Rick Warren - The Purpose of Work — Part Two

This is Pastor Rick's Daily Hope, the audio broadcast ministry

of Pastor Rick Warren. Today we continue with our series

called Doing Business with God. In this series, Rick helps

you understand why you work, what you should be working for,

and how God can use you in your workplace. Right now,

here's Pastor Rick with part two of a message called

the Purpose of Work.

You know, some people think that the goal of life

is really just to make enough money so you can

do nothing. No, the goal of life is not to

do nothing. In fact, Proverbs twelve twenty seven. Look up

here on the screen. A lazy life is a what

an empty life? You know? I just read a fascinating

study this week on why depression is rising as an

epidemic in our society. More and more depressed people today

than ever before, particularly among teenagers and young adults. Depression

rates are soaring. Why and it said, because we have

more free time than ever before. Now, free time is

a good thing, but you weren't meant to live your

whole life in free time. There's a time to work,

there's a time to play, there's a time to do

something hard, there's a time to rest. The Bible says

there's a time for everything. There are patterns, and there

are rhythms in life. And if your life is all

free time, then your life lacks meaning, your life lacks purpose,

and that lack of meaning and purpose leads to depression.

And so they're saying, a lot of teenagers who have

a lot of free time on their hands, and a

lot of young adults who've gone to school but can't

find a job in this economy, got a lot of

free time in there. They're having epidemic proportion of depression.

Because we weren't made to do nothing. We were made

to make our lives count. People are happiest. You're happiest

when you're using the talents God gave you for something

great than yourself that gives your life meaning. That's what

this series is all about, to help you discover your

own personal talents and use them for the greatest causes

in the world. Now, the greatest cause in the world,

of course, is the Kingdom of God. It is the Church.

God is building a family. The whole reason the world

exists is God is creating a family that one day

is going to live with in forever. When you give

your life to the Kingdom of God, There's nothing more

significant than that, and it gives your life meaning in purpose.

What does it mean to live a successful life? What

does it mean to have a successful career? Well, it

would be like Paul to say. Paul at the end

of his life could say I've finished the race. I've

fought the good fight. I've run my course. In other words,

I did what God put me on earth to do.

Jesus at the end of his life told the disciples

and told Jesus the Father, I have finished the work

that you gave me to do. Will you be able

to say that at the end of your life? So

I don't even know what is the work God gave

me to do. When Jesus was twelve years old, the

very first recorded words of Jesus were I must be

about my father's business. He already knew what business he

was in at age twelve, and at the end of

his life on the cross, he says, it is finished.

That is the book in those are the bookends of

a life well lived. That's a definition of success. I

must be about my father's business, and I've finished the

work that you gave me to do. It is finished.

What is my business? And how's business. Those are two

fundamental questions you need to be asking about your life.

Meaning matters more than money. And what we want you

to do is we want you to not waste your life,

but make the rest of your life the best of

your life. First purpose, necessity, I work in order to live.

Second purpose, identity, I work in order to express my talents.

Third purpose maturity maturity. I work in order to develop

my character. I work in order to develop my character.

That's maturity. Pastor Buddy Owens is going to come and

teach you on the next couple of points.

So God is far more concerned about who you are

than what you do, and he is much more interested

in your character than he is in your career. God

uses your work and your workplace to develop your character.

Your workplace is a testing ground, it's a life course

in character development. And if you have a boss who

drives you nuts, you'll notice I'm not turning around.

But think about this.

God can use a boss that drives you nuts. He

can use a workplace that you're unhappy in. He can

use those things to develop and to grow character. It's

like he's it's like he plants little seeds in your heart.

A seed of love, seeds of joy, seeds of peace,

seeds of patience. And then in the workplace he fertilizes

those seeds.

You know what I'm saying, I want to make a

bumper sticker.

This says, fertilizer happens, and most often in life, the

fertilizing of those seeds of character. Those are the things

that are happening in the workplace. Because God is trying

to make something out of you. It's so much more

than just what you do. It's who you are, and

it's who you become. And when you're in the workplace

and you're asking how come this is going on, and

why is this such a tough place, and why are

these people picking on me? And why isn't my life

happier in the workplace, you're really just asking the same

question that Solomon asked in the Bible.

Look at the next verse.

In Ecclesiastes, he said, he said, you spend your life

working and laboring, and what do you have to show

for it?

The answer is character. It's character.

As Rick always says, life is preparation for eternity, it's

preparation for heaven, and God is developing your character here

on earth because it's the only thing you're going to

take to heaven with you. You're not going to take

your career with you to heaven. Some of you are

very happy to hear that news, but you are.

Going to take your character.

And while you are here on earth, God is developing

your character, and he's testing you. He's testing your faithfulness.

Will you be faithful to do the right thing even

when you don't feel like doing the right thing. He's

watching so that he can determine and decide what kind

of job is he going to give you in eternity.

Look at what Jesus says in Luke chapter sixteen.

He says, whoever can be trusted with very little can

be trusted with much. If you have not been trustworthy

in handling worldly wealth, then who will trust you with

true riches? And if you've not been trustworthy with someone

else's property, then who will give you their own or

your own? There's a great example of this in the

Old Testament. At the end of Genesis, about the last

ten or so chapters, you read about a man named Joseph,

and God had given Joseph a vision, a dream of

being a great leader. But for forty years he spent

his life as a slave. Much of that time he

actually spent working in prison. That was the testing ground,

the proving ground, the developing ground, the fertilizing of Joseph's character.

That when the day came.

And the time was just right, that God pulled him

out of that setting and placed him where God had

always intended Joseph to be. During that entire time, God

was growing Joseph's character. In fact, look at what the

Bible says in Psalm one O five, verse nineteen. It says,

until the time came to fulfill his word, the Lord

tested Joseph's character. So while you're working on the job,

working on you, and the most important thing that you're

going to bring home from your job is not your paycheck.

The most important thing you bring home is you. It's

who you are becoming. And if you're in one of

those positions right now, maybe you're looking at a job change,

a career change, Maybe you're in something that's been either

forced on you, or you're just trying to decide is

it time for me to move on? The most important

question for you to be asking is not what will

I make?

But what will I become? Now?

Right now. I am in my third career, my third

working career. My first career was in politics, no kidding,

right out of college. My first job, I was the

administrative assistant to the Lieutenant Governor of California. And then

I spent twenty years in the music business. And at

the end of that twenty years, God opened a door

for me and booted me right out into a hallway.

I left that and there I was waiting to see

what next door, what the next opportunity was going to

be that would open up for me. I wasn't at

saddleback at that time. I was a member of another church.

I was a businessman. I wasn't a pastor. But there

was an old guy in our congregation who knew what

was going on with me. He said, you know, buddy,

when God closes one door, he opens another. But it's

hell in the hallway. I've been in the hallway, and

any of you who are in the hallway, let me

tell you what I learned in that hallway. I looked

at the hallway as an opportunity to see if God

might want to completely reinvent me, to not necessarily just

find another job in the same career, but to say, Lord,

is there's something entirely different you want to do with

my life that never could have been done in that

old career, in the same career. See, the Bible says

that when you commit your way to the Lord, he

directs your steps. And I committed my way to the Lord.

So I believed that God was directing my steps, that

he had something in mind for me. I wasn't sure

what it was at that time. But just a couple

months after winding up in that hallway, still wondering where

I was going to go, what I was going to

do with my life, I got a phone call from

a friend of mine. Is this guy sitting back here,

Pastor Rick. I wasn't a member of this church. He

was my friend long before he was my pastor. He

was my friend before he was my boss. But he

called me up to see how I was doing, and

he invited me to come and have lunch with him.

So I had lunch with him and I never left,

which all of which should be a lesson to you.

Don't invite me over to eat because I will not leave.

I'm like a stray cat. But the decision on what

door to walk through has eternal implications. You have to

ask yourself, not what will I do, but what will

I become? What is it in my character that God

wants to develop and put to use for his purposes.

And the goal of all of this is one day

to hear the words that Jesus said in Matthew twenty five,

to hear him say these words to you, Well done,

good and faithful servant. You have been faithful with a

few things. I will put you in charge of many things.

Now let's talk about the fourth purpose of work. The

fourth purpose of work is credibility. It's credibility. It's to

witness to others. It's so that your words have meaning

to them. It's there something backing up your words. There's

on me to tell you a story. There's a man

in our church, a man named Jean, successful, wealthy businessman,

and a number of years ago he hired a carpenter

to do some work on his house. It was a

lengthy job, but Jean was impressed by the work that

this man was doing. He showed up on time, he

did excellent work. He cared about all the details. And finally,

one day Jean started talking to this man about his

work ethic.

Why he did things the way he did him and.

The guy said, well, it's because I'm a Christian and

I do these things because it's an act of to

demonstrate my faith.

Jean said, I want to know more about the things

you believe.

So eventually the carpenter invited Jean to a small group.

And Jean gave his life to Jesus Christ.

You see, there's something about the quality of what you

do that can speak so much louder than your words.

There's something about the quality of your work that can

actually open up doors of opportunity for you to tell

your story, for you to share your faith. The combination

of good work and good witness, it's your work that

demonstrates what you believe, far more sometimes than what you

actually have to say. It can be a very powerful

testimony for you.

How you do the things you.

Do, especially when you're under pressure, especially when people are

making unreasonable demands on you. How do you respond to

those things. Let's look at a couple of verses in scripture. First,

Thessalonians chapter four says this, take care of your own

business and do your own work. If you do, then

people who are not believers will respect you. That's what

happened to Gene. Look at Tewod Corinthians, chapter six, verse four.

Our work as God's servants gets validated or not in

the details. People are watching us as we stay at

our post, alertly, unswervingly in hard times, tough times, and

bad times. So God expects us to use our work

to validate our message. And you may be in a

workplace where you can't share your faith openly with people,

at least not in your words, but you can in the.

Way that you do your work.

As people see who you are, they see your character

reflected in your work, then they'll start asking you who

are you?

What makes you the way you are? Look at what

Jesus said in Matthew chapter five.

He said, your light must shine before people so they'll

see the good things you do. So you shine your

light by the things you do. He says, they'll see

the good things you do, and they'll praise your Father

in heaven. And you may work in a place that

is just the darkest place you can imagine. There may

be people in your workplace who cuss enough to embarrass

a sailor. You think God is surprised by that. You're going, man,

how can I be a witness in a place like this, well,

that's why you're there. The light always shines brightest in

the darkest room. And if God has called you any

place into the workplace, he doesn't call all believers to

become full time pastors. That's what happened to me, probably

won't happen to you. He may have something entirely different

for you. But it's because God wants to scatter us,

to place us throughout the darkness, throughout the world around us,

to shine a light so that when people see that

light and they see the good things we do, they

see the good work that we do, then they want

to know about our faith. Your workplace is the best

place for you to share the good news about Jesus.

So maybe a question we need to ask ourselves is

when was the last time somebody at work asked me

about my faith? And why did they ask me? Do

they have reason by watching me? Do they have reason

to even imagine that I must be some kind of

person of faith? How would they know that if I

never showed it to them. You are the only Bible

that a lot of people are ever going to read.

In a very real sense, you are a living Bible,

and people will see your life. They'll see the life

of Christ in you. They'll see the character of Christ

developing through all the fertilizing at work, and they'll say, man,

I don't know how you can be so patient and

so hopeful and so forgiving. And that's when you have

the opportunity to share your faith because you're representing Jesus

in the workplace. Look at what the Bible says in

Colossians chapter three. It says, whatever you do or say,

let it be as a representative of the Lord Jesus. Now,

Pastor Rick is going to come and tell us a fifth.

Purpose of work.

Let's review the purposes. I work number one to meet

my needs. That's necessity. I work number two to express

my talent. That's an identity. I work to develop my character.

That's maturity. Number four. I work to witness to others.

It's a platform witness to others. That's credibility. Number five.

You've probably never thought of. This one is charity. I

work in order to give the money money away. I

work in order to help others. I work in order

to help other people in need who have a little

less than I do. You maybe have never thought about this,

But you can keep working in order to give more.

One of the popular things to do today is to

retire early, because particularly people are often involved in new

businesses or investments or startups. Often they'll make as much

money in a few years as their parents did in

an entire lifetime. And so we have people cashing out

early at thirty, at forty, at fifty years of age.

They're retiring so that they don't have to work anymore

at all, because they've already made more than they could

possibly spend. What do you do when your own basic

needs are met, Well, go ahead and retire. Then start

working again for a higher purpose, a higher purpose. Keep

on working, but now you're not working for a necessity

or identity, working for charity, and you're working for the

Kingdom of God. You keep ongoing. Actually, I've been doing this.

Most of you know that I wrote purpose Driven Life

that brought an enormous amount of money that scared me

to death, because I'm a pretty simple guy. And I

still live in the same house we've lived in, and

I drive the same car I was driving ten eleven

years ago. And if I've got a pair of jeans

and a good t shirt. I'm pretty happy. I'm a

I'm a pretty simple guy. I don't have I don't

need a lot of bling and and so, uh it'sat

my smile and my wife. Uh but you know, so

you know I didn't need I didn't need to work anymore.

But when you write a book, in the first sentence

of the book is it's not about you, then you

know the money he's not meant for you either. So

we just gave it all away. And that was a

whole lot of fun. But as you know, I I

stopped taking a salary from this church ten years ago,

gave all the money the church that paid me back,

and so I've been your volunteer pastor for ten years. Okay, now,

now you couldn't pay me to do this, But the

fact is you can't fire me either. No, no, Nina,

because you're not paying me, you can't fire me. So

but the point is, I just keep on working. But

now my motivation is not to provide for my family

or provide for my kids. My motivation now is how

much money can I make to give away to other

people and use for the Kingdom of God. See, I've

got a higher motivation now, I've retired from the younger

motivations the easy way. Does this make sense? And so

the higher motivation is I work for charity. I work

in order to help other people who haven't been as

blessed yet. Now, the Bible says this in Ephesians four.

We must work. We must work doing something useful with

our own hands, so that we may have something to

share with those in need. This is the higher purpose

of charity, so that we may have something to share

with those in need. I've got a friend of mine

who's a banker, and he's in his nineties, and he

retired as president of his bank years ago, but in

his nineties he's still making deals. I mean, he's still

making deals in his nineties and making everything he touches

turns to gold. And why does he do that? He

doesn't need the money. He has far more money than

could he possibly spend. But he's doing it for two reasons. One,

it expresses his shape who he is. He's wired to

do it, and he's still alive. And second, he is

funding food banks in churches all over America with the

prophet is that a cool vein? That's a higher goal.

So he's still he just changed who he was working for,

change what he was doing. Carnegie had this attitude. Andrew Carnegie,

he used to say, do your living, do your giving

while you're living. Then you'll be knowing where it's going.

Problem is some people when it comes to giving, a

lot of people just stop at nothing. It'll sink in

just to hang on. Actually, they are generous. They're generous

with their criticism. Now, if you want God's blessing on

your business, you got to learn to be generous. If

you want God's blessing on your work, you want God's

blessing on your career, you want God's blessing on your vocation,

you want God's blessing on your job. I'm just going

to tell you from personal experience, learn to be generous.

The more generous you are, the more God pours his

blessing on your business, on your life, on your marriage. Why.

Because God is looking for people to bless and God

wants us to become like him. God is a generous God.

Everything I have in life is due to the generosity

of God. The air I breathe, the sun that warms me,

the plans, everything is a gift of God. God says,

like father, like son, like father, like daughter. He said,

I want my kids to learn to be generous. And

if you learn to be generous, I've played this game

with God for thirty seven years. You cannot outgive him.

The more you give to God, the more blessing he

pours on your life. Deuteronomy eight eighteen says this, let's

go well. Proverbs eleven twenty five says this, A generous

man will prosper. He who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.

If you learn this principle of generosity and you start.

I know a lot of businesses they don't only the

owner doesn't just tithe. The business tithes. They tie. The

owner tithes his personal prophet and the business ties too.

And God is blessing those business is an amazing way.

Deuteronomy eight eighteen says this. I'm going to read it

to you. Always remember that it is the Lord your

God who gives you the ability to create wealth. Might

write that down Deuteronomy eight eighteen. Always remember it as

the Lord your God who gives you the ability to

create wealth. Did you know that the Bible doesn't teach

wealth redistribution, It teaches wealth creation. The antidote to poverty

is not forced redistribution. The antidote to poverty is wealth creation.

The Bible says, remember it's God who gives you that ability.

And so the way I honor God is by tithing

back to him. And I say, God, I'm going to

give you back the first ten percent because I remember

it all came from you in the first place. Now,

for thirty seven years, Kay and I have been playing

this game, and we try to follow Paul's example. Look

at the next verse, Acts twenty, verse thirty five. I've

been at Paul says, I've been a constant example. I've

been a constant example of how you can help the

poor by working hard. How's my working hard helped the poor?

And remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, It's more

blessed to give than to receive. So that's the fifth

purpose of work. I keep on working even after I've

made enough for myself, so I can give away to others,

so I can be able to help others. It's more

blessed to give than receive.

That was Pastor Rick Warren with his current series Doing

Business with God. Right now, here's Pastor Rick with today's offer.

Did you know that? And even your job matters to God,

your work matters for eternity. Did you know that the

Bible says in Colossians three twenty three, whatever you do

that means whatever job you've got right now, work at

it with all your heart as working for the Lord,

not for men. You see, God gave you a special

calling to your work, and he placed you around certain

people so you can minister to them right there where

you work. Now, whether your work is paid or volunteer,

whether you work at an office or at a job site,

or in your home with your kids. God has planned

this work to be a ministry for you through the

work you do. That's why I want to help you

discover how God is at work in your work. So

I put together a study kit for you. It's called

Christians in the Workplace. Now. I believe this study will

energize you. It'll equip you for your ministry at your work,

whether you work in the home, in the office, outdoors,

or anywhere around the world. This Christians in the Workplace

study Kit includes a six session study guide and a

DVD that I actually developed with Professor Paul Schreier. He's

a professor at a ZEUSA Pacific University Christian University, and

these sessions also include helpful interviews from real people who

are living out their faith at work. I know it's

going to help you and encourage you throughout this study

Christians in the workplace. You're going to learn how God

calls and equips you to do your work and why

your work is a ministry. And I'll teach you to

see your work as an opportunity for spiritual growth and

how to develop moral and ethical character to guide you

at your work. Plus, I'm going to show you how

to find opportunities to share your faith, how to be

a witness at work.

It'ste your copy today by going to Pastorick dot com,

or you can text the word hope to eight hundred

six hundred five thousand and four. That's Pastorick dot com.

Or text the word hope to eight hundred six hundred

five thousand and four. Thanks so much for your support.

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