The Five Marks of a Man Seven Day Devotion by Brian TomeSample

Day 5 

Men Work to Experience God

John 5:17

Men, if you want a life in sync with the rhythms God created, you must learn to value work and to experience God through your work. 

The primary reason we work is to experience God. When God created Adam and Eve, he gave them some responsibilities, including filling the earth and subduing it (Genesis 1:28). What does it mean to subdue the earth?

In the very next chapter of Genesis, sin enters the world. Adam and Eve disobey God, and that’s when everything goes south. But God’s plan for them to work came before all of that. Work isn’t bad. It’s a part of the natural order. It’s what God planned for us. 

God commanded Adam and Eve to create order out of creation. He commanded them to bring culture and civilization into being. They were to figure out how to manage it, organize it, and make things that didn’t yet exist. 

God works, so when we put our hand to the plow, we are experiencing a part of him we can’t know in other ways. If we see work only as a money maker, we are likely to get knocked off course in the journey of manliness. If our world crashes when we lose a particular job, the job title might have become our identity. If we value our jobs solely on the size of our paychecks, or if we look to our jobs to tell us how good we are, we’re asking something of work it is not meant to give. 

Work is a way we experience God, but it doesn’t tell us who we are or what we’re worth. The sequence here is important. We are designed to work, but the Bible says we ourselves are God’s workmanship—we are a work of God. That’s where our value and identity come from. When we get that, we begin to think about our jobs and careers less in terms of a scorecard and more as opportunities to make the best contribution we can based on how God wired us. I know at some level, it’s what we all want: work to which we can bring our best, our A-game, our sweet spot, something we’re passionate about. That’s what God wants for us too.

What act of work do you need to do in the next week to move you toward your vision?