Which Reward?

DEVOTION

THE LETTER TO THE COLOSSIANS

WHICH REWARD

Col 3:22-25

22 Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything; and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. 23 Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, 24 since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. 25 Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.

NIV

Having looked into the relationships of the family and how that relates to our relationship with Jesus, we move on to this aspect of slaves and masters. Of course slavery in the sense it is spoken of here no longer exists in our culture. However, there is in some sense a correlation between employees and employers that would fit our situation in life. Because we make an agreement, a covenant with our employer, as Christians we are obligated to work diligently at our task whether the boss is present or not. We are told to obey them, to fulfill our agreement to work at that job, or position we have been hired to do and for that certain amount, we agreed to receive as compensation for our labor. We also need to work with sincerity of heart and reverence for the Lord. We have to remember we are representing the Lord and as we work, the manner of our work, the attitude in our work all reflects Jesus. There should be no complaining, no grumbling about the boss, or about what assignment we have been given. We show up on time, perhaps even before our appointed time to work so we are ready to begin when we should. We do not compare ourselves to others or grumble or gossip about their work, or lack of it. Whatever we do, we do to the best of our ability because we are working as though we are working for Jesus. We should rejoice we have the opportunity to work as onto the Lord. Sure, we work and we get paid every so many days so we can pay bills, buy food and perhaps even enjoy some extras in life. Each payday is a reward of sorts for our labor. However, we are told because we work with all our heart, we pour ourselves into our labor, our given task as though we were working for Jesus, we have a far greater reward, an inheritance from the Lord. On the flip side, if we are slipshod or lackadaisical in our work ethic we are in the wrong and we will be repaid for that wrong, for God does not show favoritism. He rewards us for doing our work well, and he rewards for doing our work poorly. The question is for which reward are we working?