Battle Ready : Rights in the Workplace Ephesians 6:5-9 Pastor Daniel Reese

Good morning.

So, I've heard this was a little too early

for you to be a church this morning,

so I'm glad y'all are here.

Two hours early, that's all right.

If you have your Bibles, Ephesians chapter six

is where we're gonna be.

Over the last several weeks,

we've looked at several different types of relationships.

We've looked at the relationship between husbands and wives.

Last week, we looked at children's relationships

to their parents,

and today we're gonna look at the employee-employer relationship.

Some read this passage that we're gonna cover this morning

and wonder if Paul and the Bible are endorsing slavery.

And Paul is not endorsing slavery

as a necessary social evil,

but Paul rather is addressing what it means

to be a Christ follower in a fallen world

and our attitude in that world.

Paul is not addressing the wrongness

in an abusive relationship,

but what is our attitude?

How do we respond?

What is our heart in any given situation?

Paul is reminding the Ephesians,

he's reminding us that God knows our circumstances.

He knows what's going on

and wants us to honor him

no matter what our current employment situation is.

God wants us to honor him

even when we work with people who dishonor him.

And so scholars have estimated

that there were an estimated 70 million slaves

in the Roman Empire and Greek societies.

A person became a slave in one of three ways.

You were either born into slavery

because your parents were slaves.

You were sold into slavery

in order to satisfy a debt

or you were captured during a time of war

and enslaved by a conquering army.

So Paul is not endorsing slavery,

but writing to a culture where slavery was prevalent.

What he is referencing in this passage

is the fact that depending on the situation,

there were some who were in slavery

or some who would potentially wind up in slavery

and the next few verses

is how they should act in those situations.

All right, and so we're gonna read chapters,

chapter six, verses five through nine.

I'm gonna invite Erlyn wherever Erlyn is.

There she comes.

She's gonna read our passage this morning.

As she comes, I'd encourage you to stand

as we honor the Lord's word together.

Let's speak right there.

Five, sir.

You haven't been a hold it for me?

You got a big Bible, hard to get close.

It's just Jesse's, I know.

It's always Jesse's fault.

Byline service, obey your earthly masters

with fear and trembling,

with a sincere heart as you would Christ.

Not by the way of eye service as people pleases,

but as bond service of Christ,

doing the will of God from the heart,

rendering service with a good will

as to the Lord and not to man.

Knowing that whatever good anyone does,

that this he will receive back from the Lord.

Whenever he is,

whether he is a bonds servant or a street masters,

do the same to them and stop your threatening

knowing that he who is both their master

and yours in heaven and that there is no partiality with him.

Good job, amen.

Let's pray.

Father, thank you for Erlyn.

And I pray God that as we look at this text this morning

in your word that we will see past the cultural references,

that we will see that this does apply to us.

And so God, I pray that you'll open our hearts

and ears to hear from you today.

It's your name you pray.

Amen.

Thank you, Erlyn.

Now, when you think about relationship

between a slave and a master,

I immediately think of slavery in the South

that led to the Civil War.

That's what comes to mind.

In any type of slavery, there aren't many rights, if any.

But since we are talking about attitude in these verses,

I do want to mention four rights that you do have

because the goal for all believers in Jesus

should be to honor God in all that we do.

The first way that we can honor God with our work

is to have the right heart.

When Jesus was growing up as a carpenter's son,

how do you think He worked?

Do you think He worked hard only when Joseph was working?

When Paul was a tent maker?

How do you think He worked?

Do you think that He worked hard only when His client

was around and watching Him?

Of course not.

That's not how it works.

They were obedient to their masters.

They were obedient to their bosses.

Notice that what has happened over our texts

over the last few weeks, back in chapter 5 verse 21,

Paul introduced the idea to Christians

in submitting to one another.

And over the last three passages,

as we've looked at this together,

he expands on that idea.

He describes what submission looks like

in our day-to-day existence.

He explains how we are supposed to submit to everybody

in our everyday relationships.

He started with our closest relationship, marriage.

That is also the most balanced,

submissive relationship that we have.

Marriage is pure, mutual submission

under the husband's headship.

Obedience isn't even mentioned when he's discussing marriage.

Then Paul moved to the next closest relationship

that we have, the parent-child relationship.

Now obviously, the submission in the parent-child relationship

is a little less balanced.

Here he first introduces the word obedience

and only alludes to submission.

Parents are to submit to the Lord and to the child's needs,

but children are to obey their parents.

Now he moves to the most unbalanced relationship,

the master-slave or the boss-worker relationship.

Here he doesn't even allude to submission

between those two parties.

It's all about obedience.

So in that light, what does it mean to obey your boss

with fear and trembling?

The word that's translated fear

is where we get our word phobia from.

And the word that's translated trembling

is where we get the word trauma from.

So we need to have a phobia about not obeying your boss.

It should be traumatic to you to think about

not being obedient to your boss.

It should traumatize you with the thought

of not being obedient in the workplace.

What it is saying is our heart has to be in the right place.

Why are you working?

I can't count how many people I've heard say things

like the only reason I'm working is for the insurance.

Now to put that in context of verse five,

that would be like saying the only reason

that I'm a Christian,

the only reason I'm a follower of Jesus

is for the benefits.

We are to be obedient in the workplace

because God has placed our bosses in authority over us.

Romans 13-1 says,

let every soul be subject unto the higher powers,

for there's no power but to God.

The powers that are to be ordained are by God.

So all the powers at every level are ordained by God,

even the powers that are in the workplace.

Our fear and tripling isn't because our boss or superior

is anything special.

It isn't because how good they are or how bad they are.

It's because of how awesome God is.

That's our response.

And because we recognize that God is the one

who put them in position over us,

understanding that allows us to do the work that we do.

We don't do it to impress them.

If we do our work to impress our bosses,

then what happens when we don't get recognized?

What happens when we don't get the recognition

that we would like?

What happens when we don't get the promotion

that we think we deserve?

We lose heart and we lose desire to work as hard.

When we do our work for eye service or to be man pleasers,

we don't have the right heart.

But when we sincerely do our work

to the best of our abilities,

the abilities that God has given us,

we are then doing God's will.

Then our work becomes our service to the Lord.

The second right is the right attitude.

Look at verse seven.

Rendering service with a good will as to the Lord

and not to man.

Once again, Paul brings out the idea of doing our work

as a service to the Lord and not to people.

But this time he adds the idea of doing it with good will.

Good will is one word in the original language

and it carries the idea of zeal, of eagerness.

Doing your service enthusiastically,

doing your job enthusiastically with a whole heart.

It's an attitude word.

It's how we...

Do you know that no matter how bad

I tell myself that things are,

they never seem to get better?

If I constantly am talking about,

thinking about how bad things are,

it doesn't make anything better.

Have you ever met those people

who never have a positive word to say?

If you don't, you're probably that person, right?

Of all the people on the face of the earth,

why should Christians be gloomy?

We are the only ones who have hope.

Of all people, we should be eager about doing our work.

If I don't get paid what I think I ought to get paid,

what I think I'm worth, guess what?

Jesus has still saved me.

If my work is hard and the boss isn't too nice, guess what?

I've got a home waiting for me in heaven.

If conditions aren't good and work is hard and hours are long,

guess what?

I have a personal relationship with the Creator of the universe.

I can talk to Him and He cares for me and He loves me.

I mean, that should make us shout hallelujah.

If that can't give you and help you have a good attitude,

I don't know what will.

But why is it important to have good will in our service?

Why is the right attitude so important?

Chuck Swindall has a very famous quote.

It's a long one, but I'm going to read it.

He said, the longer I live,

the more I realize the impact of attitude on life.

Attitude to me is more important than facts.

It's more important than the past, than education,

than money, than circumstances, than failures and successes,

than what other people think or say or do.

It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill.

It will make or break a company, a church, a home.

The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude

we will embrace for that day.

We cannot change our past.

We cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way.

We cannot change the inevitable.

The only thing we can do is play on the one string that we have,

and that is our attitude.

Attitude reflects our confidence in our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

If we truly believe that God is in control, that will affect our attitude.

If we truly believe that God cares for our every need,

that will affect our attitude.

If we truly believe that Jesus is the only one who has any rights at all,

and when we're saved, he takes our sin and he gives us his righteousness,

that will affect our attitude.

Our attitude will affect those all around us.

If we as Christians are always walking around like,

I don't know if it's still even around,

but do you remember the cartoon or the show, Winnie the Pooh?

If we're constantly walking, I should have brought a picture,

because I used to dress up like Winnie the Pooh, and y'all would have loved it.

Yeah, I got pictures.

I digress.

But if we're constantly walking around like Eor, you know Eor?

Who in their right mind would want to have that?

Who in their right mind would want to hang around that?

But if a pagan, if a non-believer, is somebody who rejects Christ,

is acting like Tigger, who's always bouncing around,

always in a good mood, always happy,

and then you have the Christian who's acting like Eor,

I think most folks would choose to hang out with a pagan.

They'd rather hang out with a person that's fun.

I told my daughter the other day, we're at a, where were we?

We're at school for something. I can't remember, they all blend together.

And I told her, one of her friends, I was like, I don't know her,

but I like her, because she always has the biggest smile on her face.

And I just want to be around her, and Natalie's like, yeah, she's great.

I love her too, because she doesn't have the Eor mentality.

Now, I realize there are lots of people who make it very difficult

to have the right attitude.

That's why Paul says that our attitude is as to the Lord and not to man.

People will always disappoint us, but God never will.

He is always faithful.

He is a steady rock that we can anchor our attitude to.

Because God is faithful, every Christian should have the right attitude in the workplace.

The third right is the right reward.

Versailles says, knowing that whatever good anyone does,

this he will receive back from the Lord,

whether he is a bond servant or is free.

Now, the third right every Christian should have in the workplace is the right reward.

Now, this is hard in our culture right now,

because everyone gets a participation trophy.

When I was growing up, second place was the first loser.

So if we didn't win the championship, it would make us want to practice harder.

It make us want to have it that much more the next year.

It created rivalries.

When my boys started playing baseball when they were younger,

Asher was on this team that was just terrible.

Terrible. I really don't even know if they won a game.

But when it came time to the end of the year awards, guess who got a trophy?

I made sure to tell them it wasn't real.

It doesn't count. It doesn't count.

I saw it in the workplace and many of you have as well.

When you work in sales, there's all these kinds of awards that happen periodically.

Quarterly awards, end of the year awards,

and a lot of times your pay was based on your performance ratings.

So you could always tell when someone was getting close to their annual performance rating time.

All of a sudden they would start doing all kinds of stuff they wouldn't usually be doing.

And they would be doing it very publicly to make sure that everybody knew,

hey, look what I'm doing over here.

They wanted everyone to know what they were doing so that they could get recognized.

Now, of course, I could see right through them.

It is obvious to anybody who is paying attention when someone does something just to be recognized.

So if it's obvious to us, don't you think God can tell?

Don't you think He can tell when we do things just to try to garner some favor with Him?

Maybe that's why Jesus said what He did in the Sermon on the Mount.

Through the first 18 verses of chapter 6, Jesus warns His listeners about doing things

just to be recognized by men.

And He starts with giving.

Don't give to be praised for it.

If you do, if you do, that's all the praise you're going to get.

Then He moves to prayer.

Don't make a mockery of prayer by using it as an opportunity to be recognized by people.

If you do, that's all the reward that you're going to get.

Then He moves to fasting.

Don't go through your spiritual disciplines so that people will recognize how pious,

how holy you are.

If you do, your reward is limited to some hunger pains and some flattery, nothing eternal.

So thinking along those lines, back in the context of our passage here in Ephesians,

what reward do you seek in your workplace?

Do you work so that you can climb the corporate ladder?

Do we work to get a raise?

Do we work to get employee of the month?

In the context of school, do we work to get the best grades so that we can get on the

honor roll, so that we can get scholarships, so that we can get recognized at the end of

the year with some certificate?

Do we work at home so our neighbors and friends can compliment men on how nice our yard looks,

how straight our lines are, how flush it is?

Do we work at church to be recognized by other people?

If we do, that's it.

That's all there is.

Now I have a whole box of plaques and certificates and trophies at home at my parents' house.

Notice I said box because that's what they're all in.

In a box in the attic.

Those things that seem really important when they're happening just kind of really fade

away into insignificance as the years go by.

Did you ever get a trophy for playing sports in school?

It seemed really significant at the time, but how significant is it now?

When I was growing up, I think I've told you this because I can.

But when I was growing up, I won the El Paso, Texas, three-point shooting contest.

I remember it like it was yesterday.

I was at Montwood High School.

There were over 100 kids of all ages competing for it.

I remember what I was wearing.

Now think back to late 90s, early 2000s.

The basketball shorts, the shorts in general, were not what they wear now.

They were a little short for me.

But back then they went past your knees.

If you showed your knee, you don't do that.

So I had these long black basketball shorts on.

I had them on a red Nike T-shirt.

Now the style back then was where you wore two socks on each foot.

So you had four socks on in general.

And then there were different colors and you layered them.

Anybody remember that?

And on top of all of it, I had these tear-away pants that you would wear when you're warming

up.

And then it came time to compete.

You rip those things right off, right?

And you walk onto the court.

So it was my time to go.

I ripped my pants off.

I'm in my get-up.

And there's 27 balls.

And I sink 25 of them.

I was the Caitlyn Clark before Caitlyn Clark was even born.

But the trophy that I have from that event, my wife won't let me display it.

She hides it from me hoping that I will forget about it.

Now don't get me wrong.

We can be happy for those things when they happen.

But if they're all we are working for, if my whole identity was based on that trophy,

we're in trouble because we need to be working for eternal rewards when we work with the

right heart.

When we work with the right attitude, we will receive heavenly rewards.

Remember that whatever work we do in the end, we only really have an audience of one.

And he's watching.

And in the last day, if you are a believer, if you are a Christian, he will judge your

work not to determine your salvation.

He's already paid for that on the cross.

But he will judge your works to see if they were worthless or if they were worth an eternal

reward.

The third right every Christian should have in the workplace is the right reward.

The fourth is the right perspective.

Look at verse 9.

Masters do the same to them.

And stop your threatening knowing that he who is both their master and yours is in heaven

and that there is no partiality in him.

The fourth right that every Christian should have in the workplace is the right perspective.

Look at how the Holy Spirit inspired Paul to start this verse.

Masters you do the same.

You do the same.

This means that if you're the boss, if you're the supervisor, if you're in control, God

expects you to have the same heart that he expects from the workers.

A heart that recognizes the fact that God is the one who puts you into that position.

And he puts you in that position to bring him honor and glory, not yourself.

It means that if you're the boss, God expects you to have the same attitude that he expects

from your workers.

A positive, enthusiastic, encouraging attitude that makes it a joy for people to work for

you.

When they mess up, discipline them.

But do it in a spirit of humility and love.

It is the fact that you are a representative of Jesus Christ to your workers and treat

them as such.

It means that if you're the boss, God expects you to have the same reward that he expects

from workers.

Work as if you're working for him.

Work as if he is the reward.

That will keep you from using your employees as a way just to make you look good.

But how can you do that?

If you're a worker, how can you have the right heart?

How can you have the right attitude?

How can you have the right reward?

If you're the boss, how can you have the right heart and attitude and reward?

The only way is to have the right perspective.

As a worker, you might be immediately accountable to your boss.

But who are you ultimately accountable to?

As the boss, you might have bosses over you.

But who are you ultimately accountable to?

As a student, as a homemaker, as a retiree, who are you ultimately accountable to?

You are accountable to your master in heaven.

And all are equally accountable before him.

Everybody on the face of this earth has one ultimate boss.

And that boss is where every knee will bow.

Every tongue will confess that he is Lord.

So if Jesus Christ is your Lord and Savior, your judgment will be a judgment of works

unto reward.

Your works will be tested to see which ones have eternal value.

Your worthless works will be burned up as wood.

As hay as stubble, but you will be saved though as by fire.

This passage is one more step in being battle ready and understanding the circumstances we

have that we're in.

We have to have the right heart.

We have to have the right attitude.

We have to have the right perspective while keeping the right reward in view.

Whatever you do, whether it be in word or in deed, do it all in the name of Jesus.

Giving thanks to God, the Father through him.

Let's pray.

Father, I pray right now that as we prepare our hearts for communion, as we remind ourselves

that you are the ultimate reward, that everything we do on this earth is a reflection of who

you are in us.

And so Father, I pray that you give us the right heart.

Give us your heart.

Give us your attitude.

Give us your perspective so that we understand that all the accolades that man can throw

at us pale in comparison to our eternal hope.

And so Father, as we go out into the community today to serve and to work and to love, I

pray Father that anybody that sees us, anybody that crosses our path will see the hope that

we have because of you.