever give up on following Jesus to the best of our ability.  We never give up on others.  We always hope and never become weary of actively helping lost people find God.  We keep on in the confidence that we will reap a spiritual harvest.

The world has a short attention span.  Britney who?  People don’t stick with relationships, jobs or much anything else for very long.  Folks get weary pretty fast.  Fans are finicky.  Few people are in it for the long haul.  But as followers of Jesus, we are called to a higher calling.  We never, ever, ever give up on Jesus.  We never give up on the truth of God’s Word.  We never stop loving.  We refuse to grow weary of doing good.  We will be faithful to the end.

And what’s my motivation for never giving up?  God.  God is the good shepherd who never gives searching until he finds the lost sheep.  He is the loving father who keeps waiting for his lost son to return (Luke 15).  He never gives up on you or  me – never, ever!

Together doing good to make a difference;
Glen