Life: God’s Version of
‘Take Your Child to Work’ Day
Week 1: Time to Get Ready
Colossians 3:1-10

† I.H.S. †

May the grace, mercy and peace of God be yours, as you labor in the faith, rejoicing as God brings His lost home!”

Robert Webber, the great modern expert on Liturgy wrote, “The purpose of worship is not only to glorify God by celebrating the work of his Son but also to assimilate in our own lives the pattern of dying to the sin that Christ died to destroy and rising to the new life that Christ rose from the dead to inaugurate.”

It’s an interesting thought, and it goes with the theme of the next 8 weeks. Whereas his statement is more from our perspective, we are going to look at how God assimilates us into this pattern of Christ’s death, resurrection and eventual ascension….as we begin to live life in the way that God has chosen for us, a life filled with love, and peace and mercy.

The way we are going to picture that goes back to an old practice, where dad’s would take their boys to work with them, so they could learn two things.  One, to introduce them to a potential career, and two, to respect their father’s hard work.

It’s too bad the practice has been pretty much forgotten, or because of insurance and OSHA rules, stopped!

Some of my friends’ families really got into it, even make the children clothes that would resemble their dad’s – making them “twins” for the day! Some of my friends loved it, the banker’s son had to wear a suit, the police Lt.’s son had a uniform—complete with BB gun, the fireman and doctor’s kids dressed up to…

The only friend I had that didn’t like that day, was the kid whose dad owned the septic tank cleaning company…he had a crappy day…

Each and every morning you and I wake up, God is taking us to His work, to learn how and what He’s doing in the world, and teaching us to do the same work, as we learn how, and grow even more in our adoration and respect for Him.

So, it’s time to get ready, and for today, we will look at the very beginning fo the day, and getting ready, getting dressed to go to work, with Dad.

Get undressed

Unless you are a pre-school teacher or maybe an elementary school teacher, most of us don’t go to work in pajamas or whatever we wear to bed…. and I think that’s a good thing!

Can you imagine if Deacon Bob was wear his flannel “spidey” pajamas under his role?

But the first step in “getting ready for work,’  is leaving the clothes of the night, behind.

Paul says, “⁵ So put to death the sinful, earthly things lurking within you. Have nothing to do with sexual immorality, impurity, lust, and evil desires. Don’t be greedy, for a greedy person is an idolater, worshiping the things of this world. ⁶ Because of these sins, the anger of God is coming. ⁷ You used to do these things when your life was still part of this world. ⁸ But now is the time to get rid of anger, rage, malicious behavior, slander, and dirty language. ⁹ Don’t lie to each other, for you have stripped off your old sinful nature and all its wicked deeds.

The phrase for “you have stripped off” is the based on the word “dyo”, to undress, to shrink out of, to remove.

The clothing of the darkness, the clothing of the night, needs to be removed, before we can get ready for work. We have to be stripped of it, it has to be removed, no matter the cost.

But look at what’s being removed…

The sinful matter described in these verses. It starts with desires and sexual immorality and all that goes with it, the desires, and it moves on to the bad stuff, uncontrolled anger, bad behavior – in fact, the word “bad” is the word for human waste product, the stuff they make fertilizer from. The list goes on and includes slander —what we term gossip today, and dirty or inappropriate language.

All that stuff has to be done away with, like the pajamas that are tossed in the hamper in the morning – they have to be put aside, even as Paul says, put to death. This is not only so we can go to work with God – but that we can live with Him.

The challenge is that we can’t – those stupid sins stick to us worse pajamas after a humid night in the 90s…. or some people stick to their bed despite 6 or 12 alarms going off!

The gospel begins as God causes us to rise out of bed, shrug off the pajamas, and He cleanses us like a steaming shower…

And now that we are cleansed, the gospel dresses us up… and get us ready to go to work…with dad.

Getting Dressed.

The same word that has a negative to it to make “undress” appears again- without the negative. Paul writes, “¹⁰ Put on your new nature, and be renewed as you learn to know your Creator and become like him.”

It is interesting that where as the behaviors of the old nature, the pajamas, the clothes worn in darkness are well documented, the behaviors to be expressed as we are clothed in Christ, as we are made ready.

We don’t have to describe the behaviors, the actions of those who are dressed with the nature of Jesus, because God walks with us, He guides us, He causes us to love and serve those who are different, those who are broken, those who lives the world has tossed aside, or glorified fro the wrong reasons.

To me this is the most amazing thing about God taking us to work –the complete change he works within us, the unbelievable peace and love that fill our lives, as we live in Christ with God our Father.

This is seen in Paul’s words to the council of Athens,. ²⁸  For in him we live and move and exist.’  Acts 17:27-28 (NLT2)

This idea of is expressed as we are told to put on Christ, that the Holy Spirit dwells in us, the we are in fellowship with God, that He will never leave or forsake us.

And He takes us to work every day, that we might share in His joy when He shows us how He saves, heals and equips others just like us… and the learn that when Jesus rose from the dead, we did as well, to share in His life, and His dad’s work.

AMEN!