Work: Its Nature In The Beginning
Minister: |
Rev. Ronald Van Overloop |
Date: |
10/9/2011 PM
|
Text:
|
Genesis 2:15
|
Psalters: |
208, 398, 88, 246 |
- By virtue of creation.
- At his creation God gave man the calling to work: ?have dominion over? and ?subdue? the earth (1:28).
- To ?subdue? is to make subservient or put into bondage.
- Man was to master creation.
- Adam?s immediate work was to ?dress? and ?keep? the garden (2:15).
- To ?dress? is to do work, to labor; and to ?keep? is to guard, protect, take care, preserve.
- They were to find labor a privilege, and the God-ordained way to bring glory to God and good to themselves.
- Implies that man was made to work (do productive activity as long as he is physically able).
- The fall into sin greatly affected man?s view of work (Gen. 3:17-19).
- God?s command for man to work did not change, however sin made work to be labor and sorrow.
- The woman?s work to replenish the earth is only done with greatly multiplied sorrow.
- Man?s work of subduing the earth would onlye with great weariness, frustration, and sorrow.
- The consequences.
- The difficulty of work cannot be neutralized on this earth.
- Today?s world wants man to be made for pleasure and entertainment.
- Let us exercise faith when experience of labor and sorrow in work.
- Faith makes us see sin and sinfulness as the cause for labor and sorrow in doing our God?given tasks.
- Faith sees that grace alone can make us work correctly.
- Faith uses the weariness and seeming uselessness of work to increase our longing for heaven.