“Character Counts - The Christian at Work”
Scripture Reading: Matthew 9:9-13
Sermon Transcript for January 29, 2006
By Rev. Dan Sinkhorn
Today we continue looking at Christian character, in particular, the character of the Christian at work. The Scripture passage that you just heard was chosen because it seems like a pretty good representation of work. Matthew at work doing what he did for a living and pretty justified for doing it the way he did. You need to note that tax collectors in those days were probably some of the most hated people that there were. They were despised by their own native people because they were seen as traitors who collected taxes for the Roman oppressors. They were also despised, ad maybe somewhat justifiably, because many of them had the habit of inflating the tax rate a little bit and making more money for themselves then what was required by Caesar. And they had the backing of the Roman army so they got away with it. People did hate tax collectors quite a bit.
And that’s why there are three things about this story that really jump out and get my attention and maybe yours too. First of all, we see that by Matthew’s calling and response that no one is out of the reach of God’s salvation. No one! And if your work experiences have been like mine then you probably know somebody at work that you think might be just a little out of God’s reach. Because we love them, we know who they are, but this story tells us that every one is within God’s reach. Another think I noticed is that Matthew had an immediate and wholehearted response. And then I noticed that in this story we see Matthew bringing his friends, co-workers, people yourself into his home and then inviting Jesus to the same gathering because he knew that these were not the sort of people that would seek out a Jewish Rabbi.
So let’s look at the first again. No one is too bad for God’s grace to transform them. No one is so far out of God’s reach that God can’t get to them if they will only reach back That’s why Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.” You know, we are going to talk about character in the church next week and one of the things we will have to acknowledge is that there are a lot of sick people in the church. Because by Jesus’ description, this is a hospital for the spiritually need and unhealthy. So welcome to the hospital for the souls. Jesus was making fun of the Pharisees and the other self-righteous people who were mocking Him because He said, “You don’t need a doctor, you are already perfect. You don’t need this Good News. You guys are just fine like you are.” Is there anyone who can really claim to be there? Already perfect already suitable for heaven? Not if we’re honest with ourselves. So I think Jesus, sort of in a way that was typical of Him, was making a little tongue-in-cheek remark to let the Pharisees and other self-righteous ones know that they are only blind to themselves. That the only thing that they couldn’t see was their own personalities, their own troubled souls. That’s why Jesus said, “I desire more than sacrifice. I don’t want you to go through the motions. I want you to love unconditionally and welcome unconditionally.” No one is beyond God’s reach—not even your co-workers.
The second thing again was that Matthew responded immediately and wholeheartedly. Matthew knew that he was a sinner. Matthew knew that we was an outcast in his own community and that he was not an acceptable sort of person by most people’s standards But here was this Rabbi whose reputation was well known at this point, inviting him to be a part of what He was doing. Here is this Rabbi who went to where Matthew plied his trade and invited him to join Him. We don’t know what the people around us are going through in their spiritual struggles. We can guess. We can make certain accurate assumptions based on what we witness about their lives. But the truth is we don’t really know how badly they need to hear the Good News. We don’t know that we aren’t the great voice that they are waiting to here. And so we’ve got to be ready to be used as the spirit guides us because we may just encounter an immediate and wholehearted response like Matthew’s. We may need to have an immediate and wholehearted response like Matthew’s of our own.
When we look at the story of Matthew, we are reminded that there is more to following Christ than just assent, just following and wearing His banner over our heads. There is more to following Christ than going to church on Sunday, calling yourself a Christian when asked, writing your religious affiliation on applications and admission papers or telling the chaplain at the hospital when you are admitted. There is much more to it than that. And Matthew demonstrates it. Because immediately after we are told of his conversion where he is answering to his calling, we hear that he has invited the people around him, people like himself, to come and meet this Jesus that he knew. The story tells us that Matthew didn’t do anything extraordinary. He wasn’t a preacher; he wasn’t trained in theological processes; he wasn’t in anyway special, in fact he was a little despised because the only thing he was good at was stealing money from other people. So he did the only thing a person in his position could do about the experience in Jesus. He just went out and told people what had happened to him, what he knew to be true. And they came. They came to Matthew’s house and Jesus went to Matthew’s house and for all we know there were dozens and dozens of transformations that evening that led to strings and webs of connection. And they were a whole body of people who were known locally by the righteous as “sinners”. It’s like the story of Jesus and the woman at the well. He went to the well where the Samaritan woman was and He knew all about her sins and her wayward lifestyle. But He forgave her sins, offered her eternal life and she was so overwhelmed that she ran and told all of her friends, all the people like herself and brought them back to Jesus. And though we don’t have the details, we can assume that there where webs and strands of saved people. We have a history book of well-known Christians and we have a volume a hundred times larger unseen of less reputable people that’s spread the Good News of Jesus Christ and changed lives. We are here today as much because of Matthew and his ilk, the Samaritan woman and her fellowship, as we are because of the Apostle Paul.
Because Matthew responded wholeheartedly and met people where they were and brought them Jesus, lives were changed, countless lives. And so this is the premise that we want to look upon for a few minutes as we consider why we need to be Christ’s servants at work. I understand and based on experience from knowing so many of you and what I see with my own eyes that there is a lot of pressure at the workplace. I know! It’s incredibly difficult to figure out how to witness your faith and work. I know that most of us have become quite comfortable compartmentalizing parts of our lives and that there is a huge psychological barrier that we have erected between work especially and the rest of our lives. We do it because it protects us from being overwhelmed by the stress and frustration that we experience at work. Or we do it because there is a justifiable fear that we will be discriminated against, that we will make a misstep that can cost our job because at the very least our livelihood and our family’s well being is at stake. And if you really love what you are doing then there is a danger that witnessing too much to your allegiance to Christ might cost you the joy that you get from doing what you do.
But it might be that we are thinking incorrectly about what it means to witness at work. It could mean that we are all filled with these caricatures of Christians witnessing at work. Who hasn’t experienced a Christian who was filled with zeal and enthusiasm for the Lord but not terribly wise in their approach or who have been taught that people need to be told now because of the sense of urgency and there is no time to waste. And so they are in your face, they are over the top, they are waving their Bible in your face and you are thinking, “This doesn’t work.” Well, I want you to know that so many great people have come to the Lord because of that kind of witness so I don’t want to completely discard it. But we are living in a time when we need to be realistic and we need to admit that our witness has to be something richer and more authentic and more acceptable in the workplace at least. That’s not a watered down Christianity. In fact, I will argue that it is a kind of Christianity that is a lot harder than throwing Scripture versus at people and dire predictions about their eternal fate. I think it is a whole lot harder to go to work every day tempered by grace, to go to work every day prepared to simply live your witness, to gently, yet consistently persevere in your personal spiritual journey in such a way that people can see Christ changing your life right before their eyes. And I wager that if you can do that to the best of your ability every day in your working life, you will have people who will come to you and say, “I want what you have.” You won’t have to get in their face. They’ll get in your face.
I can say this, in part, because of my own personal experience. I understand some of these things because I’ve lived them. I remember when I was selling MAC trucks for a living. I really enjoyed selling those trucks. I wasn’t great at it; I didn’t make lots of money. I specialized in “dirty” trucks. We called them that because I sold garbage trucks, dump trucks, off-road equipment. I like the interesting applications where the trucks were all unique. That really fed my intellect. I use to say that there wasn’t a hole in the ground in Indiana or Kentucky that I hadn’t visited. So I made a decent living selling those trucks. But one day my sales manager, who was a very kind person, called me into his office and he said, “You know, you are doing a fair job, but the truth is you need to do a lot better.” And I said, “Well, I’m doing the best I can. I would like to think that my clients know that they have a trust worthy and faithful representative of our product who will take care of them and give them exactly what they need.” And the sales manager said, “Well, Dan, you do that. But the problem is you are just too honest.” He said, “You just don’t play the game well enough.” And I had to agree; he was right. And for a long time I was really uncomfortable because I didn’t know what to do. And I did have a family to feed, you know. At that time in my life we only had three kids. They were all real small and we decided that Laura should be with the kids as much as possible and so we gambled a lot on my ability to sell trucks. So this was a very troubling time for me and it was very worrisome. And I watched how some of the other salesmen in the office operated and I could see that they were really good at schmoozing the customers and that they were very good at wining and dining them and giving them all those extra perks that, well, would cost me time with my family and would put at risk some of my core values. And I just couldn’t do it. I was eventually given the opportunity to go into the Parts Department and sell for them and become someone else’s problem. And I took it. No regrets, but it was a hard time! And that eventually led me to the meeting with Reverend Mike that led me to a place called Grace Church where I became your Associate Pastor.
So, God is at work in these things but it is hard. And you have to resist the temptation to conform. And you’ve got to learn to lead in love. This is what Paul says in the Letter to the Galatians that it is “for freedom that Christ set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.”(Galatians 5:1) Now, Paul is talking about circumcision, he’s talking about a religious affiliation in this particular passage, but it is easy to see how that would apply to this aspect of our lives where we feel that our social reputation and our livelihood is at stake. But the challenge is to stand firm, to resist conformity, and to lead in love. And know that your leadership isn’t so much about the techniques you use to get them to come to church as it is about the testimony of your life. Jesus had the same problem. There is a story in the Gospel of John when Jesus is at the Temple again, that was His workplace you might say. And the people around Him pressured Him and said, “How long are you going to leave us in the dark? Tell us are you the Messiah or not?” And Jesus said, “I have told you but you don’t believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name testify to me.” (John 10:26) You see, even Jesus had that problem. And Jesus answers, “I’m living it right before your eyes.”
And so Christian brothers and sisters I think Jesus is telling us in the same way, live it! Let them see the Father through you. Let them see Christ through you. Let your testimony be so magnetic in its presentation that they are drawn to you because there is something you have that they want. You can do that at work. You can do that without crossing ethical lines and without violating political correctness. You can do that because you are a Christian changed by God’s grace, filled with his Holy Spirit, and you are on a journey of transformation--this journey that John Wesley called “the road to perfection”. Accepting discipleship into Christ comes with a cost. There is no question that you, even through a living witness, you will encounter difficulty. You may be faced like I was with a dilemma. But those dilemmas are the ones that more often than not show other people vividly what kind of spiritual backbone you have. And believe me when I tell you that the people around you are watching because they know you are different. And they are watching you really carefully to see exactly what you are going to do when the troubling time comes.
Thanks to the CSI program based in Las Vegas there is a song from my youth that has become again. It’s a song by “The Who” called “Who are you?” The chorus is real clever. The chorus says:
Well, who are you?
I really wanna know
Tell me, who are you?
‘Cause I really wanna know
You see, when you are at work behaving differently from the rest of your week, then Christ may be asking you, “Who are you?” Or if you are at work living as generally with Christ in the same way that you try every day of your life, then maybe the people around you will look at you and say, “Who are you? I really want to know? Who are you?”
Over the years I’ve learned that even in ministry we are faced with a different set of attitude during the week from the attitude we bring on Sunday morning and we have to really work at it even when the church is our whole life. And I’ve learned that we stumble. All of us! I stumble. Even today, even this week there will be times when I know people are watching my witness and judging it and I will let them down. And I need to tell you then that while you are living out this witness in a way you will be tempted to be afraid of falling because you know that these people have held you to a higher standard. And there is only one answer when that happens. Own it; accept that this is a product of your spiritual journey, your road to perfection. Admit it especially to those who are critiquing your life because they are trying to find something about you for themselves. Admit that occasionally we make mistakes even as we live in Christ and Christ in us. Admit it, accept the consequences, repent of it and move on because it is what theologians call the process of “sanctification”, getting a little better every day. I can assure you that I will sin today but I can also assure you that tomorrow I will be a little bit better than I was today. And with the Lord’s help, I will grow ever closer to His image through the remainder of my days. And I want to make sure I do it 24-hours a day, 7-days a week no matter how frightening the environment, no matter how tempting the relationships might be. We must stand firm as the Letter to the Galatians says, “I must not grow weary in well doing. I must continue to look forward to what we reap at harvest time and to never give up.” (Galatians 6:9) Because the fact is, if we don’t try, we’re never going to get there.
So please remember these things: At work there are people that God loves very much that might not seem savable but they are. Remember that there is a lot at stake and so you need to be careful in how you witness for Christ. But if you will let Christ go before you and as He promised give you the words and deeds that testify to His spirit within you, you can be a light that attracts people to Christ. And then accept the fact that no matter what you do, there will always be a price to pay for your discipleship. It comes with a cost even for some of us as much as it cost Jesus Himself. But we must continue and not grow weary. And with the Lord’s help, then we can deal what this passage says on the screen. We can live a life that Jesus will be proud of. Bountiful in fruits from the soil making Jesus Christ attractive to all and getting every one involved in the glory and praise of God. If that’s your desire, join me in saying “Amen”.
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