God never intended for us to be idle. This daily devotional looks at how God wants us to focus our energies by working for Him.
Nuggets
- God calls us to work to provide for ourselves.
- God calls us to work to know Him.
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Idleness is a big issue these days. When is it acceptable to be idle, and what is society’s obligation when we choose to be idle?
Charnock partially addressed that. We’ve been looking at Charnock’s sermon entitled The Sinfulness and Cure of Thoughts. Charnock has taught us so far that we cleanse our thoughts when we return to having a strong relationship with God.
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Let’s see what the Scriptures have to say about disciples working.
“Avoid idleness. Serious callings do naturally compose men’s spirits, but too much recreation makes them blaze out in vanity. Idle souls as well as idle spirits will be ranging” (Charnock, The Sinfulness and Cure of Thoughts)
Let's Put It into Context #1
We’ve been looking at Charnock’s sermon entitled The Sinfulness and Cure of Thoughts to show us how to cleanse, a.k.a. sanctify, our thought processes. Charnock has taught us
- that we cleanse our thoughts when we return to having a strong relationship with God. We can do that by studying the Scriptures, meditating on God, contemplating on His creation, and praising Him.
- that we focus our thoughts by being humble instead of prideful and not following the worldview.
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Glossary
Here is a running list of what we’ve discussed previously.
Let's Put It into Context #2
Richardson had a great definition of idleness, only he called it slothful. He wrote, “The slothful man wants to attain the end without the use of the proper means. He would be rich without labour, learned without study, and respected without doing anything to deserve respect.”
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Hardwood called it “… a sin against the ordinance of God.” Ordinances are an expression of the disciples’ obedience.
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Avoid the Idle Body
“For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies. Now such persons we command and encourage in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living” (II Thess. 3: 10-12 ESV)
God calls us to work to provide for ourselves.
Paul was specifically talking temporal work here, not spiritual work. He said with no hesitation, “Work. No work, no eat.”
Well, the Energizer Bunny for God never was one to sugarcoat anything. He called them like God told him to.
Richardson gave a long list of the consequences of idleness.
- Becomes a burden on others.
- Loses the respect of others.
- Hurt those around them.
- Covet the property of others because of envy
- Lose contentment with our lives.
- Commit other sins
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Glossary
The opposite of idleness is to work. We know God worked six days in creating the universe; then, He rested.
God expected all along for us to work. He put Adam to work in the garden. “The Lord God took the man and placed him in the garden of Eden to work it and watch over it” (Gen. 2: 15 CSB). This was before the original sin.
Glossary
Diggle expanded on this. He wrote, “When God placed man in the Garden of Eden, He placed him there not for the sole purpose of contemplation, but to dress the garden and keep it.”
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But God is still working. “For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to his good purpose” (Phil. 2: 13 CSB).
If God hasn’t stopped working, it is logical that He would not want us to stop working.
Avoid the Idle Soul
“The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing, while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied” (Prov. 13: 4 ESV)
God calls us to work to know Him.
Did you catch that? Right before Philippians 2: 13 that we talked about in the last section is the work-out-your-salvation verse.
“Therefore, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, so now, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil. 2: 12 CSB).
God didn’t just give us the whole kit and caboodle at salvation. I believe when we ABCD, He changes us from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive.
- Salvation is the gift of life through the deliverance from condemnation and sin to acceptance and holiness and changes us from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive.
- Sins are actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
- Holiness is the transcendent excellence of His nature that includes elements of purity, dedication, and commitment that lead to being set apart. Purity means possessing God’s moral character, having eliminated the stain of sin.
- Spiritual death is the spiritual separation from God that occurred as a consequence of Adam and Eve’s original sin. The spiritually alive are those who have ABCDed, so they are no longer separated from God.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Glossary
But we have to change in order to have His character. Plus, we still are in this physical body with our human nature, so we will continue to sin. That is sanctification or working out our salvation.
- Sanctification is the transformation of mind, body, and soul, which begins with regeneration, gradually changes our nature through the promptings of the Holy Spirit, and ends with perfected state of spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Regeneration is being changed from spiritually dead to spiritually alive and the internal requickening in us that God brings about through the work of the Holy Spirit to give us new character.
- The perfected state indicates the combination of the spiritual graces which, when all are present, form spiritual wholeness or completeness.
- Spiritual graces are worldly morals that have been submitted to God to further His kingdom instead of enhancing this world.
Glossary
Finally, when God calls us home, He will change us — give us new bodies — so that we will no longer sin. That is the ultimate salvation.
Idleness is disastrous when we apply it to our relationships with God. Richardson wrote, “God will be found only of them who diligently seek Him.”
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If we are not seeking God, there is no way He can sanctify us. We are definitely not working at our salvation.
Harwood called it disobedience instead of expressing obedience to God. It is that important. Since it is a thing we don’t do instead of do, it is a sin of omission.
If we are taking the easy way out with the least amount of work possible, we won’t find God.
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Why is not being idle so important? It deals with our character. Remember, our character is our thoughts, feelings, and actions all added together.
If through our actions are not seeking God, then we can’t be like God.
Because face it. Seeking God takes time and energy — work.
Searching for and Seeking God
Hearing His Word (Rom. 10: 17).
Reading His Word (Rev. 1: 3).
Praying to Him (Heb. 4: 16).
Studying His Word (Ac. 17: 11).
Meditating on His Word (Ps. 1: 1-2).
Memorizing His Word (Ps. 119: 11).
I love what the Homilist’s called it. We must be soul-craving. It was written in the sermon that “Souls have a hunger as well as bodies, and the hunger of the soul is a much more serious thing.”
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We know that we can find that which our soul hungers for, but we must yearn to know God. That is, we must want it badly.
The only way to do that is to be diligent in seeking God. Diligence is a consistent, persistent effort through repentance to obey God’s laws and commandments. We’ve talked about this before.
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Watts stressed that this diligence should be exercised in every part of our walk. This not only includes throwing our hearts into it, but also putting in the time to do it.
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It also means being on guard to withstand whatever Satan hurls our way. This watchfulness is more than that, though.
Watchfulness is a continual conscious examination of ourselves and all events so that we may follow God in all things. We can’t be idle and quit examining where we are in our journey and what we need to do to become more in line with what God wants.
I know. That is hard. We not only have to set aside the time to do the evaluation, but we also must be honest with ourselves. It doesn’t do us any good if we can’t look at ourselves like God looks at us.
But when our soul craves a relationship with Sovereign God, we do the work.
I see you jumping up and down. What about grace? Doesn’t grace negate the sin and all that work?
Okay. I have never heard this world before. Antinomianism is the fancy name for thinking that grace allows us to no longer follow the moral laws because we have salvation. What I always say!
Salvation does not give us license to continue sinning. Grace does not give us a pass to not do what God has called us to do. That includes working.
Close took it one step further. He wrote, “And if this be true individually in what we have to do in working out our own salvation, how much more in our labours of love. Here nothing is done without toil. You need but look at all the benevolent institutions of the country to see that no real good is done without trouble.”
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Let’s look at it this way. All year, we have had one picture about the greatest commandments and perfection.
If God is expecting us to work to love Him, shouldn’t we expect to work to love others?
Making the Connections
I wonder how many opportunities we miss because of idleness. That means we miss the blessings.
Watts told us the blessing we get because we are diligently seeking God.
• We find success.
• We access God’s promises.
• We guard against temptations.
• We make progress on the Sanctification Road.
• We become useful to ourselves and to those around us.
• We are rewarded with peace, hope, and joy.
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How Do We Apply This?
God calls us to work for a reason. Diggle wrote, “There is probably no means of grace more strengthening against temptation, more healthful for the spirit, more uplifting towards God, than honest, earnest work.”
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- Diligently pursue our careers and calling from God so that we can be rewarded with plenty and comfort.
- Work to change to have God’s character.
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We’ve had some worksheets in the past that might help us now.
We need to work to make our relationships with God what He wants them to be.
Father God. We want to become what You call us to be – like You. We know the only way doing that is putting in the work. Help us to be diligent and not become discouraged because we know it is a life-long process. Amen.
What do you think?
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