Nor is the business person is left out. He’s ever ready and willing to play ball with officials in both the public and private sectors. He’ll offer inducement to get contracts and acquiesce at over-invoicing. Many start out well, resisting the temptation to play the devil’s game but let the devil bare his fangs a little, and we cave in. One brother recently told his story. He had been in the marketing communication field for a while now just getting by with small accounts because he found he had to either pay “public relations” upfront or collaborate with relevant officials to inflate invoices. Now, he says he’s tired of playing the “saint” where everyone else is a “sinner” laughing joyfully to the bank. Why does he want to do that? He was getting married and would therefore soon have a family to provide for...
As we come to the home stretch, I wish to reiterate that those of us who have accepted the Lordship of Jesus Christ have no business living our lives as anything but sons. The kingdom that the Lord Jesus helped to birth is a kingdom of sons, not of subjects. Adam was a son of God who worked in the family business. When he lost his son-ship through rebellion, God promised to restore him one day. He did through the Lord Jesus, also known as the second Adam. The restoration is total. The Bible says he who knew no sin was made sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. The import of that was that we were restored to that state of fellowship, which Adam had with God the Father in the Garden of Eden; that state where they enjoyed “Tales by Moonlight” together in the cool of the day. Righteousness means right-standing. It speaks of that state of being able to stand in the presence of the Father without any feeling of guilt, unworthiness or inferiority. That is an envious state to be in!
But what use is an enviable position that is not used for any good? What use is son-ship if, in practice, it’s just another name for servant-hood? Yet that unfortunately is the rule rather than the exception in Christendom, a whopping 2,009 years after Jesus finished the work of reconciliation, reinstatement and restoration at great personal cost to the entire Godhead. The Bible says God was in Christ reconciling us to himself. It says Jesus came to restore unto us eternal life, which is the very nature of God. It says that to those who believe, he has granted the power, the right to become sons of God.
I have been saying that in nowhere else is our servant mentality more glaring than in our attitude to work. If some sociologist had not conceptualised the rat race, the average Christian would have, because, he epitomises it! From cradle, he is primed for the race – the race to get an education so that he can get a certificate or certificates, so that he can get a job, so that he can make money to put food on the table, wear good clothes, live in a good part of town, ride the best cars, put his children in the best schools, so that they can join the rat race with a couple of advantages over others.
If somewhere along the line, he realises that things are not working exactly as he would have wanted, it dawns on him that he needs God. So, he inserts God and church somewhere in his schedule. From that point on, he never leaves home without praying which oftener than not is simply to tell God what’s going wrong and ask him to fix it “in the mighty names of Jesus.” And off he goes to work for his daily bread!
If, like many, he doesn’t get a job fast enough after acquiring his degrees, he, as the Americans used to say, “gets religion,” which is saying, he becomes active in church. He’s the first to arrive for every service. Whatever work there is to do, he’s available. He’s fervent in spirit, serving the Lord to borrow the words of Apostle Paul. Then his prayers are answered, he gets a job. Glory to God. Of course he is no longer available to serve the Lord – understandably. He has to wake up at five in the morning, in order to be at work before eight. He does not return home till 10pm, thanks to heavy commuter traffic. He’s in the rat race now to make money so that he can put food on the table, wear good clothes, live in a good part of town, ride the best cars, put his children in the best schools, so that they can join the rat race…
Of course, our now gainfully employed brother feeds his intellect fat in the course of his job - no choice about that. It is a requirement if he’s to keep his job and ever get ahead. In contrast, he has become a Sunday-only Christian who sits under the word only on the Sabbath. And if his church is one of those seeker-friendly ones; where the service, as one of my pastors (Rev B) would put it, is the microwave, fast-food type, that can mean hearing the word of God for no more than 30-40 minutes a week. In effect, his spirit is severely malnourished. He becomes heavily depended on the wisdom of man, not having fresh supply of the wisdom of God that’s available in God’s word.
This is the general trend. We are resigned to the demands of the Babylonian system. We even tell God to understand because, after all he gave us the job, and in any case that’s where our tithes and offerings come from.
Next, when issues arise threatening the job, we are ready to give it whatever it takes to retain it. The guys are willing to play tough and rough while the babes are willing to play soft and smooth. The former is euphemism for maiming and killing while the other can mean bed-hopping and unscheduled late nighters.
It doesn’t end there. In the civil service for instance, take-homes are routinely increased through doctored touring advance retirement featuring fake receipts and sundry documents. This obtains in the private sector too. Contract inflation is the order of the day while payment for jobs never done is the norm.
Nor is the business person is left out. He’s ever ready and willing to play ball with officials in both the public and private sectors. He’ll offer inducement to get contracts and acquiesce at over-invoicing. Many start out well, resisting the temptation to play the devil’s game but let the devil bare his fangs a little, and we cave in. One brother recently told his story. He had been in the marketing communication field for a while now just getting by with small accounts because he found he had to either pay “public relations” upfront or collaborate with relevant officials to inflate invoices. Now, he says he’s tired of playing the “saint” where everyone else is a “sinner” laughing joyfully to the bank. Why does he want to do that? He was getting married and would therefore soon have a family to provide for. Food on the table, again!
You already know about the politicians among us. To get nominated to contest at all, they have to play ball at the party level and other levels thereafter depending on how high on the ladder the office is. Some of them literally maim and kill to “win elections”. When they finally get to office, the primary assignment is to recoup expenses, including but not limited to, those to be paid with huge interest to “godfathers,” and the cost of financing mayhem. As many readers of KINGDOM Perspective might recall, we sounded an alarm at the fact that at one stage there were many more professing Christian ex-Governors being tried than adherents of other faiths.
Nothing new in all of these, I can hear you say, but what has it got to do with son-ship? Let me try to answer in the little space that I have left. First, a child of God has no business trusting in anything or anyone else to provide for him/her. When you understand that your job is not your source; that it is simply God’s place of kingdom assignment for you, you’ll do it differently. You’ll find it easy to go to God and ask for a change if the job is getting in the way of church, for instance. That’s because it can never be God’s perfect will for you to be in a job that forces you to “forsake the assembling of yourselves together” or which stifles your ability to grow your faith through hearing the word of God.
When you see your job as a kingdom assignment, you’ll appreciate the need to apply only kingdom principles in carrying out your duties. You will not seek to hold on to it at all costs; you’ll resist the urge to do the immoral, the illegal and the sinful. You will do it as unto the Lord. One of the most effective weapons of the enemy is the lie that faith and your work don’t mix; the lie that work is work and it has its own methodologies, and faith is faith and it has a different set of rules. The truth is that children of God have only one assignment – to grow the family business, which is the kingdom of God. You grow the business not to earn a living, but to serve your father in love. You have a heirloom to draw from as a heir of the Father and joint-heir with Christ. God will meet your needs, if you let him. If he chooses to do so through the department he has posted you to, that is his prerogative. But that job is not and can never be your source, He is. (CONCLUDED)
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