Now concerning brotherly love you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another, for that indeed is what you are doing to all the brothers throughout Macedonia. But we urge you, brothers, to do this more and more, and to aspire to live quietly, and to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we instructed you, so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one.
1 Thesis
Rev Dwight Yoo
This sermon series is trying to address our generation's fear of being ordinary. We are trying to create an image of a sustainable, everyday faith. We want to avoid being lazy in our spiritual walk, but also avoid the over-valuing of radical, world-changing lifestyle.
Your ordinary job is an important way of living others.
Paul writes the church during persecution and tells them to continue doing what they do in regards to brotherly love. This is a very generous church. They were not rich, but they were generous. Paul talks about living quiet lives as well as giving to kingdom work in other regions. Working with your hands is another way of showing love. Aspiring to live quietly and working is a way to show love. Why? Many Christians in this church were not working. They were so obsessed with the return of Jesus that they quit working. They were living off of other Christians and welfare. This was hindering the witness of the church there. They were so caught up in the spectacular that they lost sight of the mundane. God works in the everyday. He doesn't always work in miraculous and spectacular ways. God provides. How? Through work, the everyday ordinary work of a baker and a supermarket worker stocking shelves. Work is more than just for your fulfillment. It is also for those we work with, for those who depend on us... That our jobs are not all about us. Not about us being the most impactful or respected by those around us. It is about being a blessing. Whether it is about freeing people from seed trafficking or baking bread for people. The work is equally valued by God. He loves both workers regardless of what work they do. Don't get caught up in big ideas and crazy schemes. Live quiet and peaceful lives. Quiet faithful lives can make an impact.
The power of valuing ordinary work
Be ambitious about being unambitious. We are driven by selfish ambition. But this is not what we are to do, we are to be ambitious to bless others and give glory to God. Don't trample those in the way of your career path. Don't envy those who work the job you want. We do this as a way to follow Christ. To lay down our personal desires for fame or acclaim, due to yourself, take up our cross and do the will of our Father in heaven just as Christ did.
Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. - Philippians 2.3-11 ESV
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