You’re Made to Work
Please turn with me to Gen. 3. Tonight we continue our series Your Work Matters
And we know that because God is the 1st worker in Gen. 1:1. All 3 persons of the Godhead work—Father, Son, & Spirit. As we saw this morning, work is a gift from God, and He created you to be His coworker.
But you might be thinking, “That all sounds good. But in my experience, work isn’t always good. I’ve had bad bosses, bad employees, bad coworkers. Look at the corruption and deception in so many whole industries.
Doesn’t Gen. 3 show us that work is actually cursed?” Some might even say, “Isn’t work part of the Curse? So work no longer has value. It no longer has that original dignity.”
So let’s look at Gen. 3 beginning in v. 17…
And unto Adam He [God] said, “Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, “Thou shalt not eat of it:” cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life;
Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the herb of the field;
In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground…”
They say, “See work is a curse. We do it in sorrow all the days of our life. Thorns & thistles. Sweat & toil. Does that sound like a gift? Work is a curse.”
But wait a second, look back at v. 17, what was actually cursed? The ground. The curse was placed on the ground, not on work per se.
Not only that, but we have to remember this is Gen. 3. In Gen. 1, God creates work as part of His original creation. It’s perfect. It’s inherently good.
God created work for man during his state of innocence— before sin, before the Fall, before the Curse.
The Curse was not work. The curse was on the ground which means we have to work harder.
You will have difficulties with your boss, with your coworkers, with your industry, with your job, with your lack of a job.
But the problem is not work. The problem is sin.
Tonight, we want to see: how does sin now impact your work?