In the past few weeks, we've touched on keys to bringing extraordinary meaning to"ordinary" work:
1. Understand that God had a special role in mind for humans before He created Adam and Eve: to govern over things on earth. This is God's First Commission, and our seminal job description.
2. Recognize that the world and everything in it is God's stuff, broken due to sin, and in need of restoration. This includes office things, shop things and kitchen things. It's all His stuff, and we are here to engage with it "as unto the Lord," so His will may be done in the shop as in heaven.
3. Reject the notion of a "secular realm." It's pure fantasy, and must be discarded.
Here's another key, which may be first:
4. Read the Bible as the Word of God (which it is), applicable to the totality of worklife.
All Scripture is “God breathed.” Human writers put stylus to papyrus in such a manner that the words they wrote expressed thoughts God Himself would have written had He been holding the pen. This does not mean God necessarily dictated the words. Yet, He guided the human authors in expressing thoughts with particular meanings to Him. The authors may not have always understood what they were writing, but the Divine Author behind the human writers did.
Meanings of words can change over time. But the words put into print by the human writers of Scripture had particular meanings in the mind of God at the time they were "breathed."
Why is this so important? Because if we are going to make faithful and authentic connections between God's Word and our work, we must see Scripture as "divine breath," with meaning untainted by our own opinions.
Recognition of biblical Truth in our day is increasingly subjective, being individualized beyond recognition. Discovering Truth in postmodern times is seldom a matter of endeavoring to understand what the Ultimate Author meant by the words human writers used in the days they were written. Instead of discovering what the Bible means to the Divine Writer, it has devolved into, “What does this Scripture mean to me?”
Asking “how does it apply to me?” is different than asking “what does it mean to me?” The latter approach wreaks havoc with our ability to work in accordance with The Ultimate Policy Manual.
For tips on Bible study, click here.
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| Jeff Myers, President of Summit Ministries has noted: "The Bible is the best-selling book in the world. It is printed, in part or in whole, in 2,800 languages worldwide. On average, 85 percent of U.S. households own a Bible; the average number of Bibles per household is 4.3. Unfortunately, while the Bible is widely owned, it goes largely unstudied." |
