Word & Deed: Witnesses at Work

Scripture References: Genesis 1:26, 2:1-3, 2:15; Romans 12:2; 1 Timothy 1:12-16; 2 Kings 5; John 15

Intro: Welcome! This sermon continues our "Word and Deed" series, exploring identity and purpose. We previously discussed being witnesses with our words; today, we focus on being witnesses at work. Since the average person spends about 90,000 hours—a third of their life—at work, it presents a vast opportunity. Let's reframe work through God's lens, understanding its divine origin and purpose, so our actions and attitudes align with His Word, creating a powerful testimony.

Key Points:

1. Work's Divine Origin & Purpose (Gen 1-2): Work existed before the Fall. God Himself worked (Hebrew: malaka - skilled, masterful work) in creation. Work isn't a curse, though sin brought frustration to it. God designed us in His image to work—to cultivate, care, create, and bring order (Gen 1:26, 2:15). This gives inherent dignity to all forms of labor, from the boardroom to the restroom.
2. Reflecting God's Character (1 Tim 1:12-16): Our workplace is a stage where God displays His perfect patience and overflowing grace through us, just as He did through Paul. How we handle failure, admit mistakes, and offer apologies speaks volumes about the God we serve. We live by grace daily.
3. Planting Kingdom Seeds (John 15): Jesus calls us to abide in Him and bear fruit. This fruit contains the "seeds" of the Kingdom. Through our consistent character, integrity, and care at work, we scatter these seeds daily. It’s often a long game, subtly influencing the environment and people around us.
4. Moments of Boldness & Transformation (2 Kings 5): Alongside seed-planting, God creates "transplanting" moments—opportunities for dramatic change, like Naaman's healing prompted by the captive Israelite girl. She saw past Naaman's position and illness to his need, showing compassion and courageous boldness rooted in her faith narrative. A renewed mind (Rom 12:2) helps us see people as God does.
5. Humility & Vulnerability (2 Kings 5): Naaman initially resisted healing because the method seemed foolish and required humility. Pride can prevent us from receiving God's help or admitting need. True strength lies in vulnerability, knowing our identity is secure in Christ, not our performance or position.

Conclusion: Work is not separate from our faith; it's a primary context for living it out. We have the opportunity to reflect God's character, plant seeds of the Kingdom through consistent faithfulness, and be ready for moments requiring bold compassion. Our security in Christ frees us to work with dignity, humility, and purpose.

Call to Action: Reflect on your work life: What kind of "seeds" are you planting through your actions and attitudes? Is pride hindering you from vulnerability or acknowledging need, like Naaman initially? Ask God to renew your mind, give you compassion for coworkers (even difficult ones, like the slave girl had), and empower you to be His witness. Embrace humility; don't despise simple acts of obedience or seeking prayer for healing or help. Be part of God's work in the 170 million-strong US workforce.

Transcript

Amen, thank you. Let me get back from the edge just a little bit there. Good morning, church. I hope you are all doing well this morning. We are in the home stretch of our Word and Deed series. We've been in this through late last year, and along the way, our heart really has been to, as a church, talk about identity and purpose as followers of Christ. We've talked about what it is to be disciples, what it is to be stewards, what it is to be worshipers, what it is to be gifted, and over the last couple weeks, what it is to be witnesses.(...) And to be a witness is to be one who has seen something that others need to know. 

 (...) 

 And this morning, we are going to follow up last week talking about to be witnesses with our words, which, how many of you guys were really attentive to the story you were writing with your words this last week, anybody else here? Man, I feel like in our house, talk about that a lot. We've got four children and trying to instill in them, hey, what story did you tell today with your words? 

 (...) 

 Was both convicting and wonderful and constructive all at the same time. This morning, we're gonna change gears though, and we're gonna talk about what it is to be witnesses at work. 

 (...) 

 Now, I know some of you are thinking, I don't wanna talk about work this morning. 

 (...) 

 It's Sunday, I am not at work today. 

 (...) 

 (Audience Laughing) 

 (...) 

 In each of the areas that we've addressed in this series, we have looked at the opportunities that we have as stewards, the opportunities we have as worshipers, the opportunities that we have as gifted, those who've been given gifts of the Lord, 

 (...) 

 gifts that God uses the Spirit to kind of flow through us. We have a tremendous opportunity at work. On average, an American's gonna spend about 90,000 hours of their life at work. 

 (...) 

 90,000 hours, that's roughly a third of one's life. 

 (...) 

 Stick with me, don't get depressed here. I saw like shoulders go, oh. 

 (...) 

 (Audience Laughing) There's something happening around us in Gen Z if you haven't noticed. 

 (...) 

 There have been these college gatherings sparking up. Asbury College kind of made the news early on.(...) I looked at an article this last week that I wanna say in the last six months, over 70,000 college students have been involved in these little gatherings that are popping up across the US. 

 (...) 

 Back in February, 8,000 students gathered at University of Kentucky in an auditorium, and over 2,000 came forward to accept Jesus. 

 (...) 

 And so we're watching this thing happen, like this little mini revival amongst Gen Z,(...) and I don't think it's gonna be isolated just to Gen Z. I think God's doing something in our midst. And what's encouraging in that Gen Z kind of, we'll call it like college age population, is there's over 19 million students enrolled in universities in the United States right now. 

 (...) 

 Man, how amazing would it be to see God continue to roll revival through 19 million Gen Zers? 

 (...) 

 There are over 170 million people currently in the US workforce right now. How awesome would it be to see God roll revival through 170 million people? 

 (...) 

 (Audience Member Chuckles) 

 (...) 

 But before we can talk about the opportunity we have at work, I wanna spend a little bit of time kind of backing up into how we're supposed to frame work in our minds through the Bible's lens. Because a recent poll taken when asking folks, why do we work here in the United States? The number one answer by a great majority was, we work to make money. 

 (...) 

 We work to make money. 

 (...) 

 And that's true, absolutely true. But I feel like there's a bit of a disconnect from the purpose of kind of why we work and why it's a part of our lives. There's a bit of a disconnect when it's just, oh well, I do it because eventually it provides me to not have to work. 

 (...) 

 And so we're gonna spend a little bit of time this morning in a sense trying to frame our view of this core part of our lives, 

 (...) 

 regardless of our age or stage.(...) And we wanna align this view with the way God sees this part of our lives and this part of who we are. Because to be witnesses to something is really valuable. If you're investigating an event trying to figure out what's the truth, 

 (...) 

 my wife and I love some cop shows. We're trying to, we gotta find out, we gotta find the evidence, we gotta see what's at the scene, but really they're looking for a witness. And if you can align a witness testimony with other things you find at the scene, it's a powerful combination to say, okay, I know what happened. And we are blessed to have the word of God. 

 (...) 

 Blessed to have the word of God. And often when a searching world is trying to figure out like what's going on here, what is life about? If we can match what the word of God says with what is flowing through the lives of those who say they have witnessed God's goodness and majesty, it is an explosive combination.(...) But for many of us, we have to kind of back up sometimes and ask God to kind of transform the way that we see the world. 

 (...) 

 Not just his goodness, but also these areas of the world that we're engaged in day to day so that our words,(...) our behavior, our actions, our attitudes about these pieces of our lives can match up with what his word says. And in that, people will be like, whoa, okay.(...) I see what you're saying is true. And I see what God is doing is amazing. 

 (...) 

 We're gonna go real basic here. We're gonna start talking about works origin. Genesis two, the familiar creation story says, thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them.(...) And on the seventh day, God finished his work that he had done and he rested on the seventh day from all the work he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy because on it, God rested from all his work that he had done in creation. 

 (...) 

 This is not an unfamiliar story to those who have been either raised going to church or been around church very long. You're like, okay, I get it, I've heard it. But this is actually the very first place, Genesis one and two, that we see this word work. 

 (...) 

 And this is pre the fall. This is like pre things going sideways. 

 (...) 

 This is God in creation working. And there's two words in Hebrew for work. 

 (...) 

 Adoba, which means like a raw, unskilled, think of like, you are just like, like chaotically throwing stuff together. And then there's this word malaka, which means like a skilled labor. You think like the work of like an artisan or a craftsman.(...) The word here used in Genesis two to describe God and his work as malaka.(...) The idea that God, when he creates, he's doing, he's painting a masterpiece. 

 (...) 

 While our creation account as believers is commonplace to us, many of us grew up with the felt board and kind of all of that. Every culture, every civilization, every time period in people has their own creation narrative and ours is a bit unique compared to most. If you go back into the ancient world, a lot of creation narratives were like, oh, the world is a result of like two gods fighting and one killed the other and then that body became the earth and that's why there's mountains over there and that's their leg over there. You get these chaotic stories of conquest and defeat and destruction. 

 (...) 

 And then the people that followed those stories like, well, we're just trying to survive and kind of pull together what's been chaotic and like just like kind of get to the end of life as peaceably as we can. Our story is just so different. We begin with the God who paints a masterpiece, 

 (...) 

 who creates beautifully and wonderfully with great care and attention and detail. That's really valuable to us because it also tells us about God's character, that he's one that paints with beauty. He cares about the detail. Man, he loves order and unity. 

 (...) 

 It also tells us that work isn't a curse. 

 (...) 

 Does work ever feel cursed? Anybody? 

 (...) 

 I work in agriculture and there's times and it's like a crop is like right on the horizon. We're getting ready to harvest and like weather comes in and just decimates and you're like, what in the world? 

 (...) 

 We don't grow cherries anymore 

 (...) 

 because we found we didn't have the heart for that. Any cherry grows in here, I feel for you. 

 (...) 

 We used to grow cherries down in Kern County out east of Arvin, east of Bakersfield. And there were a number of times I recall growing up where you go out and just beautiful red on the trees, like, ah, we're three days to harvest and then a hailstorm comes through and you're like, well, that crop's gone.(...) And it just breaks your heart and you feel like, gosh, this is cursed.(...) Well, the reality is work itself is not a curse and work is not cursed. The frustration, the pain, the difficulty of the fracture of this world. Yeah, that's the result of sin. But work itself is not a curse.(...) And it's really important for us, I think, to hold that dear because often, what do our conversations devolve in the workplace with our coworkers? 

 (...) 

 It's not always that, man, there's just, ah, work is amazing. Ah, it's hard, but it's amazing. Often it kind of goes the other way. 

 (...) 

 Work is also of great purpose to us. There's a great purpose and design behind our involvement in work. 

 (...) 

 Genesis 1.26, if you back up just a couple verses from what I just read, says, and this is kind of where we come on the scene. Then God said, "Let us make man in our image after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens, and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." 

 (...) 

 Jump forward back to chapter two. And in chapter two, verse 15, we see, "Lord, God took man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and to keep it." Again, that word work is the melaka. It's like they're like to,(...) in a skilled way, like cultivate and to care. And so, work has been in our design since the beginning. Like prior to it all going sideways, like God made us to do the things that he did, 

 (...) 

 to reflect his image, to care, to cultivate, even to create. I love that the picture of man in the start of the story in Genesis is like, we're the gardener. How many of you guys in here like to garden? 

 (...) 

 There's a few here, wonderful.(...) Lori Riley, by the way, if you ever wanna see an amazing garden, go to the Riley's place. It's absolutely incredible.(...) Sorry, Lori. I mean, it's, yeah. When we garden, we're in a sense, when we're gardeners, all we're doing is we're taking the raw material that God has created, and we're like reshaping, reordering it to try to produce something that flourishes. 

 (...) 

 It's a beautiful reflection of our call as people, created in God's image, taking what God has made, and shaping, and cultivating, and caring. And you can translate this idea to almost any job that you can think of, whether high level leadership, like praised by this world, or like, in a sense, almost like forgotten and behind the scenes in the eyes of the world. Almost any aspect of work in the workplace can be seen somewhat through a lens of, is there creativity here, is there cultivation here, is there caring here, is there a maintaining or restoring that's here, is there a caring for people that's here? 

 (...) 

 Work has tremendous dignity, because it's written into our DNA as one of the ways that we reflect God,(...) clearest,(...) to create, to care. 

 (...) 

 That phrase to keep it means like to be God's agent, to take what he's made, and to do something with it. The Bible begins in a garden that ends in a city. 

 (...) 

 That's not by random circumstance. 

 (...) 

 That's part of our place and our role. 

 (...) 

 My father growing up, as a small business owner, wanted his kids to see every type of job that was a part of the business. And there were varying reasons, but the core reason was because he had a real passion for his kids to understand the dignity and the purpose and the contribution of every role. So in my days as a child working in our family business, I cleaned restrooms, cleaned the public restrooms at our cold storage facility. 

 (...) 

 I weighed boxes of grapes in the field. 

 (...) 

 I pulled the suckers off of lemon trees. If you guys have ever, like the new little shoots of growth on lemon trees, lemons have thorns. It's really not glamorous to get in that tree and pulling those things off, arms getting all scarred up. 

 (...) 

 I really didn't like it as a kid.(...) Believe me, suiting up at six a.m. in the morning, getting ready to go clean a public restroom was not my idea of a good time as a 15-year-old. But I'm so thankful that my parents had this view of having their children understand the dignity of every job because looking back now in our business,(...) we care about the experience of all those we interact with. And in the last five years, we've really focused on the feedback and the feel of truck drivers who come in and out of our facilities. I'm like, do they feel cared for? Do they feel seen? And one of the first things they call is like, hey, you guys have clean facilities for us. Like, thank you. 

 (...) 

 And so I can reflect back on, okay,(...) cleaning the restroom as undignified as it seemed was a job worth doing. 

 (...) 

 And we as the people of God, if we put our voice or our attitude to belittling any kind of work, I think it speaks a message separate from what the scriptures show us. And I say that because we will stand out in the workplace(...) if we communicate with our words and our actions, dignity to those that are behind the scenes or have the job that we're thankful we don't have. 

 (...) 

 All right, I'll get off that horse for a second here. 

 (...) 

 Okay, now we're gonna jump into works opportunity. And this is really the core of today because as I share, there's over 170 million people in this workplace and I think God's doing something. So how can we look at our place as witnesses at work as a great opportunity, as a great opportunity(...) because we will spend a third of our waking hours there? 

 (...) 

 Well, there's two things primarily I think we get to do at work. One is to reflect and one is to redeem,(...) to reflect. Paul wrote a letter to Timothy that we have, we call it First Timothy, it's the first of two letters he wrote. And in this letter, Paul included this little kind of commentary on how he saw what God was doing in his life and the impact it was gonna have. It's one of my favorite little snapshots of both humility and purpose. And it starts in First Timothy chapter one, verse 12. 

 (...) 

 This is Paul writing, he says, "I thank him who has given me strength, "Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful,(...) "appointed me to his service. 

 (...) 

 "Though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, "and insolent opponent, but I have received mercy "because I acted ignorantly in unbelief, "and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me "with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 

 (...) 

 "This saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance "that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners "of whom I am the foremost. 

 (...) 

 "But I received mercy for this reason, "that in me as the foremost, "Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience "as an example to those who were to believe in him "for eternal life." 

 (...) 

 Paul saw it really clearly. Paul, who was gifted, talented, I mean, his writings are part of our New Testament. But he saw clearly that why did he receive mercy? It wasn't to be an author. 

 (...) 

 He received mercy so that Jesus Christ might display something to the world around him and be an example of those who would believe. (Sighs) 

 (...) 

 In the 90,000 hours we're gonna spend at work,(...) we're gonna fail, we're gonna succeed, we're gonna have a whole lot of interactions with folks around us, and our lives are gonna be kind of just on display for many to watch God's grace and mercy(...) intercede, rebuild, and restore. 

 (...) 

 Others get to see God's perfect patience and what happens with us. And I'll say this, when it comes to the workplace, when it comes to everyday kind of going again, 

 (...) 

 our apologies speak so much more than our victories. 

 (...) 

 The life of a believer is kind of, let me back up. 

 (...) 

 We are saved by grace. 

 (...) 

 We also live everyday on God's grace. 

 (...) 

 And what we do in our work, 

 (...) 

 whether that's work you get paid for, volunteer work, or not in what quote unquote would be called the American workplace, I mean I don't wanna exclude anybody from this, but what we do in the day to day where we put our effort, the community that we're in, the groups that we're around, 

 (...) 

 there is this thing happening called receiving, giving grace, failing, repenting, going again, 

 (...) 

 on just loop after loop after loop. And people are watching that. People are watching, how do you handle failure? 

 (...) 

 Where is your identity? 

 (...) 

 People get to watch you and I fail and make the mistake and then they say, what are they gonna do with that? Are they gonna deflect and hide? Are they gonna make it somebody else's? Because, ah, that's not on me, that's on them. Are they gonna say, you know what, I'm secure enough in who God has made me to be and I know what I've gotta do is I've gotta say I'm sorry. 

 (...) 

 Gotta say I'm sorry. 

 (...) 

 And I can own my mistake because failure is not fatal and it's not final. 

 (...) 

 Like Jesus took care of that. 

 (...) 

 The other thing we're doing kind of behind the scenes that we don't even know is we are planting seeds everyday, 

 (...) 

 every interaction,(...) and especially in the moments we're less proud of.(...) There's this picture that comes over and over in the New Testament and again, going back, the Bible was written largely during a time of like an agrarian society. So agriculture,(...) things of that nature, they are just wrought throughout the Bible and I love it. So I feel like there's like metaphors to no end with that. 

 (...) 

 Jesus talked about the kingdom of God being 

 (...) 

 like a mustard seed that when planted and it sprouts creates something just beautiful and so much bigger than how it started and it's almost uncontainable. 

 (...) 

 So this thing, this little seed,(...) it blows my mind because a seed carries the DNA, the full DNA of its mother plant. 

 (...) 

 So you think about like a huge tree, one seed produced from that tree carries the full DNA, like everything that is needed to replicate. 

 (...) 

 When the Bible uses these pictures of fruit and seed, it could be so powerful for us if we really kind of take it in.(...) If any of you guys have tried to grow something from seed in your garden or like try to reseed grass, like it's a waiting game and you spread so much more seed than you actually expect to get germinated and sprouted because a lot are gonna fail, not all are gonna make it, but if you spread that seed really diligently, something will come up. You will have something to care for. Something's gonna pop up. 

 (...) 

 (Audience Member Sneezes) 

 (...) 

 When we live out our relationship with the Lord in front of people, we are in a sense spreading seeds. 

 (...) 

 But it's done in our lives through fruit. The Bible speaks to this. 

 (...) 

 John 15, the vine, the branches, he talks to his disciples about, hey, if you abide in me, you're gonna bear much fruit. And so you may be wondering like, what is the actual mechanism that this quote unquote seed, these seeds of the kingdom are spreading in my life. Well, it's through the fruit that comes of your life. And fruit's an amazing thing. So we love fruit and I grow a lot of fruit for its consumption and the benefit to it. But fruiting by a plant or a tree is actually a mechanism for reproduction and survival. 

 (...) 

 Most fruit contain seeds. We grow a lot of blueberries. If you cut a blueberry in half, you'll actually little microscopic seeds in there. And the purpose of fruit really is for reproduction and survival. That when something fruits, it creates something attractive enough that someone else is gonna wanna take it. And in taking it, takes those seeds and takes them somewhere else. And through whatever natural process out the other side, those seeds can go back into the ground.(...) We'll do that for another day. 

 (...) 

 (Audience Laughing) And so when Jesus points to his disciples and said, hey, you're gonna bear fruit for me, what he's saying is that through your very lives, you are gonna produce something that others want. And they're gonna take it in. And it's gonna carry the very DNA of the kingdom with it. 

 (...) 

 Now I'll say this though,(...) growing from seeds is the long game. Holy smokes. And you guys ever tried to like grow something from a seed in your garden? You gotta wait, you gotta wait, you gotta wait. Then you're tired of waiting so you go buy a full grown plant at Lowe's, then you go plant that instead. Absolutely. 

 (...) 

 Our day to day reflecting of God in the workplace, it's the long game. It's absolutely the long game. 

 (...) 

 But it's not the only game at work. 

 (...) 

 There are times when God through us or just around us isn't gonna plant through seeds. He's not gonna spread the kingdom through these little almost unnoticeable moments. He's gonna transplant a tree. 

 (...) 

 One of the guys in my pack was sharing, and he works in law enforcement, that he had a stop on the road one day and he'd just gotten through a couple years of dealing with something personal that was a bit tough, the Lord let him through it. And at the end of that stop,(...) the guy that he was about to kind of send on his merry way peeked his head out, was like, "Hey, can I talk to you for a moment?" 

 (...) 

 And my friend's like, "Oh, sure." And walked over there and talked to him. The guy expressed, which just kind of like blurted out that he'd been struggling with anxiety, all these different things that my friend had just kind of worked through with the Lord.(...) And so what ensued the next 15 minutes was a guy getting out of his car and my friend like praying on and praying over him for this guy to receive the Lord and accept the Lord as the avenue by which this anxiety could be dealt with. That's like a tree transplanting moment. 

 (...) 

 Because there's a void, there's a need, and it's just an opportunity, and you're like, "Well, we're not gonna start "from a seed here, like boom, put it in the ground, "like here we go." And we have those moments around us at work. We absolutely do. 

 (...) 

 But they may look a little bit different. 

 (...) 

 I want to share a story out of 2 Kings 5. 

 (...) 

 Some of you may know the story. This is the story of this guy named Naaman. But I think it's actually more than just the story of Naaman. 

 (...) 

 So Naaman, he was a commander for the Syrian army. 

 (...) 

 We'll read more of the story here in just a moment.(...) But Naaman had a tree transplanting moment. 

 (...) 

 So let's start, 2 Kings 5, starting verse one. Naaman,(...) commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master and in high favor. Because by him the Lord had given victory to Syria.(...) He was a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper. 

 (...) 

 Now the Syrians on one of their raids had carried off a little girl from the land of Israel, and she worked in the service of Naaman's wife. 

 (...) 

 And she said to her mistress,(...) "Would that my Lord were with the prophet "who was in Samaria, he would cure him of his leprosy." 

 (...) 

 The titling in your Bible, if you have like kind of subheads and topics, is gonna point to this story in 2 Kings 5 is about Naaman.(...) And most of it is.(...) But we'd be remiss to not spend a little bit of time looking at this little girl. 

 (...) 

 So some of you as I'm talking about work may be like, "You don't know my work. "You don't know my boss." Like I am keeping my head down and I, I mean, 

 (...) 

 I want nothing to do with what you're talking about. 

 (...) 

 Or I work in a place that is unwelcoming. That's like that hard path. If I spread seed in the hard path, I just get trampled underfoot. 

 (...) 

 Well, let's look at this little girl for a second. I want you to kind of see this story from her perspective. 

 (...) 

 She's an Israelite who's just been taken a slave and taken captive. 

 (...) 

 She's displaced,(...) she's faceless, 

 (...) 

 probably felt most part like she was voiceless. 

 (...) 

 And yet in the household of Naaman, who at that point in time was probably like the very depiction of like the captivity that she was in and the oppressor of her people. I mean, we don't have detail what it was like when Naaman led a portion of the Syrian army in and captured her little village in town like, but I promise you it was not good. 

 (...) 

 And the thing she could recall, 

 (...) 

 the hostilities she witnessed, the trauma she was experiencing, 

 (...) 

 boy, probably pretty unspeakable. 

 (...) 

 (Audience Member Shouting) But I wonder what the narrative was in her mind that would have led her to see Naaman's pain, 

 (...) 

 to see Naaman as a person, not a position, 

 (...) 

 to see Naaman as a man and not just a monster. And in seeing his pain,(...) having compassion, 

 (...) 

 and then getting up the courage to say something. 

 (...) 

 Narratives are so foundational to how we think that they determined how we understand and interpret life. 

 (...) 

 For most of us, our experiences, our environment growing up is the most shaping part of our narrative. And it defines just kind of how we view life and how life should be and what knocks life off balance and how things can be made right. 

 (...) 

 We each have a narrative that we live into. 

 (...) 

 One of the main places that we work out that narrative is at work, where we spend most of our waking hours. 

 (...) 

 The narrative that we hold to, it fills our conversation, it determines what we do, our decisions, it determines who are the protagonists, who are the antagonists. 

 (...) 

 When God intercedes in our lives, it should profoundly change our narrative. 

 (...) 

 Romans 12, 2 tells us to not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of our mind, the idea that God reshapes our narrative. 

 (...) 

 He shapes our narrative about his character, about his goodness, the value of people, the reality of sin, and what he's doing about it. 

 (...) 

 And somehow for this little girl, God had shaped her narrative to not simply divide the world into heroes and villains, 

 (...) 

 which he could have done and had named it as the villain, 

 (...) 

 but to somehow get beyond just singling out some aspect of creation as the villain and actually see like sin as the villain and not the person. And he's not the person. As the villain and not the person as the villain. 

 (...) 

 And so being able to understand like sin and fallenness somehow as the villain and not just the person, it allowed her, like it would allow all of us to actually see beyond the behavior, to see the heart and to care about those who even we feel like are oppressing us. 

 (...) 

 One of the dangers if we just single out people or parts of creation as like the real problem and not really seeing sin rightly as the problem is that we will demonize something that really isn't bad enough to explain the whole mess that we're in 

 (...) 

 or also to cause us to idolize something not powerful enough to get us out. 

 (...) 

 This is our danger around politics or people or opinions at times. If we begin to like turn our eyes away from sin as like the root of the problem or away from God as the solution to the problem. 

 (...) 

 Whenever we put our hope or lean our hope on something that's not the Lord, honestly, we put our hope on something that can't stand under the weight of our hope. And we're going to be disappointed. 

 (...) 

 So back to this girl, her actions make it hard to believe that she had just stuck with Naaman as the villain and somehow got to move her beyond that. And she saw Naaman with compassion. 

 (...) 

 And then boy, she was bold and she was courageous.(...) How many here find it difficult to be bold and courageous with your words in the workplace when it comes to like evangelizing, sharing the gospel? 

 (...) 

 I'll call us a plug for the Scott Washa deal. I'm like, that's going to be awesome. Some more training because it could be kind of scary, right?(...) Imagine her potential fear of trepidation. Here is the most powerful man in the Syrian army, probably the second most powerful in the Syrian empire besides the king. And she's in his house likely seeing this day-to-day struggle with leprosy. Those don't know what leprosy is. It was a skin disease. There was no real answer solution at this time in history for it. And so it would start by like these like kind of white dots and bumps on your skin. And eventually start to eat away at your skin.(...) Leopards before they died actually at times had almost no face left because it was like eating away at their face. 

 (...) 

 And so here is this man, extremely powerful, 

 (...) 

 that at this time in his life is being eaten alive from within. 

 (...) 

 Probably searched for every answer. Probably been met by every Syrian medical doctor.(...) And this little girl is like, I think I know what can help you. 

 (...) 

 How about you go back to where I'm from and talk to this guy? 

 (...) 

 And if I'm in her shoes, I'm like, man, if this goes wrong, like I'm probably dead(...) because you're going to be so upset.(...) And to kill a slave meant nothing in most of these cultures. 

 (...) 

 But she puts her voice in the room because she had seen what God could do and she heard of a man that exercised the power of God, this prophet Elisha. 

 (...) 

 And so Naaman goes and asks this king like, hey, can I go? This little girl said this, can I go? And the king, who apparently holds such high value for Naaman, is like, yes, go, and take all these riches with you to pay the guy. Like this will work, like take what was roughly the equivalent of like $1.2 million worth of treasure with him to go pay the guy to get this done. And so Naaman goes off and he goes and meets with Elisha. And that's when we get to Naaman's moment here. And this is starting in verse 9. So Naaman came with his horses and chariots and stood at the door of Elisha's house. So here's Elisha the prophet, like out in Samaria, like kind of a little hut kind of thing. And here comes all this pomp and circumstance. Imagine like the chariots rolling in and everything. 

 (...) 

 Elisha sent a messenger to him. So Elisha's come out of his house. He sends his messenger out and tells him, "Hey, go wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean."(...) But Naaman was angry. So the Jordan is a very dirty river, in case you're wondering. 

 (...) 

 It's like, hey, go jump in the creek over here, Mill Creek.(...) Good luck. 

 (...) 

 But Naaman was angry and went away, saying, "Behold, I thought he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the Lord his God and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper. Are not Abana and Farpar the rivers of Damascus better than these waters? Are better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?" So he turned and went away in a rage. 

 (...) 

 So here's Naaman. He's dying on the inside. 

 (...) 

 He's seeking help, and yet he's seeking help on his terms. 

 (...) 

 Don't you know who I am? That's too humiliating. Don't you know who I am? That's a bit too vulnerable. Don't you know who I am? That seems silly that that could work to cure this. 

 (...) 

 Verse 13, "But a servant came near and said to him, Father--" excuse me, "My father, it is a great word the prophet has spoken to you. Will you not do it? 

 (...) 

 Has he actually said, Do you wash and be clean?" So he went down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, and according to the word of the man of God--(...) excuse me, according to the word of the man of God-- and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean. He was clean. 

 (...) 

 Verse 15, "Then he returned to the man of God, he in all his company, and he came and stood before him. And he said, Behold, I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. So accept now a present from your servant. But he said, As the Lord lives,(...) before whom I stand, I will receive none." This is Elisha saying, like, "No, I'm not taking any gifts from you." 

 (...) 

 Naaman urged him to take it, but he refused, and the Naaman said, "Well, if not, please let there be given to your servant." Basically, like, let me take with me two mule loads of earth, "For from now on your servant will not offer burnt offering or sacrifice to any God but the Lord." 

 (...) 

 It's kind of a funky end. We'll get there in just a second. Okay, so Naaman finally, because his servant's like, "Didn't you say, like, you could be clean?" He's like, "Okay, okay, I guess, I guess. Like, I don't want this thing to eat me alive, so I guess I'll try something that seems foolish. I guess I'll step into being vulnerable. 

 (...) 

 I guess I'll take the risk that, man,(...) people may see some things I don't want them to see. 

 (...) 

 And when he did, the Lord healed him and says his skin was restored like that of a baby." 

 (...) 

 He goes back to Elisha and is like, "Hey, here's the reward." Elisha's like, "I'm not taking it." 

 (...) 

 Most commentators say Elisha's stance is one of being like, "I didn't do this. God did this. I simply told you to do what God said to do. I'm not taking it." 

 (...) 

 Naaman then is like, "Well, can I take some earth with me?" 

 (...) 

 It was really common back then for people to believe that individual gods had power over specific places. Like different countries or different civilizations had, like, "These are our gods. Here's what they do." So it wasn't uncommon that if someone encountered what seemed like a really powerful god, they asked, "Can I take some of the earth with me? Can I take some of this place with me?" So maybe like that god's power stays with me when I leave. Again, a very immature view of what we now know about our god, but at the time it was very, very common. So we shouldn't look down on Naaman too much for it. He was trying to transport some holy soil. 

 (...) 

 Elisha, I'm thinking maybe, he's like, "Well, sure, take it with you." Maybe it gives you some tangible reminder of who the real god is,(...) who the real god is. 

 (...) 

 As we close today, we're going to have communion together. But I want us to kind of come around this and see the opportunity we have at work from a couple perspectives and to wrestle with a few questions if we take communion.(...) One would be,(...) what kind of seeds are being produced from our lives? 

 (...) 

 Because not everything produced from our lives looks godly and wonderful and points to Jesus. 

 (...) 

 If you guys have ever let weeds go rampant in your backyard,(...) once a weed goes to flower and those seeds spread, often for the years to come you regret the decision to let them last that long. 

 (...) 

 They don't go away very easy. 

 (...) 

 In Oregon we have these things called blackberries, and a blackberry plant is terrible to try to get rid of once it's taken root. 

 (...) 

 Because even if you cut off the top, every time you fracture the roots below the surface, each individual root fragment can grow a new plant. 

 (...) 

 It's brutal. 

 (...) 

 Well, I hope that what is imparted to others through our lives is like a blackberry. 

 (...) 

 That once it takes root, they just can't shake it. 

 (...) 

 They just can't shake it. But it's not going to be us mustering up the effort to try to be good enough. It's going to be us being open before the Lord daily and allowing His work to be on display that's going to plant those kind of seeds. 

 (...) 

 I also want us to consider Naaman though. 

 (...) 

 We all look really polished and nice right now.(...) But for some of us there may be something beneath the surface that's eating away at our lives, that's eating away at our relationships, 

 (...) 

 that's eating away at the very core of who we are. And we know it, and we sense it, and we feel it, and we want it to be dealt with. 

 (...) 

 There's going to be a prayer team up here that would love to pray with you, but I will say that sometimes the way that God heals seems really vulnerable or a little foolish or almost too simple. 

 (...) 

 I would encourage you not to discount the way that God works and the invitation to healing. 

 (...) 

 We find this a lot in leadership that often leaders fall because they were too prideful to acknowledge something small that was going awry, 

 (...) 

 and then it becomes crippling for the rest of their lives. 

 (...) 

 You see this in like church leadership at times, you see it in marketplace leadership. It's a little bit of everywhere that sometimes we can be convinced that, "Mmm, things look too good from the exterior. There's no way I'm humbling myself to acknowledge that." 

 (...) 

 That's a clock that's ticking and going, "No, we're good." 

 (...) 

 We as the people of God, our identity is not rooted in our performance. It's not rooted in our position. It's rooted in the Lord. 

 (...) 

 Jesus has said, "You are my children. You're my beloved.(...) I have freedom for you." And lastly, I would ask that are we in a position where like the slave girl,(...) we're at kind of a tipping point of do we have enough compassion and care to see the actual people around us that maybe are the most offensive 

 (...) 

 or who have brought us pain as something not worth praying for,(...) loving, and caring for? 

 (...) 

 It could be within work, it could be within family.(...) That little girl's impact is just incredible. She spoke up and saw the need of another and said, "Even though, man, I could look at this person as my enemy and say, you know what, your leprosy is your lot in life. That's what you get." 

 (...) 

 She didn't say that.(...) She said, "No, I know someone that can heal you. And at the risk of looking foolish or the risk of being wrong on what could come, I'm going to put my voice in the room and say, I know someone who can heal you." 

 (...) 

 And not only was Naaman changed, but Naaman and his whole household saw a turn. 

 (...) 

 So worship team, would you come?(...) I'm going to pray we're going to worship. I just ask you to take communion to remember that God's doing something around us.(...) The Lord's moving. 

 (...) 

 And we have 90,000 plus hours to be a part of it in every conference room, in every building, in every workplace.(...) Man,(...) we want to spread the seeds of the kingdom all throughout our world. 

 (...) 

 It's available to us.(...) It's here for us. Lord, I thank you that you are with us. You are for us.(...) And we're not just waiting for a day when it gets better. 

 (...) 

 But you've told us that the kingdom of God is at hand.(...) Go and make disciples.(...) That you have told us that you are enough to heal every disease,(...) to heal every sickness,(...) to heal every heart. 

 (...) 

 And that sometimes you're going to do that through the little moments that are almost unnoticeable, that eventually germinate and sprout and take root. And sometimes you're going to do it through a major transplant where you fill the void quickly and in an instant things are changed. 

 (...) 

 Thank you that you involve us in it, Lord. Thank you that you love us the way that you do, Lord. We are grateful. 

 (...) 

 But Lord, I also ask you to help us to humble ourselves and not believe that just because we've received grace once that that was it, but that you now lead us on a life where we receive grace every day. For any of those Lord who may be hurting inside and afraid to open up, Lord, I ask that you would do a mighty work, that you would heal the leprosy within. 

 (...) 

 Thank you God that it just took a simple act and you healed what was eating away a life. 

 (...) 

 We love you, Lord.(...) Lord, I ask that you would help us to be your witnesses at work in a powerful way. 

 (...) 

 As you advance the kingdom of God around us, Lord.(...) Amen.