Honouring Jesus with my work

1 Timothy 5:23-6:2a

²³ Stop drinking only water, and use a little wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses.

²⁴ The sins of some are obvious, reaching the place of judgment ahead of them; the sins of others trail behind them. ²⁵ In the same way, good deeds are obvious, and even those that are not obvious cannot remain hidden forever.

¹ All who are under the yoke of slavery should consider their masters worthy of full respect, so that God’s name and our teaching may not be slandered. ² Those who have believing masters should not show them disrespect just because they are fellow believers. Instead, they should serve them even better because their masters are dear to them as fellow believers and are devoted to the welfare of their slaves.

Well, this is a bit of a potpourri of Scripture.  From ensuring you drink wine to deal with digestive and illness issues to some sin and some good works being easily seen and others, both sin and good works, not being easily seen and then Paul addresses work relationships, in the context of the time or the slave-master relationship.

Modern day slavery is a significant problem, but to conflate what Paul is saying with the modern-day slave context is to misunderstand Paul’s context.  At the time of Paul, the slave-master relationship was the common employment context.  So what Paul is getting at here is what we would regard as the normal working relationship we have with an employer.  Paul makes plain that we should not try to get an advantage in our workplace because of our faith, and especially if we are aware of the faith of our employer.  We are in fact to work hard because they have faith.

I have always tried to ensure that I work as “unto the Lord” in every employed endeavour so as no accusation that as a Christian I am somehow slack could be levelled at me.

Father – help me to work in a manner that honours you and those I work with.

Written by Ps. Richard Botta