God and Vocation How Faith Affects All We Do in Life

God and Vocation How Faith Affects All We Do in Life

2. THE GOODNESS OF WORK

Work

Works

Good Works

Rest

How Faith Affects All We Do in Life

Creation Fall Redemption

Consummation

2. The Goodness of Work: Serving as Priests and Kings

3. The Goal of Work: Perfecting the Kingdom of God

5. The Futility of Work: Cursed in our Kingship

4. The Idolatry of Work: Betraying our Priesthood

9. The Posture of Work: Recovering our Priesthood

10. The Power of Work: Recovering our Kingship

11. The Presence and Place of Rest: Priests and Kings Now and Not Yet

8. The Redemption of Work: Jesus as our Priest and King

1. The Big Picture

7. Midterm Exam

12. How Then Should We Work?

13. Final Discussion and Review

14. Final Exam

6. The Tyranny of Work: Betraying our Kingship

Special lecture: Andy Crouch

Work

How Faith Affects All We Do in Life

Eph 2.4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

Eph 2.8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Eph 2.10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Works

Good Works

X

Work

Works

Good Works

Rest

How Faith Affects All We Do in Life

Creation Fall Redemption

Consummation

Creation

Story

Significance

God creates all things, with humans as his royal priests.

God is the creator, separate from but active in creation.

Creation is good.

Seven Days of Creation

7. GOD RESTING IN SOVEREIGN RULE

4. Sun, Moon, & Stars

5. Birds & Fish

6. Land Animals

1.  Division of Light & Darkness

2. Vertical Division: Sky & Sea

3. Horizontal Division: Land & Sea

Man, the image of God

Rea

lms

Rul

ers

Creation Fall

Story Story

Significance

God creates all things, with humans as his royal priests.

God is the creator, separate from but active in creation.

Creation is good.

Adam and Eve disobey and are expelled from the Garden.

Next verse, same as the first: Cain, Flood, Tower of Babel, ISRAEL.

Significance

Disobedience and exile.

In God’s Presence In God’s Land

Creation

Fall (Expulsion) Exile

Exodus (New Creation)

New Exodus

Creation

Exod 14.20-21 Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land.

Exod 19: 5-6 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

Exod 40.33 And he erected the court around the tabernacle and the altar, and set up the screen of the gate of the court. So Moses finished the work.

1 Pet 2.9   But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.

Rev 1:6 To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood 6 and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. Cf. 5:10; 20:6

Creation

Exod 14.20-21 Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land.

Exod 19: 5-6 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

Exod 40.33 And he erected the court around the tabernacle and the altar, and set up the screen of the gate of the court. So Moses finished the work.

Gen 1.16 And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars.

Gen 1.26   Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

Gen 2:2 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.

Gen 1.3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. . . 9 And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so.

Creation

Exod 14.20-21 Throughout the night the cloud brought darkness to the one side and light to the other side; so neither went near the other all night long. Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the LORD drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land.

Exod 19: 5-6 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Gen 1.16 And God made the two great lights—the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars.

Gen 1.26   Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

Gen 2:2 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.

Work

2. The Goodness of Work: Serving as Priests and Kings

Num 3.7 They shall keep guard over him and over the whole congregation before the tent of meeting, as they minister at the tabernacle. 8 They shall guard all the furnishings of the tent of meeting, and keep guard over the people of Israel as they minister at the tabernacle (cf. 8:26; 18:7).

Gen 2.15   The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it (cf. 2:5).

Gen 1.3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness. . . 9 And God said, “Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.” And it was so.

Creation

Work

2. The Goodness of Work: Serving as Priests and Kings

Gen 2:2 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.

Gen 1.26   Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

“There are many reasons to think that what God has in view, in an increasing communication of himself through eternity, is an increasing knowledge of God, love to him, and joy in him. . . . for so much the more is it united to God in love, the heart is drawn nearer and nearer to God, and the union with him becomes more firm and close: and, at the same time, the creature becomes more and more conformed to God. The image is more and more perfect, and so the good that is in the creature comes for ever nearer and nearer to an identity with that which is in God.” John Piper, God’s Passion for His Glory, 159-160

“God in seeking his glory seeks the good of his creatures, because the emanation of his glory (which he seeks and delights in, as he delights in himself and his own eternal glory) implies the communicated excellency and happiness of his creatures. . . God, in seeking their glory and happiness, seeks himself, and in seeking himself, i.e. diffused and expressed (which he delights in as he delights in his own beauty and fullness), he seeks their glory and happiness.” John Piper, God’s Passion for His Glory, 176-77

JONATHAN EDWARDS

2 Pet 1.3   His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, 4 by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.

Creation

Work

2. The Goodness of Work: Serving as Priests and Kings

Gen 2:2 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.

Gen 1.26   Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.”

THE BIG QUESTION

What then is our creational responsibility as priestly kings in the world?

This means that we need to reclaim the language of goodness, not to mention power (and to repent of cynicism) in ways that recognize or responsibility to steward these gifts for the sake of the world and God’s kingdom. The creational goodness of work is this: sharing in the extension of God’s goodness to the world.

It is to mediate God’s goodness (and power) to the world (as kings) and then to offer the fruit of that work back to God in worship (as priests).

Next week:

The Goal of Work— Perfecting the Kingdom of God