Podcast Host (21:32)

It's estimated that most of us spend half of our waking hours at work. How does the wisdom of the Bible apply to our careers? In other words, how can our work connect with God's work? And how can our vocations be more missional? In his book Every Good Endeavor, Tim Keller draws from decades of teaching on vocation and calling to show you how to find true joy in your work as you serve God and others. The book offers surprising insights into how a Christian perspective on work can serve as the foundation for a thriving career and a balanced personal life. Every Good Endeavor is our. Thank you for your gift to help gospel and life share Christ's love with more people around the world. Just visit gospelandlife.com give. That's gospelandlife.com give. Now, here's Dr. Keller with the remainder of today's teaching.

Tim Keller (22:23)

Now, one more thing, and that is you can't find a verse, actually, that tells people that there's nothing. You're not going to find a verse in the Bible that says we need to abandon slavery. Not only that, you don't see a verse in the Bible that says whether or not you should belong to a labor union. You're not going to find a verse that says a lot of things. And here's the reason why. Because what the Bible does is it lays down universal principles, principles that apply to everything. If it went after this or that social institution and dealt with it in a detailed way, there'd be big sections of the scripture. We could just say, ugh, that doesn't, you know, it doesn't apply to us who got rid of slavery. It was essentially, and I think most people would agree with this, most historians would certainly agree with it. It was essentially Christians and evangelical Christians. There was a friend of mine who's now passed away, but who was a history professor and a student of history at Yale University, and he. He did his dissertation there on abolitionism in the States. And he says, you know, a historian doesn't think the way normal people do. He says, a historian doesn't say, look at the abolition of slavery and say, why did people put up with it that long? You know, how could those people have ever put up with slavery? It's amazing it took so long for people to abolish it. The historian asked the question, since everybody, everywhere did it as far back as human beings can ever remember, that the strong enslaved the weak and the conquerors enslaved the conquered. Since everybody had done it from whenever, why did it ever get into anybody's mind that it was wrong? The historian says it's a complete. It's very difficult to understand. And he says the point is that people got the idea that it was wrong from the Bible. In Britain and here in Britain, there was a man named William Wilberforce, who was a very wealthy person, born in the lap of luxury, who lived in the early 19th century and who led a lifelong battle to get it abolished in the British Empire. Why? Because, you see, William Wilberforce didn't necessarily find a verse about slavery one way or the other. Instead, he found all the passage. He found the Ten Commandments. He found the Golden Rule. Love your neighbor as yourself, pay people wages, treat every human being with dignity. And it's just. It's very easy to see that you don't. Every human being is in the image of God. You don't have the right to own people, to sell people, to kill people, to say who's going to marry who and so forth in that sense. And therefore Christians understood that and they got rid of it. And that's the reason why you can say, you know, does this passage condone slavery? Actually it doesn't abolish it, it doesn't condone it. It's not talking about that. How do we know that slavery is wrong though? Because we know. Well, the Bible obviously is a backward looking document. If the Bible is a backward looking document, if there is no revelation, you have no way of judging what progress is. No way at all. It's a crapshoot. The deconstructionists know it and they're saying that, they're saying all beliefs are social constructions. Basically there's no right and wrong. All beliefs come out of, you know, are socially constructed, out of your own imagination and basically out of, out of curiosity, communities. And if that's true, then which end is up? This end up? We don't know. There's no way of dealing with progress. The reason I know that slavery is wrong is because the scripture says so. Because Christianity lays out, you know, in a sense, Paul, even in this passage and other places, if you look carefully, has sown the seeds of his destruction. Now the practical, what we've got are several principles, actually two and only two. Let me tell them to you now and then go back and just elaborate on them until we're finished. Let me tell them to you now. There's two false views of work that this passage knocks down. First false view of work is that work is a curse and that leisure is the meaning of life. And here it tells us that you should be doing work as if it's the will of God and you should be doing it from the heart. The second false view of work. So the first view is that work is a curse and leisure is the meaning of life. The second false view of work is that work is the meaning of life. Okay? And leisure is just something, you know. In other words, the first view says we work in order to really live and the second view says we live in order to work. All I do, I just have enough leisure so I can just get back in there just enough so I don't completely kill myself. Leisure is my fulfillment. Work is my fulfillment. Now I'm giving it to you in a nutshell. Both of these things are very, very Dangerous. If work is a curse and leisure is the meaning of life, if that view of work gets into somebody or gets into a population, gets into a society, what really happens, of course, is what is happening one quarter of all human beings. Well, no, but actually I want to show you that in our culture both these false views of work are growing extremely fast because God, because of the secularization of our society, because God's out of the picture. If God's out of the picture, either leisure is the meaning of life or work is the meaning of life. Now, if leisure is the meaning of life and all I do, work is a curse. And I don't really care whether I'm getting anything done, whether I'm helping anybody, whether I enjoy what I'm doing. I just need to, I want to get enough dollars so I can really live, do the things that I want. In a situation like that, productivity goes down, pride in our work goes down, quality of product goes down. Do you know that today, 1/4 studies show one quarter of all American workers are deeply ashamed of what they're producing in the workplace. That's deeply ashamed. Okay, three quarters of all people, three quarters of all people in the workplace say that the quality of the work at this place was better 10 years ago. That's pretty scary as well. Well, what happens, of course, is to all society when that happens. And the third, the third bad response, or the third problem is dishonesty becomes routine when work is a curse. You don't have pride in your work. You don't see yourself as a servant of anybody. And therefore you're going to cut corners wherever you can. You're going to get whatever you can out of people. You're going to work strictly for the short term in getting the bucks, not for the long term. And the good of the economy or good of community or good of people. Isn't that right? And so what you have is the great temptation of dishonesty over here on the left. That's an accident. I'm not talking about the left, but on my left hand it could be on my right. I'm not talking about politics here. So on the one hand, work is a curse. However, I must point out to some degree it's a bit of a blue collar problem. Because on the other hand, we've got the other problem. That is, whereas people work in order to live, there's other people who live only to work. Work as self fulfillment, work as the meaning of my life. Now the problem with this view and the problem that happens here is work Whereas it should be your dignity. It's become your definition. It's the thing that gives you even meaning in life. And of course, the great danger on this side is the danger of workaholism and burnout. And you see, what's interesting is the temptation of dishonesty and the temptation to overwork are both stem from a lack of trust in God. If you are dishonest to try to get more money, you're simply saying, I can't trust God to take care of me. On the other hand, if you are burning yourself out to work, in many cases, again, you're saying, I can't really trust God to support and take care of me either. They both stem from basically getting God out of the picture. Now, let's talk about these two things briefly. And you see, on the one hand, the passage goes against the idea of work as a curse. It says, do your work as the will of God. It gets rid of the view of work as self fulfillment, you see, because it's saying you're working for God. See, this person over here says, I'm working for the master. I'm just putting my time in. I'm working. You know, I've got the ball and chain on me and I'm just working for the money. Over here it says I'm working for myself, to fulfill myself, to know that I'm a great person, to know that I really can accomplish something. And the Bible says if you work either for money or for yourself, the whole society will go down and you yourself will eventually break apart. So you have to transform. First of all, your view of work, it's not a curse, it's a calling. And then secondly, you have to transform the aim of your work. It's not self fulfillment, but it's service and stewardship of your gifts to please God. If you get those two things down, by and large, you're going to find an awful lot of your problems, not only in society but in the workplace, will work themselves out. Now, I got a couple minutes, so let me go back and try to elaborate each of these a little bit. On the one hand, work is a curse that comes from the classical traditions. It comes from the Greeks and from the Romans. If anybody has read, if you read your Greek mythology close enough, you remember the little story of Pandora. Zeus gave Pandora a box when the world was perfect, there was no problems in the world. And Zeus gave Pandora a box and says, don't open that box. Now this is a real sexist myth anyway. We all know that, because you Know, you give it to a woman, so the woman is to blame. And at least, you know, at least in the, in Genesis, the man and the woman do it together, you know, and then they blame each other, which we all know is absolutely realistic. But you know, in the Greek myth, it is a sexist myth, first of all, the woman is the one who's to blame and she's just too curious. She doesn't have self control. She lets her emotions get away with her. That's how the myth goes. The point I'm trying to make is when she opens the box, all sorts of things come out. Disease comes out and death comes out and hatred. All sorts of, you know what else comes out? Work. Completely different approach to the Bible. The Bible tells us that work was there from the beginning, that Adam and Eve were put into the world to work and that you were built to work. You were built to get something, to take care of it, to cultivate it, to create. You're made in the image of God who loves to create. You're made in the image of God who loves to take things and bring the best out of them. And if there was no sin in the world, you'd still have work. And in, as far as we know, in heaven, there's going to be work because you were built for it and there can't be a real joy without it. That's totally different than the Greek and Roman notion. See, the biblical understanding is that we were put here and then sin happens through the man and the woman together, and all kinds of things come into the world, but work is not one of them. That was already there. It's not a curse, it's cursed. Work has been cursed, but it's not a curse. Very important balance, but a very difficult one to maintain. Work is cursed. That's the reason why God says to Adam and Eve, you're going to toil in the dust and you're going to try to cultivate the earth and it will never quite go right and the thorns will come up. And that means no matter how good you are and no matter how perfect your work environment is, you're always going to find thorns coming up, frustrations, never able to quite do it. But you cannot jump from that to saying work is a curse. The Greek and the Roman idea, in fact, the Latin word for work, negotium, actually means non leisure. It goes to show their idea was work is a curse and the best thing to do is get away from it, especially physical labor. Contrary to that, the Bible says the first man was a gardener. And the first man and woman were farmers. And they worked with their hands. Tremendous dignity given to work. Aristotle and Plato says, if you got to work, you should never work with your hands. Do art. Depends on what kind of art, right? Some of you get awfully dirty doing your art. I know that. Do music, do philosophy, do politics. Anyway, the point is, you know, don't get dirty. Do politics. Oh, Aristotle. Come on. The Bible says Adam and Eve worked in the garden. But more than that, the Bible says that work is a calling. Now, what does that mean? It doesn't use that word here, though it's implied. It Sundays so in 1st Corinthians and 7 and several other places. Work is a calling. A calling means that God has put things in you, given you abilities, and that. Not that there's one job for you, but that there are a range of jobs that use those abilities. And you need to find your abilities so that you can use them as a signpost toward those jobs that you will find that they will be fulfilling. There's a fulfillment there. You remember, for example, in Chariots of Fire, here you have two guys, Eric Liddell and Harold Abrams, and they're both working for the prize, and they're reaching for the prize, and they want to be gold medalists in running. They're doing the same thing, the same work in everything. Two quotes. Eric Liddell at one point says to his sister, who's afraid he's not going to go to missionary to be a missionary in China. And eventually he did, of course. But he says to her, jenny, you've got to understand. I believe God made me for China, but he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure. See, now, there's a Christian view of work. Both. Remember I said, there's a Christian view of work. It's a calling. And the Christian aim of work not for money and not for yourself, but for him. What does he say? First of all, there's the Christian view of work. God made me fast. And here's the Christian aim of work. When I run, I'm pleasing him. I feel his pleasure. Meanwhile, Harold Abraham says, I've never known contentment. I'm forever in pursuit, and I don't even know what it is I'm chasing. Would you please answer me a very personal question? In your work right now, what is the language of your heart? Do you say, man, when I do the thing I'm doing, I'm not doing it right. But when I do the thing I'm doing with all my Might. I think I'm starting to find out who I really am. I'm finding myself. I feel his pleasure. Or do you say, I'm working and working and working and working like a dog? I don't even know what I'm working for, and there's no joy or contentment in it. Which are you closer to? Now, I'll tell you this. If you're like Harold Abrams, then you have to look at these two things. One is you have to say, am I working only for money? Have I sold my soul for a mess of pottage? Is that what I've done? Okay. Or secondly, am I burning myself out? And that gets us to the other thing, because I'm trying to define myself in terms of my work, which is a more subtle problem and a more difficult problem for Christians to deal with. And if you say, hey, I don't think I'm doing that either, then thirdly, maybe you just haven't really found the place that fits your gifts. So talk to people and find it. Well, now let me just talk briefly about that other side of things. As I said that work is a curse, leisure is the meaning of life. You've got to begin to realize you're not going to find yourself that way. You have to say, I am working as a steward of what God's given me, my gifts, and in the world I am to be useful to people. That's what you work for, to be useful to people, to be a steward of the things that God's given you, the world that he's given you and the gifts that he's given you, that's a calling. See, he's called you into that. And no matter who you are, no matter how high or how low, whether you're just a gardener or somebody sweeping, you see, as opposed to a philosopher, the biblical understanding is whatever you do with all your might, you are pleasing him and you are honoring him. That's why, Elizabeth Elliot, you've heard me say this. Elizabeth Elliott says, a clam glorifies God better than you. She would say, why? Because a clam is doing exactly what it was built to do. It is using its capacities. It's glorifying God by being a clam. It's glorifying God by being a clam. It's perfectly everything God meant it to be. And when it clams, it feels his pleasure. I'm sure. But are you being what you were meant to be? Are you using your gifts and capacities in that way for Him? Do you see that? Okay, secondly, here's the other problem. Much more subtle and much more difficult. And this is where I have to close is the other problem of work is the meaning of life. You see, because you heard me, didn't you hear me get very close to saying that? As you work, you find yourself. Yeah, as you work under the Lord, you find yourself. There's a place in the Narnia Chronicles where Lucy reads a beautiful story. The most beautiful story she ever, ever, ever heard. And as soon as she closed the page, she couldn't remember it, no matter how hard she tried. But from that time on, for the rest of her life, whenever she heard a good story, she always said, I know that's a good story because it reminds me of the one that I can't quite remember. It gets me back to that story. And when I get into heaven, I'll have the story for real. There's a sense in which, when we're doing our jobs well, using the gifts, feeling his pleasure, doing things with all his might, being useful to people, being a good steward of what we've got, there's almost a sense in which it gets us back in touch with that story of who we're really supposed to be that we can't quite remember and we won't really know until we get there. But on the other hand, work is definition. The perfect example of that was Rocky. Rocky, sure, go for it. What's it not? Money. Oh, no. What's it. If I just go the distance, then I'll know that I'm not a bum. If I can do my job right, I know I have a self. I know I exist. And the way you know that you've moved over from work as dignity to work as being your salvation is you're working yourself into the ground. Now they say, what about the fact that I'm scared of losing my job? People are giving me too much to do. And you see, there's plenty of people to whom work is a curse or to whom work is fulfillment of their meaning in life. And they're your boss. And when that happens, it's mighty difficult for you to just sort of arrange things the way you want. But look carefully and look really at your motives. What this says is, you must never work for your boss. You must never work for your constituency. You must never work for the people out there. How was it possible for a slave to get through a day? Paul says, the only way a slave is going to get through the day is to look at the master. And of course, in the heart, not out loud Say, I am not working for you. That's how he dealt with it. That's how she dealt with it. I'm not working for you. I'm working for my Master in heaven. I'm going to do the best job with my gifts today. I'm going to be as useful as I possibly can. I'm not going to worry about how you think or what you feel. I am simply going to do what you asked me to do. But I'm not working for you. And until you're able to do that yourself, you're not going to be able to deal with the pressure. Hey, you know, us Christian workers have the worst problem of all. Because of course you're working for the Lord. Not necessarily at all. I have to. Every single week I've got to look out there and say, I'm not working for you. You see, because it is not very far to say I really need for them to come back next week and bring somebody. That's why I'm preaching. Oh no. Oh no. I got as much of a problem with being a slave to you as you've got a problem being a slave to your worker. These folks have being a slave to their masters. Now here's the last thing I'll say. You gotta be a Christian to do this. You gotta be a Christian to do this. Because unless God is the meaning for your life and unless he's the thing you're living for, you've only got leisure, money or self fulfillment and self actualization, you've got nothing else. And both of those things are going to destroy the country which they are economically. And most of all, they'll destroy you. Especially if you become that workaholic that I gotta live for my work. There was a University of California, Berkeley student not too long ago that went berserk in class, started running around yelling, they're getting ahead of me. They're getting ahead of me. Sure, he looked down in the gym. There was people down there who were getting ahead of him in training. There are people in the library reading books he should have been reading. And they're getting ahead of him, the poor guy, down into the ground. Why? Because unless I do a great job, I won't know that I exist. Everybody's getting ahead of me. What else are you going to live for? Unless you live for Jesus, you're going to have to live for money. And that's the most boring thing. I tell you. We're not built for that kind of work. And it will kill you. Your life will become like A dust storm that's choking you. But you're not built to live for work either. That'll just grind you into the ground. You'll never be able to relax. You'll never be able to say, I'm going home because I'm working for him. I'm not working for you. I'm not working even for me. I'm working for him. You've got to, by the way, have a personal relationship with him. Because it says, don't work for them, don't look at their eyes, look at God's eyes. You got to be a Christian. You've got to have looked him in the eye and you've got to keep looking him in the eye. When you take your eye off of him, one way or the other, work will be a curse. It will be a millstone around your neck and down you'll go. Jenny, he says, I know God made me for China, but he also made me fast. And when I run, I feel his pleasure. Have you felt the pleasure of working for him? Let's pray now. Father, we thank you that you have shown us so much here, even though we only had a brief period of time to look at it. I pray now that you would enable us to. To bring you into every part of our lives so that we can truly be filled with the Spirit and we can truly honor you. Lord, where else will we go if we don't work for you, if we don't live for you, we'll just be crushed. And yet we know, Father, that you would not have shown us this unless you were going to give us your spirit and give us the power to practice it. So we ask that you'd help us now. And we ask that you would help us to practice it and apply it to our lives in the individual ways that we need to by your spirit's help. In your son's name. Amen.

Podcast Host (44:58)

Thanks for joining us here on the Gospel in Life podcast. We hope that today's teaching challenged and encouraged you. We invite you to help others discover this podcast by rating and reviewing it. And to find more great gospel centered content by Tim Keller, visit gospelunlife.com Today's sermon was recorded in 1991. The sermons and talks you hear on the Gospel and Light podcast were recorded between 1989 and 2017 while Dr. Keller was senior pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church.