Colossians 3:18 – 4:6

Feb. 5, 2022

18Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord.

19Husbands, love your wives, and be not bitter against them.

20Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord.

21Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged.

22Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God:

23And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men;

24Knowing that of the Lord ye shall receive the reward of the inheritance: for ye serve the Lord Christ.

25But he that doeth wrong shall receive for the wrong which he hath done: and there is no respect of persons.

Chapter 4

Masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal; knowing that ye also have a Master in heaven.

2Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving;

3Withal praying also for us, that God would open unto us a door of utterance, to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in bonds:

4That I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak.

5Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time.

6Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man.

I have to admit I’m chuckling to myself – I’m not going to tackle verses 18 and 19. That can be a fairly hilarious, but sometime fraught, topic. Instead, let’s look at “22Servants, obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God:” and “23And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men;“. Those are excellent words to follow in anything and everything we do. I have two loads of laundry that need to be done; rather than just stuffing the machine, I can opt to take the time to sort by color or whatever else needs to be washed separately. If I do my laundry to the glory of God, I’ll take the time to sort it and be particular in how I fold it when it’s dried. Because can you imagine doing God’s laundry? You wouldn’t just toss it in and walk away – you’d make sure it was the best laundry job you ever did.

I always got to work early so I had years to watch my co-workers come into work. You can tell just by the way they walked what kind of a day it was going to be for them. They’re going to do their eight but they were not going to be happy about it and they are not going to give it any more than the most cursory attention. But you better believe they expected a full day’s pay for a quarter of the quality the employer expected. If they knew that God was watching, that they were working for His glory, would they have had the same attitude. I have a very strong suspicion they would not.

No job is menial, no job is meaningless, no job is beneath us if we perform our duties as if we were doing them for God. Because we are. And because He’s watching. And because we want to honor Him in all things.

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