Your Work is Your Ministry

As Eric mentioned earlier, Tobin continues his series right now on gospel and work.

And as he's been preparing for this, he's been asking for some feedback from us as a family.

What does that mean to us?

And we've gotten several letters about that.

And so this morning, we just want to share a couple of excerpts from those letters.

This first one reads, Dear Tobin, thanks for talking about this topic.

I always feel like it's something, as a Christian, I should be dealing with.

But I tend to get so busy just performing at work that I really have no time to get involved in an office outreach or a Bible study or a mission trip.

What should I do?

Dear Tobin, my struggle is this.

If I do what I really want to do or feel a passion to do, then there is no way I can live the lifestyle that I live now in Hong Kong.

In fact, it could mean that I give up some things and actually move away from Hong Kong.

Am I being selfish?

Dear Pastor, I actually feel very discouraged by what I do in my job.

I feel like my job has very little redeeming value in society.

And that instead of trying to make society a better place to live in for the many,

I'm actually taking resources away from the many who could use them

and giving them to a minority that already has more than they could ever use in this lifetime.

Help me see how to redeem my job and my life.

Dear Pastor Tobin,

My job and profession seems so broken that I actually do not know where to begin as one person trying to make it all right.

It used to be that people entered my profession because they were idealists

and wanted to help people and make life and society better.

Now, it seems like the main reason people enter my field is to make money.

Then if it happens to also help people and make life better,

it's purely by happenstance.

How can one person fight for change in the midst of the craziness?

Thanks for any thoughts that you might have.

From God's word, we find this passage in Genesis 2 and 3, which you will find in your bulletin.

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them.

And on the seventh day, God finished his work that he had done.

And he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done.

So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy,

because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.

The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.

The Lord God commanded the man, saying,

From any tree of the garden you may eat freely,

but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat,

for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.

The serpent said to the woman,

You surely won't die,

for God knows that in the day you eat from it,

your eyes will be opened,

and you will be like God,

knowing good and evil.

When the woman saw that the tree was good for food,

and that it was a delight to the eyes,

and that the tree was desirable to make one wise,

she took from its fruit and ate,

and she gave also to her husband with her,

and he ate.

Then the eyes of both of them were opened,

and they knew that they were naked,

and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day,

and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

Then the Lord God called to the man and said to him,

Where are you?

He said,

I heard the sound of you in the garden,

and I was afraid because I was naked,

so I hid myself.

And he said,

Who told you that you were naked?

Have you eaten from the tree of which I command you not to eat?

Then God said to Adam,

Cursed is the ground because of you.

In toil you will eat of it all the days of your life.

Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you.

And you will eat the plants of the field.

By the sweat of your face you will eat bread.

Till you return to the ground.

This is the reading of the word of the Lord.

How are you guys doing?

How is everybody doing this beautiful day?

Good, good, good.

Wow.

Well, we are continuing a sermon series on the gospel

and how that impacts our work.

What does it look like for us to be followers of Christ

in the workplace or wherever God has us go?

My fear is sometimes as you hear us up here talking

that you'll find out a lot about us.

And you'll find out,

oh, our quirks and all these things.

And, you know, it's just interesting

as you come up and present things

and just trying to figure out

what are people thinking as we do this

and how they're responding to this.

And we've said before that we have no illusion

that just after one talk you'll say,

oh, yeah, I totally agree with all that.

And so we've been basically just kind of putting out

some thoughts and ideas about work

and what does it look like for us to deal with that.

I am a sixth-generation German farmer.

So always when we get to passages about the farming,

it's something that kind of I pick up and go,

wow, I can understand that.

I can relate to that.

My dad is 100% German, I think,

five or six generations here in America.

My mom is Norwegian, Scandinavian, and American Indian.

So we have all the minorities

and all the free schooling captured there.

And we grew up on a ranch, especially in the summers.

My family has a ranch in Montana

and we'll hopefully go see that in two weeks

and hang out with our kiddos there.

And I learned a lot about farming and ranching

in my summers in Montana

and hanging out with my grandparents.

I learned a lot about plants and how they grow.

There's a thing called plant competition.

There's certain plants that come in

and they're introduced into your granary

or your harvest or your field.

They compete with the good crops

and they take away things that are needed

for those crops like moisture and nutrients

and space and root space.

And I learned a lot about weeds

and I learned a lot about thistles

and I learned a lot about thorns.

One day it came time to mow the yard.

My dad said, hey, let's go out and mow the yard.

And so I was put in charge of that

and they were going to go to town

to buy some supplies.

And he took me out

and he walked me around the yard.

And as he walked around the yard,

he showed me these little patches of dandelions.

I don't know if you ever know what a dandelion,

have you ever seen those?

They're a little beautiful yellow flower

that kind of sprouts up in your yard

and they look really cool.

There might be things your kids would collect

and give to mom as a present.

But what happens with dandelion

after it is fertilized

is it kind of looks like it dies.

It kind of closes up.

And then in a little time,

it opens up and it's this white flower.

But it's not really a flower.

It's full of all these seeds.

And these seeds spread everywhere.

And so the dandelion is a weed.

It's a bad plant.

It's a competitive plant

for all the things that you would harvest,

like wheat and barley and rye

and things like that.

And so as we're mowing the yard,

my dad said, okay,

I want you to come out and mow the yard.

But before you mow the yard,

you've got to pull these weeds up.

Because if you don't pull them up,

if you just mow over them,

it's going to be a bad idea, a bad thing.

And then he left.

And as any 10-year-old boy did,

you know, I walked out there

and I bent down

and I pulled the first weed up

and the tap roots are like that long, right?

And I was like, man,

this is going to take forever.

And I got to mow the yard.

I got to get it done before they come back.

So I just ignored my dad's instructions.

And I figured,

well, if I just run across it quick enough

with a lawnmower,

it will just chop up everything.

And I don't have to worry about the seeds

or anything like that.

And so that's what I did.

I took out there

and I ran through the yard

and I was trying to suck up

the dandelions and everything

and making sure that nothing got on the grass.

And at the end, I go,

well, this is really good.

I finished the job.

My parents came home.

Great job.

You did a great job.

You mowed the yard.

Great thing.

About four days later,

my dad and I are sitting at the kitchen table

and we're looking out into the yard

and there's hundreds of little flowers

budding up all over the grass.

And my dad looks at me and he goes,

did you pull up those dandelions

before you mowed the yard?

Well, he knew the answer to that, right?

The answer was no.

And because of that,

the weeds grew up

and they took over everything.

And my job the next time

became harder and harder.

And this passage is about weeds in our life.

Last week, we talked about

what the gospel means in our work.

And we said that when we come to our workplace,

that our ultimate boss is God.

He's the one that we work for.

He's the one that we're to please.

He's the one that we're to work hard about.

And he's the one that we're to trust for our future.

As we got in all these emails

and people asking these questions,

it seemed as I looked at them

or prayed about them,

that they seemed to have these same common themes.

The themes were brokenness.

The themes were frustration with their work.

The themes were things aren't as they should be.

The themes were what really is work as a Christian?

How do I approach it?

The things were that things are not perfect

in my work life, in my world.

The themes continually were of brokenness,

in chaos, in weeds, in thorns, in thistles.

So I wanted to look at this passage

because this passage today takes us back

to the very beginning

because I think that as we talk about

the gospel in our workplace,

we need to continually redefine terms and ideas

and what does it mean and how does it all begin.

And we need to think about

what does it look like in the very beginning.

If you look in your bulletin,

you see the story of Genesis.

And in the story,

you see that God created everything

and then it was good

and God was actually working in the Bible.

At the very beginning,

we're told that God works,

that work is a good thing,

that God is working.

And he works and he hands over the work

to you and me.

He puts us in a garden

and he says,

I want you to take everything that I've left there

and I want you to build it.

I want you to fix it.

I want you to tweak it.

I want you to make something useful

and good for society out of it.

And he gives a man and a woman one thing.

He says,

but all these things,

I don't want you to do this one thing.

I don't want you to eat out of this tree.

The tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Well, you know the story, right?

Because it's in there

and you've heard it a billion,

gazillion times,

they do that.

They think that,

well, you know,

I know God said don't do this,

but I know better than that.

I can do these things.

I'm just as smart as God.

I've been around for a long time.

I can get these things done.

And so instead of picking up the dandelions

before they mow the yard,

they act as God

and they go and they eat the fruit.

And you know what happens

because chaos ensues.

Things start to break

because of their choices.

And this place called Eden,

which used to mean pleasure

and goodness

and providing

this place of our work,

this place where we live,

all of a sudden became a curse.

And it became broken.

And it wasn't as God meant for it

to originally be.

And so we see that these thorns

in verse 18 come out

and these thistles grow

and they take over

and they compete

and they compete

with our lives

and they compete

with everything that's going on.

And in the thorns

and thistles in Hebrew,

actually the idea

is this strong idea

of hardship.

That where the ground

used to be good,

now it's going to be hardship.

Now it's going to be disappointment.

Now you're going to go to work

and you're going to feel frustrated

because there's so many things

you want to do

and you wish you could do.

And if you only had

the right resources,

you could do it.

Or if you got all the right resources

in place

and all of a sudden

the right people move

right before that big project

and you get frustrated

and you're not in the position

that you want to be

because if you were

in the best position

you could really help the company

but your boss

just doesn't seem

to understand that.

And instead of pleasure

and happiness

you feel frustration

and pain

and toil

and work

and setbacks

and hardships.

and it doesn't just happen

with creation.

The Bible says

the same thing happens

in our mind

and how we look at things

around us.

We see brokenness.

We see things

that don't work

the way they should be.

We don't understand

work anymore.

We have different words

for work.

Work isn't valuable anymore.

It's not anything good.

All we can think about

sometimes is just

it's a necessary evil.

And if I can get it done with

then I can do the things

that I really want to do.

And we all play those games

don't we?

Kind of.

And we create

new terminology, right?

We have the sacred

and we have the secular.

We have the weak

and then we have

our weekend.

Some of us

if you're like me

like Eric said

we divide our lives

into sections.

The first half of my section

is for success.

I want to make power

and money

and position.

I want to provide

for my family.

I want to be secure.

But then in the second half

of my life

I want significance.

I want to do something

with eternal meaning.

I want to do something

that's transcendent.

I want to do something

that's spiritual.

I want to do something

that is considered

ministry.

ministry.

And I got to come

to you right now

and apologize

to you guys

because I feel like

the church has done

a terrible job

talking about these things.

I mean the reason

we have this confusion

I think sometimes

is because pastors

in the church

don't understand it.

They don't want

to stand up.

They don't want

to talk about it.

They don't want

to hurt people's feelings.

but it shouldn't be

like that.

We shouldn't be thinking

this is the secular

and this is the sacred.

This is necessary

but this is best.

But the scripture says

that it is all

to God's honor.

It's all to God's glory.

Sometimes I talk

to people in Hong Kong

business people

and they say things

like this to me.

You know sometimes

I just feel like a bank.

That Christians

and Christian groups

come to from around

the world

and they just ask

for money.

And so all I am

is a bank

and I feed people

and I do funds

and that's all I do.

That's what I'm good for.

That's my work.

One day I can retire

and I'll stop being a bank

and then I can go

ask people for money also.

But sometimes

I just feel like a bank.

Some people have

a hard time understanding

ministry in their workplace.

What if I ask you

the question

we're having coffee

this week

and I said

so tell me about

your ministry

in your workplace.

How is God using you?

How would you answer that?

What if I ask you

the question

how do you see

your workplace

in relationship

to church?

Do the two

work together?

Or is the workplace

just something you do

during the week

and churches

just something you do

on the weekend

and they hardly

ever, ever

collide?

In the ten years

that I've been

in Hong Kong

so far

and listening to people

in the business world

I've heard comments

like this

I can't wait

to go into ministry

but then I can do

something significant.

You know

I feel guilty

I feel guilty

because

I'm working

in the secular

and I know

that the sacred

is the most important thing

and I'm not doing

much ministry

in my work

and I feel

really guilty.

I can't wait

to retire

and then I can do

something significant

with my ministry

with my gifts

and my talents.

My only hope

is if I can just

live long enough

that someday

I can get to a point

where I can leave

all of these things

behind

and I can do

something eternal

and significant.

I don't know

if you've ever heard

people say that.

I don't know

if you've ever

said that.

but I have

and I'm in the ministry

whatever that means.

The passage says

that because

the choices

that our parents made

because of open

disobedience

because they thought

they could be God

better than God

could be God

in their life

sin came into their life

and thorns

and thistles

grew up everywhere

and for the rest

of our lives

we're going to

struggle with this

and many of us

are going to have

a hard time

understanding

the difference

between the

intrinsic goodness

of work

and the

extrinsic

goodness

of work.

Most of us

get the extrinsic

I work

and it provides

me food

it provides

me education

it provides

me housing

it provides

me money

to give

the missions

trips

it provides

me all these

things

most of us

get those

things

but very few

of us

understand

the intrinsic

value

of work

and the

intrinsic

value

of work

is this

that God

made you

to work

whatever you

do

and as you're

a doctor

and as you're

a lawyer

and as you're

a teacher

and as you're

a pastor

and as you're

a mom

and as you're

a helper

and as you're

a politician

all of those

things

according to

God's word

have ultimate

value

and worth

the problem

is we start

to think of

things as

sacred

and secular

and those

two words

bifurcate

all of our

life

and what

does that

mean

you come

into church

today

and you're

in the sacred

and all of a sudden

somebody hurts

your feelings

maybe they

ignore you

maybe they've

had a bad

day

maybe they're

just upset

and you look

at them

and you go

how can a

church person

do that

this is the

sacred

we're never

supposed to

act that

way

but then you

go to your

workplace

and you expect

everybody to do

that

because they're

all jerks

but the passage

says

no

the passage

says that

we're all

broken

if you expect

me as your

pastor to be

perfect

you're going

to be incredibly

disappointed

really quickly

if you expect

your community

group

or the people

in your group

to be perfect

you're going

to be incredibly

disappointed

right away

and all of this

comes back

from the garden

all these thoughts

all of these

programs come

back from the

brokenness

the thorns

and the thistles

and if you think

anything else

but that your

work

and what you're

doing

has ultimate

intrinsic value

you're lost

in the weeds

does that make

sense

it's taken me

a long time

to get my

head around

that

I'm still

getting my

head around

that

I still

make mistakes

I still say

things like

I can't wait

to do ministry

I can't wait

to go on a

mission trip

but the bible

says our

mission trip

is everywhere

the ministry

and mission

and work

and calling

all those

are the same

thing

and if we

don't see

it like

that

we'll never

experience

the joy

that God

created you

to have

in your

workplace

in this

sermon series

I've asked

people to come

up and share

some of their

stories

and so I've

asked Ian

to come up

and share

with him

so Ian

is on the

hot chair

today

and Ian

come on in

Ian

you have to

come up

Ian has been

serving

and he and his

wife Shireen

have been

serving

in the

church

and other

things in

their life

and so he's

usually on the

back of the

sound board

and Shireen

is helping

with the

kids

and I

promise not

to beat

him up

too much

we had

Bernard

up here

last week

and so

Ian

I just

wanted you

we gave

some questions

or some

thoughts

ideas

that go

on

and then

I'm

going to

ask you

two or

three

incredibly

hard and

difficult

personal

questions

that you

don't know

about

okay

right

okay

so

but the

first question

we just

talked about

was just

share a little

bit about

you know

where you're

coming from

on this

journey of

work

and what

has God

been teaching

you

maybe a little

bit about

your history

right

I am

Ian

I've been

in Watermark

since it

started

practically

and I was

born in the

UK

grew up in

Hong Kong

spent a lot

of time

in the UK

I was a

medical doctor

for about

14 years

and then

I have a

wonderful wife

Shireen

over there

and she's

a corporate

lawyer

she used

to be a

corporate

lawyer

and a

while back

we were

blessed by

God

and we

were very

privileged

to be able

to stop

doing our

profession

professional

work

and started

our own

investment

company

and here

we are

I told

Suzanne

is here

today

Suzanne

is supposed

to deliver

her baby

and so

she's here

in church

and so

I told

her up

here

that if

she starts

happening

right now

it's okay

because

Ian

is OBGYN

and I

worked

two years

in a

trauma

unit

so we

got it

made

and Katie

is a

nurse

so we

got all

the things

here

so I

thought

what a

great day

we have

Ian up

here

just in

case

he goes

into

delivery

and

it'll

be a

church

service

you'll

never

forget

right

you'll

just

hear

boil

water

get

clean

cloth

right

or things

like that

so

I

thought

Ian

all

joking

aside

but

it

is

joking

can

you

just

share

a little

bit

about

as you

as a

doctor

in

London

what

are

some

of the

things

that

were

tensions

for

you

the

question

we

talked

about

was

what

do

you

feel

like

when

you

experience

the

thorns

and

thistles

in

the

medical

field

what

were

some

of

those

you

had

to

deal

with

when

I

first

graduated

I

was

very

naive

I

thought

that

being

a

doctor

clearly

doesn't

really

have

any

kind

of

moral

conflict

as

such

compared

to

some

other

jobs

because

you're

only

there

to

help

people

who

are

ill

and

they

trust

you

because

they're

your

patients

and

they

don't

know

anything

about

their

condition

and

it's

one

of

the

most

one

side

in

terms

of

information

regarding

a job

is

concerned

maybe

with

the

exception

of

iBanking

I think

yes

so

I

didn't

think

that I

would have

to deal

with

too many

moral

issues

or

conflict

I

was

already

a

Christian

I

was

very

happy

going

to

work

and

I

think

that

my

first

real

challenge

come

after

I

finish

being

a

health

officer

so

there

will

be

for

Americans

out

there

there

was

a

grade

in

the

UK

between

internship

and

residency

so

I

started

my

first

job

in

gynecology

and

in

the

first

week

I

got

given

my

timetable

and

there

was

in

it

there

was

a

TOP

surgical

list

and

I

didn't

really

know

what

that

means

so

I

went

and

asked

my

colleague

who

are

more

senior

than

I

am

and

they

told

me

that

was

a

termination

of

pregnancy

list

so

in

UK

since

the

legalisation

of

abortion

in

the

late

60s

that

has

in

all

national

hospitals

in

the

UK

there

are

these

kind

of

surgical

lists

and

and

and

and

when

I

saw

that

I

thought

this

is

not

very

good

this

is

clearly

something

that

I

feel

that

I

shouldn't

be

doing

and

but

at

that

particular

point

in

time

I

just

feel

that

okay

I

am

here

to

do

a

job

and

also

that

I

need

to

keep

my

bosses

happy

and

if

I

don't

do

it

who

is

going

to

do

it

and

I

briefly

for a

sacred

part

of

life

and

since

my

patient

is

not

going

to

meet

my

church

friends

maybe

nobody

is

ever

going

to

know

but

I

didn't

feel

very

good

about

it

and

also

that

I

I

guess

I

was

angry

myself

that

I

allowed

myself

to

be

in

that

position

that

I

didn't

really

research

very

carefully

about

what

I

have

to

do

in

work

at

the

end

I

pray

about

it

but

it

was

a

good

result

because

I

met

another

colleague

more

senior

than

I

am

and

she

is

a

very

devout

Christian

and

she

explained

to

me

you

don't

really

have

to

do

that

you

need

to

find

another

doctor

that

does

that

but

you

need

to

do

his

or

her

clinical

duties

in

place

of

that

person

so

I

was

very

relieved

but

that

was

a

moment

in

time

that

I

clearly

stepped

into

a

gray

area

or

maybe

a

black

area

even

and

that

I

didn't

think

beforehand

didn't

find out

beforehand

so

almost

if you

had

talked

about

that

maybe

in

your

church

beforehand

with

people

with

other

doctors

and they

were able

to give

you a

heads

up

that

would

have

been

a

good

thing

that

would

have

been

very

good

yeah

yes

yeah

I

think

that

again

that's

one

of the

reasons

we're

doing

this

series

is

because

we

feel

like

sometimes

we

don't

talk

about

that

very

much

in

church

what

does

it

mean

to

go

out

into

your

workplace

and

honor

the

Lord

and

what's

happening

there

okay

so

the

hard

question

one

of

and

sometimes

I

known

all

my

friends

who

went

into

medicine

they

sometimes

go

through

periods

of

being

lost

and

they

get

lost

within

their

profession

and

the

things

that

their

profession

can

buy

and

all

that

I

mean

was

that

how

did

you

deal

with

that

in

your

life

and

that

struggle

and

things

I

think

that

I

was

already

a

Christian

really

helped

me

a

great

deal

but

I

certainly

do

see

it

is

a

profession

that

a

lot

of

people

see

that

defines

them

I

mean

they

give

them

a

different

title

some

doctors

even

have

like

doctors

so and

so on

their

credit

card

printed

on

their

passport

they

would

be

very

fast

to

admit

that

they

are

a

doctor

except

when

they

are

called

upon

to

do

some

emergency

things

on

an

airplane

or

something

is

there

a

doctor

here

yes

I

did

have

a

colleague

that

was

on

a

plane

and

they

asked

for

a

doctor

and

he

said

surely

there

must

be

another

doctor

and

they

make

another

announcement

and

nobody

stand up

and

they

make

a

third

announcement

and

suddenly

five

people

stood up

so

that's

that's

kind of like

the totally

opposite of

lawyers

right

if you

say

I

need

a

lawyer

you

have

like

50

lawyers

come

to

you

because

they

expect

some

big

pay

out

but

I

think

that

it

is

also

very

true

that

they

see

their

patients

at

their

most

vulnerable

like

I

mentioned

earlier

on

that

the

information

is

so

one-sided

a

patient

put a

lot

of

trust

in

their

doctor

and

the

doctor

likes

to

quite a

lot

of

doctors

feel

that

they

are

doing

something

good

for

the

patients

sometimes

they

might

mistake

that

they

are

instrument

of

God

for

they

might

think

that

they

might

have

a

God

like

complex

they

fail

to

or

they

might

have

forgotten

after a

while

that

it

is

a

privilege

to

be

in

that

position

to

be

able

to

help

and

interact

with

patients

in that

kind

of

way

one of

the

stories

we

talked

in

community

group

you

shared

that

you

had

the

frustration

of

sometimes

not

even

being

able

to

give

people

the

best

care

and

some

of

that

led

to

you

there

was

a

national

health

service

so

the

Americans

out

there

this

is

a