All Things Work Together For Good <\/b><\/p>\n
Is your significance tied too closely to achievements\u2014building buildings, reaching business goals, acquiring material possessions, climbing career ladders? There\u2019s nothing inherently wrong with these. But if you lost them, would your confidence completely crumble? If your sense of worth depends on them, what happens when you reach the top of the ladder, only to discover that the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall?<\/p>\n
The problem is that our world has a system of values that is upside down from the way God determines value. It lacks any sense of what Scripture describes as \u201ccalling,\u201d or what Christians later termed \u201cvocation\u201d\u2014a perspective that God has called and equipped people to serve Him through their work in the world. Instead, our culture encourages us to climb a work\/identity ladder that is ultimately self-serving, and often self-destructive.<\/p>\n
Climbing that ladder can be very misleading. The higher one goes, the more one\u2019s identity, value, and security tend to depend on the nature of one\u2019s work. But what happens if we lose our position, titles, or high-level compensation? Perhaps this explains why severe emotional problems\u2014drug and alcohol abuse, abuse of spouse and children, divorce, even suicide\u2014often accompany job loss. If our significance relies on our job, then it dies with our job.<\/p>\n
God calls us to a far more stable basis for significance. He wants us to establish our identity in the fact that we are His children, created by Him to carry out good works as responsible people in His kingdom (Eph. 2:10). This is our calling or vocation from God. According to Scripture, our calling:<\/p>\n
\u2022 is irrevocable (Rom. 11:29).<\/p>\n
\u2022 is from God; He wants to let us share in Christ\u2019s glory (2 Thess. 2:14).<\/p>\n
\u2022 is a function of how God has designed us (Eph. 2:10).<\/p>\n
\u2022 is an assurance that God will give us everything we need to serve Him, including the strength to remain faithful to Him (1 Cor. 1:7\u20139).<\/p>\n
\u2022 is what we should be proclaiming as our true identity (1 Pet. 2:5, 9).<\/p>\n
\u2022 carries us through suffering (1 Pet. 2:19\u201321).<\/p>\n
\u2022 is rooted in peace, no matter what the circumstances in which we find ourselves (1 Cor. 7:15\u201324).<\/p>\n
\u2022 is focused on eternal achievements, not merely temporal ones (Phil. 3:13\u20144:1).<\/p>\n
Above all else, believers are called to character development, service to others, and loyalty to God. These can be accomplished wherever we live or work, whatever our occupational status or position in society. If we pursue these, we can enjoy great satisfaction and significance. No matter what happens on the job, we can join Paul in saying, \u201cWe know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose\u201d (Rom. 8:28).<\/p>\n
The Word in Life Study Bible, New Testament Edition, (Thomas Nelson Publishers, Nashville; 1993), p. 180<\/p>\n
Vocare<\/b><\/p>\n
It comes from the Latin vocare, to call, and means the work a man is called to by God.<\/p>\n
There are all different kinds of voices calling you to all different kinds of work, and the problem is to find out which is the voice of God rather than of Society, say, or the Superego, or Self-Interest.<\/p>\n
By-and-large a good rule for finding out is this. <\/p>\n
\u2022 The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done. <\/p>\n
\u2022 If you really get a kick out of your work, you\u2019ve presumably met requirement (a), but if your work is writing TV deodorant commercials, the chances are you\u2019ve missed requirement (b). On the other hand, if your work is being a doctor in a leper colony, you have probably met requirement (b), but if most of the time you\u2019re bored and depressed by it, the chances are you have not only bypassed (a) but probably aren\u2019t helping your patients much either.<\/p>\n
Neither the hair shirt nor the soft berth will do. The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world\u2019s deep hunger meet.<\/p>\n
Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking, A Theological ABC, (Harper SanFrancisco, A Division of Harper Collins Publishers, 1973), p. 95<\/p>\n
Learning to Rule By Obedience<\/b><\/p>\n
In the eleventh century, King Henry III of Bavaria grew tired of court life and the pressures of being a monarch. He made application to Prior Richard at as local monastery, asking to be accepted as a contemplative and spend the rest of his life in the monastery. <\/p>\n
\u201cYour Majesty,\u201d said Prior Richard, \u201cdo you understand that the pledge here is one of obedience? That will be hard because you have been a king.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cI understand,\u201d said Henry, \u201cThe rest of my life I will be obedient to you, as Christ leads you.\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cThen I will tell you what to do,\u201d said Prior Richard. \u201cGo back to your throne and serve faithfully in the place where God has put you.\u201d <\/p>\n
When King Henry died, a statement was written: \u201cThe King learned to rule by being obedient.\u201d <\/p>\n
When we tire of our roles and responsibilities, it helps to remember God has planted us in a certain place and told us to be a good accountant or teacher or mother or father. Christ expects us to be faithful where he puts us, and when he returns, we\u2019ll rule together with him. <\/p>\n
Steve Brown <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
All Things Work Together For Good Is your significance tied too closely to achievements\u2014building buildings, reaching business goals, acquiring material possessions, climbing career ladders? There\u2019s nothing inherently wrong with these. But if you lost them, would your confidence completely crumble? If your sense of worth depends on them, what happens when you reach the top … Continue reading “Vocation”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1239","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1239","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1239"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1239\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1239"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1239"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1239"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}