Why does God include us in His work?

Hey, thanks again for sending in questions related to our recent sermons. This last Sunday, we studied Psalm 27, which instructs, unless the Lord builds the house, the laborers uh labor in vain or build in vain. And through the course of the sermon, we talked about uh working with God in a building project or really in any way that we work with God.

I mean, in our evangelism efforts, in our in in raising families, in in our responsibilities in our career. If we ever feel like we’re working with God, that co-laboring with him looks a lot like what what it’s like to bring children into the world. Um parents certainly must be involved in the process of bringing children into the world, but at the end of the day, it’s God’s miraculous work that that brings it to fruition. Um and we said that’s that’s what it’s going to be like with our building

project here at Bridges. We will all each do our part, but but God will do something more than that uh to bring it all together. That’s what it’s like to build with the Lord. Um we do our part, but the result is beyond what we could ever do on our own. Um and so the question comes in today is why does God involve us in the process at all?

Why why does he invite us into working with him? Why doesn’t he just work and give to us, you know, uh uh all the results as a gift? Um and the answer is, it seems pretty clear in scripture, um that that that that work and purpose, um creating, adding to the beauty of the world, um is is part of God’s perfect good design.

It is a joy to work. Uh we know that because um you know, in the garden before there was ever sin, we were working alongside of God. That means that it’s that it’s beautiful, that it’s perfect. Um that it gives us joy. We we also know it because God works uh in the garden. Um and God is perfect in all of his ways. Um you know, he works to bring sun and moon and stars and fish and animals and us.

That’s work. And if God does it, then we know um it’s it’s not it’s not menial, it’s not purposeless, it’s it’s part of the goodness, perfection, beauty of the world. And so God wants us to do it because he wants us to experience the goodness, beauty, um perfection of what it is to work alongside of him.

He would he would be doing us a disservice if we just, you know, floated around on clouds and strawberries fell into our mouth all, you know, for all of our existence. That that wouldn’t be good. That would be less than good. Um because he does work, we know that work is a is a is a good and glorious thing.

Now, of course, work got tainted by the fall like everything else does. But even in eternity, you know, the pictures we have in eternity are not us just floating around on clouds. We are still participating in the beauty of the world to come. Um and so we will always be uh kind of working alongside of him because that is the path to fullest joy. Um so thanks for the question.

We’ll see you next time.