I hope you woke up ready to lock-in because I want to cover something really important this morning!
Today I want to talk about the point of our work, and propose a goal that I’ve been working on for the last few months. Not just one of many goals, but a goal that changes our entire perspective on why we work as Christians.
So I’ll share the goal, give a little context on its origin, and then circle back to why I believe this might be something really important for us!
My Proposed Goal:
“God’s primary goal for our work is for us to experience joy”
Now, I know many of us are getting ready to tackle a full day of hard work and there is likely at least half of it that you are NOT looking forward to. Meetings you have to attend, reports you have to fill out, emails you have to sift through.
Joy is not what first comes to mind for me most days, but stick with me and I want to hear what you think about my proposed goal after we’ve broken it down a bit!
What is the primary goal for all of life?
If we are going to look at the goal of our work, then naturally we should consider what the primary goal of our life is as Christians.
The Westminster Shorter Catechism states was written in 1647 to answer these types of questions, and question one get’s straight to the heart of the primary goal.
Q. 1. What is the chief end of man?
A. Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.
I’ve been going to a church where this question has been available to me for 10+ years, but it really wasn’t until the last two years that it stopped me in my tracks.
Seriously, the biggest thing, the most important thing, the thing I’m meant to do most, is to glorify God and enjoy him forever?
Some of the deepest thinkers and brightest minds in the faith came together and determined that this was the #1 goal. Whether you agree with that out of the gates or not, I challenge you to wrestle with it this week.
As I’ve wrestled with it, I’ve found John Piper to be an incredible resource to wrap my arms around these ideas of glory and joy.
Here’s how Piper states it:
“Experiencing God’s joy is the ultimate purpose of human life”
For the sake of brevity, I won’t go down this rabbit hole further, but I will provide this video if you find a longer pocket of time in the next week to watch/listen to it.
So what is the primary goal of our work?
I ran a marketing agency for almost 12 years, so let me use a marketing framework to transition us back to work.
When you put together a marketing campaign or a messaging framework, there is always one central message, from which all secondary messages align to. If you like visuals, here’s one I’ve found helpful over the years.
So if the ultimate purpose of the Christian life is to experience God’s joy, then every pillar of our life should align to that purpose. Friendships, marriage, parenting, and work.
Which brings us to my proposed goal for our work.
“God’s primary goal for our work is for us to experience joy”
As you might imagine, I don’t believe this is the goal of most Christians. It hasn’t my primary goal for the vast majority of my working life. Instead, I think our unspoken, but deepest held goals sound more like this:
The goal of my work is to prove my ability to be good at something
The goal of my work is to generate financial security
The goal of my work is to be able to do the non-work things I want to do
The reality is that most of us carry the unspoken goal of using our work to secure our independence, aka, being in control of our lives.
So as you finish out your work this week, I’ll leave you with a few questions to consider.
Do you find it easy or hard to “enjoy God”?
What is your core belief statement about work’s purpose today?
What is your gut reaction to the proposed goal of working to experience joy?
How does it make you feel when challenged to embrace a life of dependence?
As always, please respond to this email if you’d like to chat and discuss anything from this or other posts! And if you have any friends who you think might derive value from exploring Wholehearted Work - I’d love for you to share it with them.
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With Heart,
Alex
