For the last several months I’ve met with a group of guys on Friday mornings at 7am to read through and discuss books together. We pick a book, read a few chapters throughout the week, then when we meet up on Fridays we just hang out and talk about what stands out, what rubs us the wrong way, how to apply what we’re reading (or if we should apply what we’re reading). I’m a social person and I love reading, so this is a great time for me!
The book we’re reading right now is called Garden City, by John Mark Comer. There was a chapter in the book that talked all about the glory of God, and how the Hebrew word translated “glory” is kavod, which literally means “weighty” or “heavy.”
I don’t want to get too far into the weeds with this, because there’s a lot to explain and there’s a lot I won’t even pretend to understand when it comes to the glory of God, but there was one thing in particular that stood out to me in this chapter that I wanted to share. I’m going to quote from the book here:
One of the most jarring commandments in the New Testament is from the writer Paul:
“Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”
We live in a time of overlap between the ages. What one theologian called “the time between the times.” Because so many people are blind to God’s glory, we, as God’s people, are to live in such a way that people start to see God’s presence and beauty. But notice Paul’s examples. “Whether you eat or drink…” What could be more ordinary and humdrum than eating and drinking? And then Paul says, “or whatever you do.” Wow, so no matter what it is we do — everything — the most mundane, unimportant stuff in our life, should be “for the glory of God.”
The chapter then goes on to say:
How do any of us glorify God with our work if it’s not overtly Christian?
Well, here’s my take: we’re the image of God, remember? Our job is to make the invisible God visible — to mirror and mimic what he is like to the world. We can glorify God by doing our work in such a way that we make the invisible God visible by what we do and how we do it.
So, everything we do has the ability to bring this weightiness of God. Even eating and drinking.
How?
I’m still trying to kind of wrap my head around it, but let my try to explain by going back to Friday mornings.
My Friday morning book group could look two different ways. It could be a day where I get up early, even though it’s my day off, and I go to a coffee shop and hang out with some guys because I’m trying to be productive and be a good friend, and there would be nothing wrong with that! It would still be pretty enjoyable! But it could also be a day where I intentionally experience and invite others to experience community and love and growth, and where we spend time doing something we enjoy for no other reason than we enjoy doing it. Neither of those things are bad. But one of those seems to have more weight to it. One of those sort of turns into a list of things to do, a quota to meet. The other seems to breath life. I think that’s because one of those is a good thing, and the other is a God thing.
Externally, there is no difference. For most of us, most of what we do has to be done. We have to go to work. We have to take care of our children. We have to eat dinner. And, if we want to stay sane, we have to find some things to do in our week that we enjoy. However, there’s a way to do those same things in a way that brings the weightiness of God to it.
As we realize that God created us to work (remember, even Adam and Eve had a job tending the garden!), created us to have and raise children, created us to eat and drink, and created us to enjoy creation, it brings freedom that these things aren’t just unfortunate boxes to check along the way to making a productive, worthwhile day. They’re actually a bunch of moments where we can intentionally engage with the way God intended the world to be, and try to make those moments look more like they were originally intended to look.
Work can be an opportunity to tend to the created world and make it better for everybody who lives in it. Raising children can be a time to build relationships and grow in love, as well as raising what will ultimately become the people who will be running the world! Eating and drinking can be a time for thankfulness for provision, a time for laughter and fun, a time for conversation and community, a time for sharing. I love the fact that God commanded festivals in the Old Testament. I think God likes when people come together and just have a good time!
So, in the day-to-day, how can we bring this weightiness to each moment we find ourselves in? How can we show the world around us the glory of God?
The Endeavor 