We Are His Workmanship, Part 3

Welcome Prayer Song Silence Sunday Schooled Principles of Perfection “We are His Workmanship” Part III January 18th 2026 Last week, we talked about the Meaning of Life and cited a long list of opinions. I summarized my view, which is up to debate, as the meaning of life being “to love and be loved,” but put that statement under the micoscope and suggest then that at the core of this love is WORK. I would go so far as to define agape love as being synonymous with work and this would accord with victor Frankel saying that if life can be defined as having meaning it would be suffering. Conversely, we might be able to say that if agape love is synonymous with work that leads to suffering and discomfort that perhaps the antonyms of love is laziness, indifference, uncaring non action toward someone or something. We might even create a syllogism that looks something like this: (GRAPHIC) Of course, this is a stripped down simplification because for every general rule there are exceptions. For instance, we are not talking about forced labor, nor are we talking about bondage, or relentless not able to manage tasks. So we have to ask what does meaningful work look like compared to labors that do little to add meaning to our existence. Before we try and uncover this lets take a little survey of the Bible to discover the existence of SSU love first in our Creator and then what the Creator wanted for us. Through this exercise of biblical principles we begin to see how work elected out of SSU love is the kind of work we are talking about rather than force or demanded labor imposed upon unwilling souls. Obviously, the go to is Genesis one where we read: In the beginning God created the heavens and then earth. The word translated created is bawraw, Which means to create, to cut down, select, feed, choose, create, dispatch, do, make. We gain some insight from scripture into what motivated God to make the heavens and the earth in the first place and then we also gain insight into what God used to do it. So, what motivated or why did God make the heavens and earth in the first place? According to the three major Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, Islam), God created the heavens and the earth to reveal His glory, to dwell with humanity in a relationship, and for creation to reflect His goodness and perfection, often described as a divine "play" (Lila in Hinduism) or a means for humanity to know and worship Him. Creation wasn't from need but from abundance, serving as a stage for divine love, grace, and testing, showcasing God's attributes to sentient beings. Central to the biblical message for Him creating is He did it for His Glory: The universe displays God's power, wisdom, and beauty, declaring His handiwork. He created heavens and earth to Know & Be Known as creation provides a way for humanity to understand, worship, and have a relationship with the Creator by and through His handiwork before us. Earth was made as a home for humans, a temple where God could live with His people. It was created out of love and out of fullness, not need, expressing His loving nature and care for us. Specifically in Christianity, creation serves to magnify God's glory, with humanity created in His image to reflect that glory and for God to bring many sons and daughters to glory. We note that God, perfect masculine and feminine did what other parents naturally do when they create a family – they work, they create, they prepare a place that will protect and provide for their offspring and that in this life these things all require – effort, labor, time, energy – which prove their love even before a child is born. These are very emblematic and beautiful reflections of the very God in humanity which come about naturally. So, we see some of the first reasons why He created in the first place – out of love for us. We didn’t earn this love – but it was given and acted upon before there was a we. Then we have to ask, who did the creating of heaven and earth. The first passage worth consideration is Isaiah 44:24 where we read, “Thus saith YAHAVAH, thy redeemer, and he that formed thee from the womb, I am YAHAVAH that maketh all things; that stretcheth forth the heavens alone; that spreadeth abroad the earth by myself; Sometimes when people try to explain Genesis 1:1 they suggest that God is including heavenly beings to do His work but Isaiah makes it plain – He made stretched and spread the heavens and earth alone – the One perfect plural -alone. So, in love he had a purpose, he then engaged in the creation and layout alone and then what were the principles at play in his creation? Jeremiah 10:12 says, He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion. These three words, “power, wisdom and discretion” can be redefined as “By His “POWER, His KNOWLEDGE-APPLIED AND His INTELLIGENCE. Thus far and looking at the Genesis model, we can say that YAHAVAH, being love and a good caring parent, created heaven and earth from LOVE ALONE BY HIS POWER, KNOWLEDGE-APPLIED (Wisdom) and His Intelligence. Finally, we have insight on the exact mechanism by which He did all of this when we read, Psalm 33:6 right? By the word of YAHAVAH the heavens were made and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth. Now we have the actual means by which He made everything – by the Word of the Lord through the breath of His mouth. And hence we are able to see the absolute undeniable import of the Word of God’s mouth being central to the things God made and I would say, makes. So much so, I suggest, that when it comes to our lives having the highest meaning, the highest aims, and most joyful expressions is when WE engage in labors of love, alone, by and through His power, His knowledge applied and His intelligence through the Spirit of the Living Christ within us. Big jump? Perhaps. But hear me out for a moment. The idea of work is central to our lives – for better and for worse. Frankly, in this fallen but reconciled world, our very bodies and minds are always working. Our hearts are beating, our brains are thinking, our hands are moving – even if we are trying to escape these things through mediation, sleep, drugs or other pleasures we employ to try and rest. This realm is synonymous with labor and everything around us is linked to its importance in growth, happiness and maturity. From learning to walk, talk, eat with a spoon, read, kick a ball, dance, math, everything demands labor, effort and in the end work. This realm operates and rewards the outcome of most labor and looks down upon non-growth, non-performance and non-results. Brutal as this is for some people to accept. Outcomes from labor are typically seen when we possess products and materials garnered from our efforts – which are material rewards obtained in an exchange for our efforts. The outcomes are typically what are rewarded in this life and not necessarily the labor itself. We rarely care too deeply about how a person came to owning a rolls Royce in this world, unless we are familiar with them personally – all we usually see from a distance is them driving one so without familiarity the possessions people have are often used to validate them as successful, and therefore having meaningful lives in the here and now. But when we get in the weeds of people’s lives we tend to see greater value in those who possess the rolls Royce through their own efforts instead of them having one given them by inheritance or lottery winnings. In other words, for most people with character, the end results of possession must accord with the means of obtaining it in the first place. Oddly in our society today, we value people who gain things through glamorous activity rather unglamorous. For example we hold people in highest esteem for possessing a rolls-royce through being great in the arts and entertainment or sport than someone who owns one as a plumber. So, all of these factors place a huge role in the way we access labor and meaning in this life. But like God Himself in whose image we were made, our lives are giving tremendous meaning in and through the labors we do, why we do them, and how we do them. We can say this because even BEFORE the Fall, we read at verse 28 Genesis 1:28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. In chapter 2 of Genesis God adds to His instructions, again, before the Fall and says, Genesis 2:15 And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And from this we get the notion of stewardship. God created wisely created the garden, alone, by speaking and breathing it into existence and gave man dominion over it, telling man to dress and keep it, to subdue it, and to exercise our god given power, knowledge applied and intelligence in so doing. Having freewill in this domain we choose and elect to use our power, knowledge applied and intelligence to do evil deeds or good – and let we forget, both require labor. Yeshua said something super important to Nicodemus in John 3:16 John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. Just like God made the heavens and earth for the well being and betterment of Man, God so LOVED the world (which He made for us) that (he also) gave his only begotten Son, that whosover believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. In the Old Testament we see God creating for us, and in the Apostolic Record we see God giving us His Son whose victorious life, death, resurrection, ascension, and return took material man and gave us the power to transition from fallen flesh laboring materially to reconciled flesh laboring in and through the vine for spiritual purposes. This is a significant repurposing of ourselves as we began with a direct relationship to God in the Garden bearing instructions to physically labor over our surroundings, then through the law the nation WORKED materially to retain that relationship but one Christ came to save us the WORK humans are so accustomed to doing shifted into a new economy where the very same principles employed by God in the creation (or should we say the recreation of heaven and earth) John continues and says, 17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. Through Him how? Through His perfectly executed labors done by and through love for the Father and then for us. Those labors were material but driven by the Spirit of God within Him and I maintain that they were accomplished by and through the very same means God created the world. In other words, Yeshua had the victory to recalibrate and reconcile the broken material world, struggling under the law through LOVE That He did it ALONE in His body But by the POWER, KNOWLEDGE-APPLIED (Wisdom) and Intelligence from within. That perhaps we could even describe the Power of God, the Holy Spirit of God and very Spirit of Christ as God’s singular love evidencing power, wisdom and intelligence in us as well. Yeshua continues in John 3 and adds 18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. 21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. Here we have a direct link to the work (deeds) that we intentionally do, willfully pursue evidence our love for light verses our love for darkness and it is profound. Think about this for a minute. In our former lives of loving dark more than the light, when we would do something evil WE literall sought and appreciated dark because we did NOT want to be exposed!!! ISn’t that radical – that our evil deeds by necessity demanded that we prefer darkness (lies, obscurity, deception) because in and through such our deeds, our dark works were hidden. But when we come to Him truly from the heart, when we do something from our flesh, there is ZERO attempt to hide it, obscure it because we are of the light, and light lovers want transparency and will not hide their mistakes or lusts or failure to be hidden! Here is where our deeds (which require work or labor on our parts or should we say action to transfer our energy and time in life from ourselves to another beneficially or predatorily) actually dictate our preferences for Dark forces or Light forces in our lives because what we do will either in Christ be transparent and loving the light of they will be evil works that we want hidden. It is amazing what we will do to experience a reprieve from being seen for what we are (which is to be seen in this world according to our actions or what labors we do) which reveals what we really love and prefer around us. A scientist in Japan won a national award for painting strips on a cow to make it look like a zebra. People thought he was nuts but something amazing happened to the cows. They totally zoned out and found themselves at super low stress levels therefore super low cortozol levels and therefore greater milk production. The scientist explained that mosquitos bite according to their ability to detect common patterns in the hair of a cow – in other words they know a cow by the standard patterns that they observe on them but the white stripes disrupted that patter, the mosquitos wouldn’t bite and the cows found safety in the camouflage. In the camouflage of darkness human beings are able to hid from scrutiny and or condemnation, responsibility, and owning up to the works they choose to do – for whatever reason – and that is another subject. Therefore because our deeds are evil we love the dark stripes than render us undetected. And so like the cows painted with strips we love the camouflage. The ability to both walk and work in the Light there must be a desire to exist under the power of the Light, fully exposed all the time in this world, therefore refusing darkness or shadow, and therefore owning up and offering up who you are, what you are, what you do and why you do it. Because your deeds are light you love the light. Another factor when we seek to understand labor and work and its connection to love and being loved, and fulfilling our lot as creations made by God who also works is to see the labor models of life and faith in the Old Testament, the New Testament and in the Next Age of Spiritual liberty. In the Old Testament most things had a material effort element to it as the Law was based in material management of a material nation waiting on a material messiah who would materially pay with His life for the sins of the world. That material model which can only exist and thrive under LAWS, rules, and material measurements of success was established by God them but what most organized religion overlook is that it was utterly routed and ruined and came crashing to the ground by and through the Messiah fulfilling it all, once and for all and forevermore in and through His perfectly lived life. Then in the Apostolic Record we read what He did and said to accomplish this but because He wrapped it up by materially taking and transforming in the twinkling of an eye His Bride from an earthly materially thing to an immaterial heavenly body, and moving her from this material falling Jerusalem to a Spiritual new Jerusalem above, many people, ignoring the text, ignoring the finished work of Christ, and continuing material models like that in the Old and Apostolic record, we have had the link to religious material labors shifted out to generations today. This is what we are attempting to show all people – that religious works in and through material demands are for this world, of this place, but are not part of His heavenly economy established at the end of material religion. Understanding this shift we maintain that believers begin to see that material structures and all the laws, demands, and expectations for material labors of time, money, volunteerism, obedience, conformity and unities are merely the way this world functions and to embrace or do them benefits life in the here and now. That said we adamantly suggest that the work and labor Sons and Daughters choose to do that pertains to The actual will of God Actual fruit of heavenly value Things from Him and the Spirit and not us and the flesh Are approached and motivated by a VERY different model than material works and labors of the former ages. If I have a minute I have had years worth of effort helping people understand the differences between the principles of working in the material world and principles of working on the inner self. So, again – The material works of men – no matter what they relate to spouse, family, religion, occupation, hobbies, recreation, acquiring skills and traits – are essentials in this world and are often outward expressions of our love for others. Parents do work for their children that they would rather not do but do it out of love for their well-being. People actively participate in the things they are interested in for whatever reason because they want to support it – out of love – and so they labor. All for this world our fitting into it and the overall well being of the thing. But heavenly work, we maintain, while often played out materially in those who are heavenly minded, is predicated on similar things but which are carried out through different approaches. Here is where Yeshuans differ radically with other organized religious approaches as most of the latter connect or overlap principles of material efforts and the material world with the heavenly but we emphatically admit both a heavenly and material reality but make an distinct difference between the two realms and how labor is done. Let’s consider a chart to help us work through some of these things...