Your Identity As A Child Of God And Your Work

READ EPHESIANS 6:5-10

MEDITATION: One of the things you will discover in Scripture is that this attitude of “give me, give me, give me” is not found in the vocabulary of a Spirit-filled believer. Instead, the spirit-filled believer is caught up, filled up, motivated by the Holy Spirit of God who lives within him/her.

The Lord Jesus lives in the person of His Spirit. Being filled with the Spirit is like taking a glass, knocking the bottom out of it, putting the glass in the water and letting the river flow through the glass. The key is to stay out of the way of the flow of the river. That is where confession and repentance comes in. If I am in the way, it dams up the flow and there is no life and light and love flowing out of me. That means wherever we go we are to be filled with the Spirit of God. Wherever we go it somehow affects the world that we have been assigned to.

Now having made Christ at home in our heart, let’s move into the work place. Understand that in Paul’s society, they had something in their culture that we do not have—slavery. As a matter of fact, at the time the book of Ephesians was written there were probably six million slaves in the Roman Empire. It was tolerated. It was accepted and it was a part of their labor force. They had masters and they had slaves. So we need to understand that (Ephesians 6:5-9).

In the context of the 21st century, since we do not have slavery, there are some principles here that could tremendously effect the world that we live in and how an employee treats his employer in the work place. Obviously, the interpretation is slaves, but there are obvious similarities that are hard to miss.

So we have a Spirit-filled employee, a Spirit-filled worker. Keep in mind that the garment you put on in Ephesians 4:24 is the garment of Christ. You don’t wear it to church on Sunday, take it off and wear another garment on Monday. If you are not wearing it to work, then you are obviously not wearing it at any other time because it is something that is consistent in your life. You are willing to let Jesus be Lord in your life, no matter what area of your life it effects.

Have you ever thought about how a slogan like, “good help is hard to find,” ever got started? It must have started because, in fact, good help is hard to find! And, why is good help hard to find? Because people are basically self-centered and self-serving. They usually don’t put the interests of their employer first, unless it somehow benefits them. And so employers everywhere complain that good help is hard to find. It works the other way, too. Good jobs are hard to find. Why? Because employers are basically self-centered and self-serving. They do not often put their employees’ interests first. And so it is rare to find a job where the employer genuinely cares about your welfare.

The apostle Paul wrote our text to show how Christian workers and bosses should treat each other. Granted, it is addressed to slaves and masters, not to employees and employers. Critics of the Bible attack Paul because he did not condemn slavery directly. Instead, Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, did something else: he addressed both slaves and masters directly and showed how their faith should radically change the way that they related to one another. As Charles Hodge observes, as both sides treated one another in this Christian manner, “first the evils of slavery, and then slavery itself, would pass away as naturally and as healthfully as children cease to be minors.” But although our text was written to slaves and masters, it applies directly to employees and employers. It shows practically how those filled with the Holy Spirit, who subject themselves to one another in the fear of Christ (5:18, 21), should relate to one another in the workplace. Paul is saying, Your relationship to Christ and the fact that you live primarily for heaven should transform your relationships at work.

How have you been relating to your work? Does your identity as a child of God have any bearing on your attitude and your relationships at work? Whose interests are you serving at your work place? How are your relationships at work helping to promote the interests of the Kingdom of God?

ACTION: Map out strategies for promoting the interests of God’s Kingdom in your work place henceforth.

PRAY THE MODEL PRAYER FOR EXTENDING THE KINGDOM OF GOD