Who Are You Working For?

Jesus did not come from Heaven to Earth just to overthrow the Roman government. He was sent by the Father to destroy the kingdom of sin and death. This is why Jesus didn’t picket against politics.
He preached against the real cause of our problems. The New Testament was not about the reformation of human government but the transformation of the human heart. The issue will forever be the heart condition of men and women.
If people’s hearts are not changed; their behavior will always reflect upon the selfishness that drives them. It is not external reform we really need because redemption is an inside job.
When God changes the souls of people, society is better off because of it.
Let’s address how believers of the Word should believe and behave in the world they live in.  Forget the separation of church and state; believers cannot justify good behavior in church and bad behavior on the job.
The workplace becomes the prime pulpit to show others milling around the difference that knowing Jesus makes in every area of life. Integrity matters most no matter who is looking or not observing our every move.
The word integrity comes from the same root word as integrated. When we have integrity, our outer self is integrated and consistent with our inner self.
Our public side matches our private side. What the boss doesn’t see matches what the boss does see. We need to be the same person doing the same job with the same attention and intensity whether anyone is watching or not. Why? Because Christians don’t do what they do for just anybody.
Christians should be doing everything they are doing for the Lord and if they can’t do it for the Lord they shouldn’t be doing it at all.
But you may say, “I am never rewarded or encouraged for all the good I do.” How can someone stay motivated to do what they do when the pay stinks? What do you do if you hate what you have to show up for every single day of your life?
I would say, “Look up and get your cue from the One who is calling you way beyond the blue.” No matter what your title, your tempo should be tenacious with the task you are performing. Colossians 3:23-24 says, “Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.”
My first job was in a car wash. I dried the same side of the cars for 10 hours every Saturday. Every penny of what I made was taken by my Mother. It would have been easy for me to do as little as possible in a job that I hated. But I couldn’t.
I was doing it for God and so I sang all day as no one could hear me anyway because the noise of the machines drowned out my voice and it made me smile when my boss told my Dad, “I wish I had a million like your son.”
The way you conduct yourself at work in public is just as powerful as the way you worship God in private. It wasn’t something I wanted to do but I still needed to do it with excellence because my testimony was on trial.
I wanted Jesus to be glorified whether I was at the carwash- a custodian cleaning a school building or a pastor of a church.
It often seems as if those who lie, steal, and cheat are the winners in our world, whereas the honest, trustworthy, and hardworking are the losers. This causes some people to stop trying to do right altogether, skate by with minimal effort, or actually start sinning and acting unethically.
How about you? Are you discouraged or even angry because of how you have been treated by those in authority over you or those under your authority?
Do they not really appreciate you, thank you, or compensate you as you see fit? Have you failed to receive your due reward?
The Bible teaches repeatedly that God does in fact reward our obedience to him no matter how bad the circumstances that we find ourselves in.
God who loves all, sees and knows all and will reward every act of staying faithful to his principles no matter how crazy the place may be around us.
Over who are you in authority at work, home, church, or any other context? How would those under your authority say that you treat them? Would they say you treat them as Jesus treats them?
Would they say that you bless and reward them as Jesus does? We live either with a heart that is reverent of God or we put other people in that place and live a life of people pleasing and we can never live serving and pleasing both God and others at the same time.
Who we hold in highest esteem determines what we do and how we live. Being controlled or mastered by people means worshipping other people, putting your trust in people, or needing people too much you can’t say, “No.”
When we are in our teens, it is called “peer-pressure.” When we are older, it is called “people-pleasing.” Recently, it has been called “codependency.”
Whose opinion matters far too much to you? Is your appetite for praise unhealthy? Are you overly devastated by criticism? Are you overcommitted to doing things God never asked you to do, but someone else did?
Do you pretend to be someone you are not when certain people are looking? Do you fear their rejection, criticism, disappointment, hatred, or conflict? Does the fear in your mind manifest itself in anxiety in your body?
Does it show up in mood swings, a nervous twitch, weight changes, suicidal thoughts, sleeplessness, depression, aggressive driving, panic attacks, high blood pressure, or something equally unhealthy?
Are you prone to act out or to self-medicate with such things as food, alcohol, or drugs? Fear is vision without hope, and it turns us into false prophets seeing only a bleak and dreaded future.
Fear is about not getting what we want and losing it, or getting what we don’t want and keeping it. The answer to fear of man is love and worship God alone. Rather than having an unhealthy fear of man, the Bible commands us to have a healthy respect for of Jesus, meaning we care more about what he says than what others say and we endure whatever we have to, knowing that he will reward us for being faithful.
Every Christian ultimately works for Jesus. Jesus’ estimation of your life and works is all that will count in the end. Given that, we’re to work hard and honestly for Jesus, not just when others are looking, but all the time because Jesus is always looking. And we can rest assured that if we work in this way for the Lord, he will reward us in this life and the life to come, so we are not wasting our lives, but rather investing them for a reward.
That’s a promise. Don’t put a fish or a cross on your stationary if the letter your life is writing is contradicting the Christian faith. Don’t put a “Honk, If You Love Jesus” bumper sticker on your car if you drive with a constant case of road rage.
People will know if you are a Christian not so much by your wardrobe but by the way you worship the Lord with your work habits because you are a Godpleaser. You have learned to work hard for the one who worked it all out for you.