WORK: THE MASTER KEY

Matthew chapter 6










Today we are walking in: Work: The Master Key







Job 34:16




If now thou hast understanding, hear H8085 this: hearken to the voice of my words.











UNDERSTAND





Today we look to the word-UNDERSTAND- H8085 shama`--to hear with attention or interest, listen to understand (language)










The Torah testifies...............




Genesis 11:7




Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand H8085 one another's speech.










The prophets proclaim..................




Nehemiah 8:2




And Ezra the priest brought the law before the congregation both of men and women, and all that could hear H8085 with understanding, upon the first day of the seventh month.











The writings bear witness...........................




1 Kings 3:9




Give therefore thy servant an understanding H8085 heart to judge thy people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this thy so great a people?







Work: The Master Key

Some dream of worthy accomplishments, while others stay awake and do them.




Jim Michaels, a television journalist in Louisville, Kentucky made the statement in one of his commentaries that “too many workers would rather get home than get ahead.” This lack of enthusiasm is clearly evident in the attitudes of many workers who see their jobs as dull, laborious, repetitious, tedious, and irritating. Since we spend most of our waking hours working, driving to work, or thinking about work, it is no wonder that a depressive attitude characterizes our feelings toward work. Indeed, the only joy many workers get out of their jobs is quitting time.




Although many laborers assume that things are better for high-ranking executives and others with large salaries, those who oversee 500 employees from behind large mahogany desks are not immune to this negative feeling toward work. They too are prone to seeing work as something to be dreaded, like death or taxes.




This attitude toward work has become of great concern to governments, corporations, and the media. As major problems with poor quality work, reduced productivity, and declining services cripple economic growth, the need and the desire to offer incentives and motivational exercises grow. Thus, aerobics classes, fitness rooms, and running tracks have become the focus of much effort and expense in the work place.




Beyond these attempts to improve the vigor and stamina of the average worker, corporate and government leaders are studying the strongest productivity centers of the world. Much of this attention is concentrated on Japan, where the art of work has been mastered since the Second World War.




After World War II, Japan was a devastated country. Many of her buildings and people had been obliterated by atomic bombs. She was a pile of rubble. After the war, the United States and other nations helped Japan to rebuild. Computer experts, agricultural specialists, scientists, teachers, and business people went to help the Japanese reconstruct their country. They set up manufacturing plants and demanded that the people work for much less than workers in the United States were paid. Because they were so devastated, the Japanese agreed. Today Japan is a power to be reckoned with. Her might is based on economic, not military strength. Her weapon is money.




WHAT RULES YOUR LIFE?




No matter how economists and politicians dissect things, the power in our society can be reduced to two basic elements: Yah and money. They are the major forces in our world. Yahusha warned that we would serve one or the other:




No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both Yah and money (Matthew 6:24).




Which one you serve has a significant impact on the release of your potential, because the basic power in your life determines what motivates you. If money motivates you, greed will control your actions. If Yah empowers you, His purposes for your life will control you. The

Scriptures promise that Yah will meet the needs of those who give their first allegiance to Him:




Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well (Matthew 6:25-26,32-33).




My son, do not forget My teachings, but keep My commands in your heart, for they will prolong your life and bring you prosperity (Proverbs 3:1-2).

The Most High does not let the righteous go hungry... (Proverbs 10:3a).




They also warn that allegiance to money brings trouble and financial bankruptcy:




Ill-gotten treasures are of no value... (Proverbs 10:2).




The greedy man brings trouble to his family... (Proverbs 15:27).




Misfortune pursues the sinner, but prosperity is the reward of the righteous.




A good man leaves an inheritance for his children’s children, but a sinner’s wealth is stored up for the righteous (Proverbs 13:21-22).




This is true because the love of money promotes corrupt morals and perverted values. The need to accumulate more and more material wealth overshadows Yah’s concerns of truth and honesty until deception and dishonesty determine what you do and how you do it.

The wicked man earns deceptive wages, but he who sows righteousness reaps a sure reward.. Whoever trusts in his riches will fall, but the righteous will thrive like a green leaf (Proverbs 11:18,28).




The wages of the righteous bring them life, but the income of the wicked brings them punishment (Proverbs 10:16).




This conflict between Yah and money is very evident in our attitudes toward work.




DO YOU WORK OR GO TO A JOB?




Most of us want jobs, but we don’t want to work. We want the money, but we don’t want to expend the energy. Nothing is as depressing and frustrating as having someone on a job who’s not interested in working. People who want a job without the work are a detriment. They are more interested in being job keepers than workers. They are more concerned with receiving a paycheck than in doing good work.




This attitude is completely contrary to Yah’s concept of work. Yah wants you to be a good worker, not a good job keeper. He is more interested in your attitude toward work than the status of your checkbook. He has the power to increase your bank account balance, but He can’t force you to have a positive attitude toward work.




OUR NEGATIVE VIEW OF WORK




Thomas Edison was a great inventor. Many of the things we enjoy today, including the electric light, are the fruit of his willingness to be responsible for the possibilities hidden within him. He was not afraid to roll up his sleeves and work out his potential to make visible that which existed but we couldn’t see. His life mirrored his words: “Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.”




“Genius is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.”




Too often we allow the pain and perspiration of work to hide its blessings. We assume that work is a necessary evil without looking for the good it brings. The source of our misconceptions lies in the fact that we equate sin and work. Although work does not exist because of sin, sin did change the conditions of work.




Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken (Genesis 3:17b-19a).




Work as Yah planned it was given to man before sin entered the world. The account of Adam naming the animals precedes the account of Adam and Eve’s disobedience. Work as we know it—with its pain, sweat, and struggle—reveals the devastation of Adam and Eve’s disobedience.




When Yah told Adam, “Dominate this world I made. Rule this planet,” life was new and fresh, and Adam had no knowledge of the power Yah had built into his brain. So Yah required Adam to come up with a different name for every animal. As he started naming the birds of the air and the beasts of the field,




Adam discovered his potential. Thus, work is a blessing that reveals what you can do. It is the master key to releasing your potential.




MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT WORK




Most of us don’t understand the importance of work. We prefer rest and relaxation to a good day’s work. The release of our potential requires that we acknowledge and move beyond the fallacies that characterize our view of work.




Six Days You Shall Labor...




We are a rest-oriented society. We believe that holidays, vacation and weekends are better than work days. This adoration of time free from work reflects our assumption that rest is to be preferred over work. This is a false assumption. Rest is not better than work.




When Yah created the world, He worked six days and rested one (see Genesis 2:2). He also instructed us to work six days and rest one (see Exodus 23:12). The result of our desire to work one day and rest six is evident in the boredom and unhappiness that plague our world.

Work always produces more personal growth and satisfaction than rest does. It stirs up your creative abilities and draws from the hidden store of your potential. If you are unfulfilled, you are probably resting too much. You’re getting bored because you aren’t working. You can’t run from work and expect to be happy. Work is the energy that keeps you alive. It’s the stuff that gives life meaning. Having six weeks of vacation is not the supreme measure of success or the ultimate prescription for happiness.




If you are unfulfilled, you are probably resting too much.




Retirement Isn’t Part of Yah’s Plan




A second fallacy that affects our view of work is the assumption that retirement is the goal of work. You were not designed to retire. You came out of Yah, and Yah hasn’t retired. He’s been working ever since He spoke the invisible into the visible. Therefore, retirement is not part of His plan for your life. Because Yah created man by giving him an immortal spirit with eternal potential, Yah planned enough work to keep you busy forever. Oh, you may retire from a specific organization or job, but you can never retire from life and work. The minute you quit working, you begin to die, because work is a necessary part of life.




Have you ever met a retired person who was uncomfortable, bitter, rowdy, and senile? He became that way because He retired from work. The lack of work made him crazy because it took away his means of finding fulfillment.




Just like a car runs on gasoline, you run on work. Yah created you to feel healthy and happy when you are expending energy to reveal all that He put in you. He designed you to find satisfaction in looking at the fruit of your labor.




That’s why inactivity often brings depression and discouragement. Yah didn’t intend for you to sit around and loaf.




Yah rested when He became tired. He didn’t retire. So He says to you, “I’m still working. Why aren’t you? There are still things in you that I need.” May Yah deliver you from the spirit of retirement, because retirement is unYahly, unscriptural, and unbiblical. Retirement is foreign to Yah’s plan for human beings.




You Can’t Get Something for Nothing




A third fallacy that adversely affects your understanding of work is the belief that you can get something for nothing. Nowhere is this fallacy more evident than in our fascination with lotteries. Advertisements for magazine sweepstakes fill our mail boxes. Daily numbers are announced every evening on TV and radio newscasts. Mail order houses promise great wealth if you buy their products. Get-rich-quick schemes, casinos, and TV game shows captivate millions and feed them this attitude. The messages of our world encourage our desire to get something for nothing. Sadly, we are taken in by their hype. Until we let go of our hideous attempts to receive benefits without effort, we will forfeit the blessings of work, because work is Yah’s pathway to a satisfying, meaningful existence.




Work is Yah’s pathway to a satisfying, meaningful existence.




You cannot fulfill your purpose without work. Trying to get money by winning the lottery bypasses personal fulfillment. Neither can you achieve Yah’s intent for your life by reaping the benefits of someone else’s efforts. Those who win the lottery often testify that they are more unhappy after they receive all that money than before. Why? Because they lose their reason for getting up in the morning.




Without purpose, life becomes meaningless. Life on “easy street” is not really easy because satisfaction requires effort. In fact, winning a million dollars could very well kill you if you stopped working. Oh, your body might live for a while, but your potential—the real you— would die from lack of use. The joy of life would be gone.




Yah gives you work to meet your need for personal fulfillment. When you try to get something for nothing you miss the opportunity to find gratification, because effort is the key to satisfaction. Life bears this out in many ways. Benefits without work short-circuit fulfillment because you usually have more appreciation for something you worked hard to get. You remember all you went through to obtain it, and from your remembering flows the impetus to treasure and care for the products of your labor. Handouts meet your desire for material possessions, but they deny you the pride of gaining through effort. This is the weakness of a welfare system that robs the individual of the personal responsibility, gratification and pride that comes from self-development and self- deployment.




WORK AND RESPONSIBILITY




The only way to rid yourself of the effects of these fallacies is to discover that the love of work is the secret to a productive life. Without work, you will lose direction and gradually succumb to atrophy. Your very survival will be threatened as the various facets of your life fall apart from a lack of purpose. So crucial is your need to work that the absence of work is often the issue that underlies problems in interpersonal relationships.




If, for example, a man marries without thinking beyond the pleasures of marriage to the responsibilities of a family, he begins to resent those things that naturally go with marriage and the establishment of a home—things like rent, utility bills, car payments, and grocery bills; things like the expenses and obligations that go with children. And, in time, the reasonable responsibilities of a home and a family begin to look unreasonable, and the duties of husband and father become burdens. That’s when the problems start, because the man begins to look for a way out of his seemingly intolerable situation. That’s when he begins to avoid being at home because he blames his wife and his kids for his multitude of responsibilities. That’s when he begins to act irresponsibly by chasing a young lady who doesn’t require him to pay the bills or to help meet the demands of family life. In essence, he begins to call responsibility pressure.




Work is Yah’s way to draw out your potential. Through work He opens the door into your inner storehouse and teaches you how to use your talents and abilities to meet the many responsibilities of life. Work and the ability to handle responsibility go hand in hand because work requires you to take on new challenges, dares you to risk failure to show your capacity for success, and prompts you to take the steps to make your dream a reality.




Yah wants you to fulfill all that He created you to do and be. That’s why He is constantly giving you tasks that reveal more and more of the wealth that lies hidden within you. Little by little, He’s chipping away at your storehouse of riches, trying to release all that He put in you. But you must cooperate with His efforts. You must refuse to allow the rest/retirement/I-can-get-something-for- nothing mentality to rob you of your need to work. When you accept your responsibility to work and allow Yah to change your perceptions of work, you will see a difference in your life because Yah set work as a priority for personal gratification. Work is the master key to releasing your potential.




PRINCIPLES




1. Yah or money will rule your life.




2. An allegiance to money brings physical, financial, social, emotional, and spiritual problems.




3. Yah wants you to be a good worker, not a good job keeper.




4. Work is a blessing that reveals what you can do.




5. Work always produces more personal growth and satisfaction that rest does.




6. Retirement isn’t part of Yah’s plan for your life. You will die if you quit working.




7. Yah gives you work to meet your need for personal fulfillment.




8. Potential needs work to manifest itself.