The Origin, Necessity and Blessing Of Labor

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Father we praise you this morning for your loving -kindness that you extend toward us for your mercy
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For your grace Lord for your word to which we turn this morning as we look to various aspects of Work and what you have commanded and Lord even as we celebrate
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This weekend a day of rest An extra day from work
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Lord. We praise you for the blessing of work and Mostly we praise you for the work of your son
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Jesus Christ without whom we would have No, hope whatsoever father bless this time in Christ's name.
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Amen. Well, good morning Hi Yeah, I started thinking a few weeks ago about the irony that you know here we have a holiday called
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Labor Day now I know it's actually, you know in celebration of unions But I just think it's funny that Labor Day is a holiday anyway, as you know,
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I often say to you that I read bad theology so that you don't have to and Well, it's my pleasure.
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I Was reading the TBN newsletter this week and a few things stuck out of my head
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One was you know, he says he's talking about Orlando. How many of you ever been to Orlando, Florida? Well, if you've been to Orlando, you know that they have what
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SeaWorld the yeah and Walt Disney World and several things and they also have the
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Holy Land what it's just called the Holy Land Oh experience And you can see it from the freeway, you know, you can see the
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Temple Mount Model there. Well TVN bought it a few years ago Trinity Broadcasting Network And so they were talking about in this newsletter now, they have some interesting things in there they have the scriptorium where they have a number of manuscripts that are extremely valuable
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New Testament and I think even some Old Testament manuscripts are very valuable there and everything But he said some things to say just one thing that really just stuck in my head
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He said that 80 million people a year visit Orlando now I don't know if that's true or not. I find that I the more
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I was thinking about that is 80 million a year That's a lot Let's say that's true.
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The next part. I don't know if this was quite correct. He said that If Jesus were physically on the earth today, he would be in Orlando.
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How do you know that? You know, I did I just thought that was pretty crazy I mean that then he went on now there was one other thing that really caught my attention here
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I'll give you two things from the newsletter This other one was he said, you know, they talked about the shows that they have at the at this thing and He says including they have one where the four most famous Famous women in the
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New Testament come to life. They have a show that does that Anybody know who the four most famous women in the
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New Testament are? Mary Mary Mary and Mary are three correct answers.
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Mary the mother of Jesus Mary the sister of Lazarus Mary Magdalene Those are three that they named and then the fourth woman
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I heard somebody say Martha Martha is not the fourth one they named What's that Lydia no
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Deborah no Delilah no New Testament New Testament Elizabeth no the fourth most famous woman in the
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New Testament is The unnamed woman who washed Jesus's feet with her hair and tears and I just thought she's famous.
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She's unnamed I Don't know, you know, I thought woman at the well Lydia and if you're gonna name
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Mary then Martha or something But I thought unnamed one. Oh, she's famous Weird stuff.
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Anyway, we're talking about work work. I would invite you to open your
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Bibles to Genesis 2 15, but if you've ever wondered where the
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Lord would be if you were here physically right now, I Just don't know where you get stuff like that Tea leaves
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Genesis 2 verse 15 and who would like to read that? Go ahead
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Fred you're saying
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What's the focus of this one this morning Steve? Well this is before after the fall before and God has created
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Adam and he has taken him and placed him in the garden to Cultivate it and keep it and as I note here on the sheet page one top of the page
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Work was commanded. It was given to Adam He was told he was given a responsibility to cultivate and keep the garden even before the fall
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So, I think sometimes we think of the Garden of Eden like it was Disneyland, you know that all they did
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No, I was gonna say e -ticket. Anybody know what an e -ticket is John Makarovsky Roger Paul Moran, okay,
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Paul. You're the young guy here. What is what is an e -ticket? You are wrong
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He was for exciting yeah, I mean it was and so so the picture we have sometimes
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I think of the Garden of Eden is that Adam and Eve were just like, you know going from one e -ticket ride to the next
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You know life was just one Big Disneyland experience. Well, they actually had a purpose, you know
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Adam it says here was put in the Garden of Eden to cultivate it and keep it and I know it's here that Adam was an image bearer of God in this respect
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Right here in the dictionary biblical imagery one of those huge books that nobody owns It says
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God as worker in Contrast a Greek mythology where the gods live a life of celestial loafing they're always goofing around when you read about them the
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Bible pictures and Always remember to turn off your cell phone when you are teaching Sunday school. The Bible pictures
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God himself as a ceaseless worker ceaseless
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Let's see Genesis 2 2 tells us that God finished his work which he had done and finished on the seventh and rested on from All the work which he had done
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But the truth is what if God just stopped working all together? Everything would fly apart as we're gonna see chaos
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The scientists would finally get their wish and we would have chaos Okay, so God worked look at Genesis 1 1 who can cite that for us?
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Without reading it in the beginning God created
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The heavens and the earth, okay, so right from the beginning God was a creator
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Genesis 2 7 tells us that he formed a man and That is used it's the verb that is used of a potter who forms out of a clay or out of clay a vessel
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So again, the indication is that God was at work
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He planted a garden for Adam in Genesis 2 8 he created woman Genesis 2 verses 21 through 22 and He set the pattern let's look at Genesis 2 verses 2 and 3
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Skipping around a little bit within the context of Genesis 2 taking things a little bit out of order just because I can
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Who wants to read verses 2 and 3?
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Go ahead Becky. So what is the pattern for work?
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You know, I mean, why was the Institute? well, we'll talk more about the Sabbath, but the The pattern is six days of work one day of rest how many of you work six day work weeks and yeah,
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I guess the moms don't have to raise their hands because they work seven day of work weeks, but What is the day of rest for a mom?
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I don't know You know, what do you just shut the kids up in the room and just leave them there? I guess that wouldn't work six days of work and One day of rest.
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Why do you suppose it is that we have 40 -hour work weeks and all that sort of thing Lazy men anybody else what do you think they have like 35 hour work weeks in some countries and 30 hour work weeks and six weeks of mandatory vacation and What's that And 80 % tax rates
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Man doesn't want to work. I think that's certainly one aspect of it If the government says listen, we'll take care of you.
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You just work 30 hours a week Most people are gonna say sweet deal Why because our men naturally inclined to work as we're gonna see the answer is no
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Not naturally inclined to our work. So if you take more of that away from them, they're thankful for it Is there another reason why they would do that?
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Mandatory, you know, I mean and even in the United States most jobs unless you're you know, really blessed and have a contract where they can work you as many hours they want but Why a 40 -hour cap
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Why a 30 -hour cap why all these other things because the fewer hours you work
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The more jobs that are created for somebody else, right? I mean when I was the deputy sheriff if I worked 80 hours a week if everybody worked 80 hours a week
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Then they would need half as many deputies as they need. So it's a way to keep unemployment down as well
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That's true, you can't spend your money if you're working So all these things kind of it done by the government to kind of engineer the economy a little bit, but I digress
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The purpose of the Sabbath, let's look at mark 2 27
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Purpose of the Sabbath, by the way, I didn't really put this in a lesson just a freebie What day of the week is the
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Sabbath? Does anybody say Sunday? It's not
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Sunday. It's Saturday It's Saturday if you want to celebrate the Sabbath and take
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Sunday off or Saturday off Sunday is the first day of the week.
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Not the last day of the week. So Anyway purpose of the Sabbath mark 227 who has that?
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Go ahead Daniel. Okay Sabbath was made for the man and not man for the
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Sabbath and I'm not going to read through all the BKC which is
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Bible knowledge commentary I abbreviate those things just so that I know and so that you know that you know, these aren't my original thoughts
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The point is what's Jesus's point when he says? Sabbath was made for man and not man for the
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Sabbath. What's he what's he trying to stress? John yeah, it's not it's not a series of rules.
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It's a day of rest. I mean how many of you have been to Israel? Anybody If you've been to Israel and you go into Jerusalem, they have literally markers in Jerusalem on how far you could walk on the
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Sabbath if you go into a building that has an elevator you cannot push a
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Button to move up and down in the building on the Sabbath You just walk in and it automatically stops on every floor because they think that that's work
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They set up so many rules and restrictions some of the Orthodox Jews Over there will take and the day before the
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Sabbath they will strategically park their cars to try to block roads So that other people don't break the
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Sabbath by firing up their cars and driving The Sabbath takes
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Control over their lives in so many ways and Jesus said that's not the way it's supposed to be
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It's not supposed to be a day of burden Supposed to be a day of refreshment a day of rest
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Okay, look at Kistemacher's comments here Not the
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Sabbath, but man was created first then came the Sabbath the Sabbath was instituted to be a blessing
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To help keep him happy Healthy, I mean you need Rest how long can you go?
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I was just thinking about this the other day. What's the longest you've ever stayed awake? Anybody stayed awake longer than two days
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Barbara 25 days 25 days.
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I can only tell you what happens to me after two days Yeah, I mean you don't really want to drive because things start what happened
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Well, I'm driving out. What happened you mentally? I mean after Yeah, well,
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I mean if you've been awake I mean when I when I was up for two days and I had to drive from the hospital home after that time
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And I'm telling you things were jumping out in front of me, you know, I mean I was seen I you know logically
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I knew these things weren't there, but I was still like tapped on the brake like crazy because you're just You start seeing things your brain needs to rest it needs to shut down Okay, let's move on from the
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Sabbath Jesus was and is a worker and I put in parentheses not a perpetual student, you know,
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I it just I think so much about work and taxes and all these kind of things because I'm just amazed at the way some countries are run in Great Britain as long as you keep going to school.
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They will keep paying you And I'm like, well, what do you my brother and I were talking about this the other day?
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What do you if the government subsidizes something guess what? You get more of it so if you tell people hey
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We're going to pay you to go get a doctorate then people are gonna line up to get doctorates
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And you know, you won't have any productivity, but you'll have lots of people with lots of advanced degrees
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Jesus worked Let's look at Mark chapter 6 Verses 1 to 3 and who has that?
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Okay, so they say isn't this the carpenter? What was the carpenter?
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Somebody who worked with wood somebody who? Made things though. I mean, it's not just I mean he could have produced any number of things
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Yeah, Daniel points out, you know, you see these pictures of Jesus and he's frail and he's weak and he's scrawny.
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I Don't think so You know you you had to I mean it was not easy.
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It's not like he just went you want a table, huh? I think I'll go bust out my skill saw and you know, just that's not what happened.
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This wasn't Tim the tool man Taylor I mean he had a he had a lot of heavy work to do.
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He wasn't scrawny. He would have been Pretty muscular because it was not easy work.
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In fact the whole that word conjures up basically he would have been
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We don't know precisely what he did but it carries the idea of he could have been any kind of Kind of construction worker could have worked with stone
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I mean he could have a lot of different things one thing we do know is that he wasn't sitting behind a desk pushing paper or you know
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Living a life of luxury. He was working hard. That's what he did So the main point of that whole thing wasn't you know, all the doubts they had about him
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It's just the nature of his work what he did before he started his ministry and in fact that that word also
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Because it carried it was such a common laboring and Labor -intensive job that it didn't carry much prestige.
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It wasn't like he was gonna walk around and hand people his business card You know, they weren't gonna say hey, this is the knowledgeable Guy in our village.
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It's just like Kidding. This guy is just a he's a lowly carpenter not well thought of But we also know from Scripture that he is the creator of all things
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Colossians 1 16 and 17. Let's go ahead and read that who has
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Colossians 1 pastor Dave Okay, so two aspects of that Talking about the
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Lord himself and his work What are the two points there that are significant concerning work and Jesus?
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Brian, that's right
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Brian notes that the first thing is he created everything and the second thing is he's still working He's still holding everything together and that if he took a day off Everything would
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Cease to exist he holds everything together And that's basically what
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Hebrews 1 3 says to that he is the sustainer of the universe So we don't need to read that again, but and he he is holding everything together
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Let's look at point number two work was made more difficult by the fall of Adam This is why it's okay to get mad at Adam not because we would have done any better but because of him everything is hard So no, it's not okay
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Let's look at Genesis 3 verses 17 and 19 This is after the fall and God is pronouncing curses who has
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Genesis 3 17 will go ahead Okay Look at what they say in the
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Bible knowledge commentary these punishments represent Retaliatory justice Adam and Eve sinned by eating they would suffer in order to eat it would be hard Think about again what it was like in the
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Garden of Eden They were supposed to work Adam and then Eve was given to him as a helper.
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They were supposed to work in the garden cultivate things, but it was difficult or easy
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Pretty easy Everybody had a green thumb all all two of them. You know in the
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Garden of Eden. It was impossible to kill things There was no death Didn't have to worry about running down and getting the right treatment for the different times of the year because there was no change of Seasons it was a constant
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Temperature everything was perfect perfect conditions all the time, but Eve Sub point number one there
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Eve was designed to be a help meet Her curse was that she would now have the desire to rule over her husband and think about this
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I Don't know if I phrased all this well But her desire is to rule over her husband and her design her
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God intended design was to be his helper so God's intent and her desires
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Are in conflict and that's why it's difficult to be a woman
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For Adam his desire now is to be a
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Slacker here for man, you know and God said this is your curse.
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It's going to be difficult to Eat it's gonna be difficult to work. You're gonna have to work hard Things were
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I mean I know it in the Garden of Eden. They were easy hundred percent employment. No taxes and no sweat very nice What could be better than that?
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James Montgomery Boyce notes the judgment on Adam has three parts First the ground is cursed because of him
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Before it had produced fruit and every good plant and abundance Now, although it will still produce
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Potentially what is good? It will also produce that which is bad thorns and thistles and Growing becomes difficult
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Adam is condemned to live by the sweat of his brow before work had been a pleasure and We'll see third like a slave longing for the evening shadows or a hard man working eagerly for his wages
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There's an end decree the end is not release but disaster it is death so death came as a as a result of what he did
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Okay, so what should be our attitude towards work, I mean this is the you know the the design of God was for man to work when he put him in the garden
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It was easy because of the fall of Adam it has become more difficult What should be our attitude towards work?
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Let's look at Colossians 3 verses 22 and 23 and who has that go ahead
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Brian I Think that is such an important principle
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Not just in terms of work, but everything we do there are two ways that we can do things
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We can do things to please people to be outwardly pleasing and We can do things
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From the heart there are two ways that things can be done now from the heart may also be outwardly pleasing
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It may also make our boss happy our wife happy our neighbors happy our kids happy Whatever, and if you're a wife your husband happy The Question isn't whether you can outwardly appear to do something right and to do something pleasing
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It is always your heart attitude, and that's why I say attitude of Christians towards work not our outward appearance our inward
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The inward truth about us Kistemacher says in spirit people cease to be slaves as soon as they begin to work for the
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Lord and No longer in the first place for men when you go to work.
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What is your priority? Do you think I am really going to knock my boss out today so that I get a raise?
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Or I'm really going to knock my boss out today because he deserves it no I'm really going to knock my boss out today because I want to please the
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Lord I want him to be glorified in my attitude towards my boss towards my work toward everything
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I do Kistemacher goes on moreover by means of his wholehearted cooperation with his master
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Rendering obedience to him in every way and doing this while his master was fully aware of the fact that the service was being rendered
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By a Christian the slave was promoting the cause and honor of the Lord The master would begin to think if the
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Christian religion does this for slaves it must be wonderful It is a matter of in some cases your witness
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People know you're a Christian and then they see that you dog it at work. Does that reflect well on the
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Lord? No, I mean if you're going to dog it at work, then please don't tell people you're a
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Christian Ruby a
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Christian must avoid laziness One of my favorite words in the entire
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Bible contained in this passage Proverbs 6 verses 6 to 11
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Yeah Remember a few years ago when we launched the IBS class and And I announced that we were gonna have
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I don't remember what the verse was I used that night that there were gonna be two tracks, you know, one was the certificate track and the other one was the
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Proverbs 6 verses 6 to 11 track or whatever, you know, and and Mike had no idea what
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I was talking about. So somebody looked it up and And there it was, you know, it was the sluggard track.
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So All right, Proverbs 6 verses 6 to 11 who has that go ahead
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Paul being a sluggard results in poverty ultimately
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Solomon was probably not calling his son a sluggard. He was speaking rhetorically to anyone who might hear or read the message and I like this the
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Hebrew word for sluggard occurs 14 times in Proverbs and Nowhere else in the
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Old Testament and it refers to more than laziness It's contrasted with the upright
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Contrasted with the righteous and is associated with being shiftless a lazy
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Irresponsible person who or is challenged to learn from the ant why you know, some people say well ants have a queen
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Well, they do Absolutely do but what's the Queen doing?
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She's not out there monitoring and that's his point. He's like listen Solomon says look at the ant.
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Nobody's out there telling the ant what to do Hey move that bale of hay over there and then after you get done with that do that.
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Nobody's telling them what to do They just do it So why do you have to be told what to do?
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Work hard not just when you're being watched but at all times. I mean just imagine, you know, the lazy ant
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Doesn't exist and that's his point number four a consistent testimony is given by Christians who work
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Heartily and I kind of use the flip side of that but the consequences of not working
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I mean if you want to have a good testimony as a Christian you work or you try to work
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You know if you're unemployed and I want to be very clear about this. I am NOT saying unemployment is a sin
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It's not a sin to lose your job. It's a sin to have a job and not work hard at it. That is a sin
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And let's look at 2nd Thessalonians Chapter 3 and I'll read verses 7 to 14 for you yourselves know
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How you ought to follow our example? Because we did not act in an undisciplined manner among you now just think about this
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Paul saying follow our the royal our Example follow my example
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Now that's pretty tough to do if Paul was Lazy Follow our example because we did not act in an undisciplined manner among you
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Nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying for it? But with labor and hardship, we kept working night and day so that we would not be a burden to any of you
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Not because we do not have the right to this But in order to offer ourselves as a model for you
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So that you would follow our example For even when we were with you, we used to give you this order if anyone is not willing to work
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Then he is not to eat either For we hear that some among you are leading an undisciplined life doing no work at all, but acting like busy bodies now such persons we command and exhort in the
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Lord Jesus Christ to work in quiet fashion and Eat their own bread But as for you brethren, do not grow weary of doing good
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If anyone does not obey our instruction in this letter take special note of him and do not associate with him so that he will be put to shame a
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Lot there and I'm going to briefly go through it But As Kistemacher notes, you know, no one who just kind of joined up with the
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Thessalonians That's what he calls it an irregular someone who just kind of had joined
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The group or the church or someone who didn't come all the time No one not one of them could say
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Paul you never taught us to be You never taught us about this work thing. They knew because of his own example secondly
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Paul Talks about Well, let me just read the
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BKC the missionaries had taught Paul and his companions had taught the
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Thessalonians to be industrious as well as giving them a good example Paul wanted no one to forget exactly what the
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Apostles had said. It was a firm rule of Christian conduct This idea that if you will not work you will not eat and there at the end of this quote
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No Christian who is able but unwilling to work should be maintained by others who labor on his behalf
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So the basic principle is if you're able to work and you're not willing to work
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Then the church should not help you out. In fact verse 11 that that idea of being undisciplined
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Literally means to be a freeloader or sponge. It's pretty rough language
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To be a busybody It's to be concerned about the lives of others meddlers lots of movement with no results, so the idea is
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That these people were very they acted very concerned and very noble but They weren't engaged in work.
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They had other things that they were more interested in. Yes pastor
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Dave yeah, they're gonna find other ways to To Fill their time and that's why
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I said, you know a few weeks ago you know when people call up the church and I mean, we don't get we don't get a lot of requests anymore for It's funny as the economy's gotten worse we've received less requests for help
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I don't know what that what that means, you know from outside the church, but You know, typically people now call and they have
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Bible questions or something like that and they'll say, you know, I went to your website or You know, I heard pastor
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Mike on the radio or whatever and they asked questions about Christianity and you know, if only this then
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I would believe or whatever and I So eventually I'll get around to well, you know, what do you what do you believe?
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What do you do? How are you gonna get to heaven things like that? And he says well, you know, I read the Bible a lot
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But I don't have a job. I'm I've been
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Diagnosed as clinically depressed and I'm unable to work I'm like, well, okay
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But I do I remember one guy said but I do work in a soup kitchen I'm like, but you're not you're depressed and you're unable to work
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Well, that's exactly right. Daniel says he spends too much time thinking of himself when you don't work When you don't have things to operate to occupy your time like pastor
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Dave was saying, you know instead you find other things to do and the
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Common malady these days is to focus on yourself what you don't have How things should be in your own life, and I'm telling you what if you spend 16 18 20 hours a day focused on you and your problems.
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You're going to need medication that's just the reality of it and People I think people can work themselves into depression work themselves and let me back that up They you can focus so much on yourself in your own life and your own problems and the way things are not that you can you can lead yourself into a
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Situation where any doctor is going to go down the checklist and decide that you're depressed and put you on medication. That's just reality
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And this is a good point here at the end of point B. Well, let's let's let's work through this working shows concern for other believers.
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You say how so? Oh, I skipped over that. How about church discipline for failure to work? Church discipline for failure to work that's pretty strong, but that could happen
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Somebody's a busybody if they're around work, but not doing it like pastor Dave was saying then that's
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That's cause for church discipline, but working shows concern for other believers.
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How so? Because as they note here in the Bible knowledge commentary working with one's own own hands
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Demonstrates love for the brethren because then no one has to be you're not a burden to anyone no one else has to support you and Paul as it as we just read set an example for the flock there to restful a life can be a problem and Paul guarded against that with this instruction this verse.
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I love this dignifies manual labor Everybody is always concerned about going to college.
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Why some people should not go to college. It's just pretty easy if You know like Charlie, and I had a conversation a few months ago about the different ways that people learn some people are very audio
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Centered they hear things and they remember them my brother And I were talking about being visually like like colors and things on flashcards
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Help us why because if I'm studying for something and I can literally Concentrate and I can bring up the color and think about what's on the card
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Some people learn by what's the other way that you learn? doing There is if somebody is gifted with their hands
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Why would you want to send them to get a PhD in something when you know when they could go down and be an auto?
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Mechanic and make a good living and support their family doing that or if they could go Be a plumber or a carpenter, or I mean they're all you know
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I I say You know when we lived in California. We lived in a very nice home. We had a landlord who was a carpenter
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There's nothing wrong with being a carpenter. There's nothing wrong with working for your hands, and it is a good way to make a living and This verse they note dignifies
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Gives dignity to manual labor We should work heartily that is from the heart even for unreasonable bosses
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Look at first Peter 2 verses 18 to 21 first Peter 2 18 to 21 and who has that go ahead
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Fred To 21
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Anybody anybody ever have an unreasonable boss I? See a few hands.
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I had some what I thought were unreasonable bosses Question isn't whether you're going to have one.
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It's how do you respond to them? I mean that is always the issue in The home within your marriage at work every relationship you have it isn't a matter of is somebody going to sin against you
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Is somebody going to behave wrongly toward you? It's how do you respond to that you know sometimes?
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We just think we have I? Don't know the Christian Bill of Rights. These are all the things up with which
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I will not put It's not the Christian life Peter wrote specifically in first Peter to Believers about how to deal with persecution
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But how to deal with people who were unreasonable and it's interesting as they note here from the
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Bible knowledge commentary The Greek word for slaves here is not do a lawyer meaning not bond servants voluntary slaves but oikatai
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Which refers to household or domestic servants? The word translated submitted
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Blah blah blah blah the idea of submission This word of exhortation was relevant to a large number of Peter's first readers because that servants and slaves were a high percentage of the early church and Peter challenged
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Christian slaves to a new level of behavior which required them to submit and respect those even who were harsh and I like how the term harsh means to be crooked so the word from which we get scoliosis
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Curvature it isn't about whether you're gonna have a bad boss because you are
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The question is how do you respond to them, and you're supposed to do what? Rebel shake your fist.
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I've had enough of this You can have your job because I'm out of here submit to them
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Submit to them why? Why you know
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I mean Peter wrote on and on about this. Why do you why are husbands? Supposed to honor their unbelieving wives.
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Why are wives supposed to submit to their unbelieving husbands? Why are Christians supposed to submit to their unreasonable bosses?
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Why the glory of Jesus Christ? The glory of Jesus Christ listen you say you're a
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Christian But when persecution when difficulty comes along, what do you do well?
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I complain and grumble and disputes. That's the Christian way No No The Christian way is to submit to even those to those who are unreasonable if they are in a place of authority
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Above you you submit to them. Yes Yes That's a good question.
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I'm sure many of you have seen in the news this this girl who left her family
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Where is that in Ohio? And apparently her parents are involved in some
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Mosque that has some questionable ties and Apparently and I say apparently she became a
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Christian because I've listened to the guy and I really don't I don't know But her fear now is that her parents will either have her killed or kill her as an honor killing and should she go back and submit to them even though You know, they're unbelievers and they might be unreasonable
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What do you think? Okay, Daniel says no because it would not be going back to a life -threatening situation would not honor
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God I mean, I think I think it's a tough one You know was it honoring her parents to leave in the first place
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I I don't know, you know, I mean if she was literally in in fear for her life and it's not like We've never seen this even in the
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United States these honor killings I would say that by now it would it would seem highly unlikely to me that that would happen, but I Don't know tough tough thing to say one way or the other but She's 17 and and so I think that also comes into play because I think she'll
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Basically get to a point where the they can Emancipate her and she could kind of Make her own decision.
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So that would be my guess legally, you know biblically I don't really know
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I mean at first I'd want to talk to her make sure sure she understood because like I said some of the things
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I heard the the pastor say just kind of Sounded a little odd to me, but I don't really know that's a good question.
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Well Go ahead John Well, what they've said now publicly, you know is that she can basically come back home
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No problem. Go ahead and practice your Christian. I mean, what else are they supposed to say? She comes home. We'll take care of her
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You know What's that yeah, there is that in the
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Muslim mindset it is okay to Lie to infidels to bring about, you know a bigger purpose.
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So I mean there are a lot of issues to sort through and I can't really Pretend to have all the answers on that.
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I think it's a complex issue You know you talked about leaving behind mother and father.
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Well, there's also you know What's the first commandment with a promise honor your mother and father? Does that mean you have to die?
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No, is she really gonna be put to death and you know I mean there are a lot of issues to kind of sort through and to evaluate and I I don't really know the answer
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Okay, we will finish this and maybe start on heaven and hell and everything in between next week, so That's what
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I'm calling it heaven hell and everything in between It could be a really long segment,
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I don't know how long it's gonna go. All right, let's pray our father we
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Do praise you for the blessing of work For the opportunity that you have given us to provide for our own well -being and For the well -being of our families we know that every good thing is from your hand and Lord we praise you for it
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Or we praise you that we live in a country that enables us to Basically negotiate or barter for things better working conditions and all these things
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Or we praise you that this is not a place where Even slavery is permitted even though that still exists in the world today
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Father I would pray that you would cause us each to look at our responses not only to work but to our bosses
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Within our homes Lord all the things that We do on a daily basis
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To check our hearts to make sure that our hearts are right before you that we have the proper motivation
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That our first motivation in everything is to be pleasing to you Father, would you just give us?
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That focus this week even as we talk about Labor Day Lord we pray these things in Christ's name.