FROM THE PASTOR
May 21, 2017
I didn’t grow up on a farm, but I did work on a farm from the time I was 12 until I graduated from high school. Those years were consumed with filling the hay mow, topping off the silos, milking the cows and tending to the chores associated with those activities. I didn’t mind that work. It was cleaning the stalls on the inside and the holding yard outside the milking parlor that I looked forward to least of all. What a disgusting job!
I was always amazed at how quickly the waste would accumulate. Manure spreader after manure spreader was filled and taken to the field. And trust me, this was not the neat enclosed spreader you see on so many farms today. This was the open style with the toothed spreader in the rear that would grab and fling, mostly backwards, but not always. Let me put it this way… an umbrella would have been handy. But the job needed to be done or the consequences to the animals, facilities and equipment would have been devastating if wasn’t.
Life is full of ‘not so pleasant’ jobs. We all face them and we understand that they must be done. But, that still doesn’t make some of them any the more pleasant. It always helps though to remember that even the not-so-pleasant jobs are to be done as doing them for the Lord. As Paul wrote…
Colossians 3:17 (NASB)
17 Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.
Whatever you do, do it in the name of the Lord. Regardless of what we do, we are always His representatives. Sometimes we’re instructed to do the unpleasant or unnoticed and even the unappreciated jobs. But we are still to do it in the name of the Lord. And furthermore, we are to do it ‘giving thanks’.
It’s hard to keep going when you feel unappreciated. That’s the part of our ‘old-nature’ that still sticks around even after salvation. But I believe the work we do in silence is the most worthwhile work that God can give us. I think it fits perfectly into the category of LOVE. It fits with the concept that the work is always for the GLORY OF GOD… not for the accolades of men.
Colossians 3:23-24 (NASB)
23 Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men,
24 knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. It is the Lord Christ whom you serve.
May God bless you as you SERVE OUR LORD.
Thank You for your faithfulness! Pastor Larry
