A Good Endeavor
Good Morning Friends,
Not all musicians believe in God but they do believe in Bach and Bach believed. That is why Bach’s work is performed even today. If it had not been connected to God’s work it would never have lasted. But let us not idolize Bach. We too need to have a job that is connected to God’s work. Perhaps it is sweeping the floor, perhaps it is tutoring a student. Perhaps it is writing a devotional. Perhaps it is singing in the choir. Whatever it is know that being part of God’s work in even a small way, is A Good Endeavor.
Scripture:
1 And don’t tell me that I have no authority to write like this. I’m perfectly free to do this – isn’t that obvious? Haven’t I been given a job to do? Wasn’t I commissioned to this work in a face-to-face meeting with Jesus, our Master? Aren’t you yourselves proof of the good work that I’ve done for the Master? 2 Even if no one else admits the authority of my commission, you can’t deny it. Why, my work with you is living proof of my authority! 3 I’m not shy in standing up to my critics. 4 We who are on missionary assignments for God have a right to decent accommodations, 5 and we have a right to support for us and our families. You don’t seem to have raised questions with the other apostles and our Master’s brothers and Peter in these matters. 6 So, why me? Is it just Barnabas and I who have to go it alone and pay our own way? 7 Are soldiers self-employed? Are gardeners forbidden to eat vegetables from their own gardens? Don’t milkmaids get to drink their fill from the pail? 8 I’m not just sounding off because I’m irritated. This is all written in the scriptural law. 9 Moses wrote, “Don’t muzzle an ox to keep it from eating the grain when it’s threshing.” Do you think Moses’ primary concern was the care of farm animals? 10 Don’t you think his concern extends to us? Of course. Farmers plow and thresh expecting something when the crop comes in. 11 So if we have planted spiritual seed among you, is it out of line to expect a meal or two from you? 12 Others demand plenty from you in these ways. Don’t we who have never demanded deserve even more? 13 All I’m concerned with right now is that you not use our decision to take advantage of others, depriving them of what is rightly theirs. You know, don’t you, that it’s always been taken for granted that those who work in the Temple live off the proceeds of the Temple, and that those who offer sacrifices at the altar eat their meals from what has been sacrificed? 14 Along the same lines, the Master directed that those who spread the Message be supported by those who believe the Message. 15 Still, I want it made clear that I’ve never gotten anything out of this for myself, and that I’m not writing now to get something. I’d rather die than give anyone ammunition to discredit me or impugn my motives. 16 If I proclaim the Message, it’s not to get something out of it for myself. I’m compelled to do it, and doomed if I don’t! 17 If this was my own idea of just another way to make a living, I’d expect some pay. But since it’s not my idea but something solemnly entrusted to me, why would I expect to get paid? 18 So am I getting anything out of it? Yes, as a matter of fact: the pleasure of proclaiming the Message at no cost to you. You don’t even have to pay my expenses! 19 Even though I am free of the demands and expectations of everyone, I have voluntarily become a servant to any and all in order to reach a wide range of people:
20 religious, nonreligious,21 meticulous moralists, loose-living immoralists, 22 the defeated, the demoralized – whoever. I didn’t take on their way of life. I kept my bearings in Christ – but I entered their world and tried to experience things from their point of view. I’ve become just about every sort of servant there is in my attempts to lead those I meet into a God-saved life.
1 Corinthians 9:1-22 (The Message)
Message: With so many changes taking place in our culture today, one has to wonder if the church is keeping pace. Still there are those transformative rituals that reach across time and space. The performance of Bach’s “St. Matthew Passion” on the occurrence of a blood red moon, on Tuesday night in New York City, in the vast space of the armory where civil war recruits took target practice must have been one. Yes, I think something special happened that night. I did not see it but I do see it in the eyes of those who did. Our minister of music and his wife and a dear patron of the arts from Moorings attended. The show was performed only twice but could have had a long run. The participatory theater was especially profound for the three, for usually during the Easter season they do not get to worship as they are most always caught up with so many other things. It reminds me that our message about Christ must never change, but our methods in order to reach others must find the Christ in our time. Friends, Jesus gave his life for us, he takes on our sins, carries the cross, leaves us in awe but what is our role…what is the role of the poor…guilt? Tears? Silence? Or perhaps a standing ovation for the work and life they have been given… we have been given. Friends, a job is a vocation only if someone else calls you to do it for them rather than for God. And so our work can be a calling just as it has been for our minister of music. For he has, as we should, reimagine a mission of service as something beyond merely our own interests. Friends thinking of work mainly as a means of self-fulfillment and self-realization slowly crushes a minister…and it will crush you too. It is the provision of God only that connects our work to God’s work across time, even in this very moment. You see only in Christ is our work remembered. Only in Christ do we truly make a difference. The true reality beneath and behind and above us is the God of the Bible. Nothing we do will make any difference unless it is pursued in response to God. Then it matters forever… even the simplest tasks…the simplest notes…Here caring acts of creation and love as a service to God becomes the good endeavor of life.
Pray we continue God’s work bringing order out of chaos, music out of random notes…purpose out of potential…meaning out of words. Pray we share in the unfolding creation recognizing what lasts and how we can be part of something that lasts. Pray we realize that glory and relationship can only coexist with God. Pray we not make idols of what is bad but also not out anything but God. Pray we realize that human culture is a positive response to God’s general revelation and simultaneously a rebellious assertion against His sovereign rule. Pray we realize that the call to action has not gone away. Pray we enjoy what is good but make sure it is God we worship in thought, word, and deed.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Here is a link to get a taste of the performance:
Daily Devotionals 