(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Now the verse that I want to focus on this morning is verse number 23 where the Bible reads, And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord, and not unto men. And I want to focus in on that phrase where it says to do it heartily, which comes from the word heart, meaning that we should do things from the heart or put our heart into it or to do things with our full effort, to do our best. Now it's interesting because in verse 17 we start out with the phrase, And whatsoever ye do. And then in verse 23 it starts out with whatsoever ye do. So this punctuates a little section here in Colossians chapter 3. In verse 17 it says, Whatsoever ye do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. And then in verse 23 it says, And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily as to the Lord, and not unto men. And what's interesting is that between these two verses that are sort of like the bookends here, one of them says, Hey, whatever you do, do it in the name of the Lord Jesus. And over here it says, Whatever you do, do it heartily as unto the Lord. And then in between we have all these specific instructions to specific people. Do you see that? Because in verse 18 it starts out wives. Verse 19 starts out husbands, children, fathers, servants. So what is he saying? He's saying, Whatever you do as a servant, do it heartily. Whatever you do as a father, do it heartily. Whatever you do as husbands and wives, as children, do it heartily unto the Lord. Whether it's a word, whether it's a deed, put your heart into it. Let's go through each of these things. Let's start with the servants. Go to Ephesians chapter 6, Ephesians chapter 6. What does it mean to do something heartily? It means that your heart is in it. Have you heard people say that they did something half-hearted? That means they're just going through the motions. But it's not really something that they have any enthusiasm for. It's not really what they're focused on. Maybe their mind is somewhere else. But it says in verse number 5 of Ephesians chapter 6, Same group is being addressed here. Servants be obedient to them that are your masters according to the flesh with fear and trembling in singleness of your heart as unto Christ. Not with eye service as men-pleasers, but as the servants of Christ doing the will of God. Watch this. From the heart. And then look at the next phrase. With good will. What does good will have to do with? It has to do with your mind, your attitude, where your heart is. He says with good will doing service as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that whatsoever good thing any man doeth the same shall he receive of the Lord, whether he be bond or free. The Bible's telling us as servants, and you say, what does he mean by servants? Well, today that would be employees. You go to your job, the Bible's saying you need to work your job with enthusiasm, with good will in your heart, and you need to work as unto the Lord and not unto men, and to do your job heartily. Now many people will look at the specific job that they have and think, this isn't really a spiritual job. It's not really that important. It's not a big deal. But God said whatsoever you do, do it heartily. He didn't say just the important tasks that are life-changing tasks. Do them heartily. No, he said anything that you do, do it heartily as unto the Lord and not unto men. That means that we need to put our heart into our work. We need to care about doing a good job when we go to work. That means when we go to work, we should be focused on work, not just zoning out, head in the clouds, thinking about everything else, and doing a slack, poor job at our workplace. Flip over if you would to Proverbs. While you're turning to Proverbs, listen to this from Romans chapter 12, verse 11. The Bible says this, not slothful in business. What does slothful mean? Slothful means lazy. And when we think of a sloth, we think of an animal that moves very slowly, right? And another synonym of slothful in the Bible is sluggardly, right? And it talks about the slothful man and the sluggard. And they both come from the name of an animal. If you think about a slug, it's an extremely slow-moving creature. A slug is basically what? A snail without a shell. And in German, the word is a naked snail, nachsnecke, all right? That's how you call it in German. So you know, you have a slug and you have a sloth. These are very slow-moving animals. This is the guy on the job who's always moving slowly because he's not excited about the work he's doing. He's not enthusiastic. He's not working hard. That is not a Christian testimony on your job. If you go to your job and you're moving slow and you don't take it seriously and you don't think it's important, you're not obeying the Bible. God says everything we do is important. Here it says a father, mother, wife, son, servant. He says whatever we do, it should be done in a way that honors the Lord, in a way that brings glory to him and heartily from the heart. He says not slothful in business, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord. So even when we're just serving our business and when we're working, if we do it unto the Lord, that pleases God. You may not think that cutting grass is a spiritual activity or painting a house or doing plumbing or electrical or computer work or whatever you do, but God says when you do it heartily, when you work hard, when you're zealous of the work that you're doing, then God is pleased by that and it is service unto the Lord and God will reward you for doing a good job and being a good servant or whatever you do. Now the Bible says in Proverbs chapter 10 verse 4, because I want to show you this word that comes up over and over again in the book of Proverbs and that word is diligent, diligence. It says in Proverbs 10 4, he becometh poor that dealeth with a slack hand, but the hand of the diligent maketh rich. We're talking about the opposite of being a slacker, a slack hand. What does slack mean? If I had a piece of rope and it had some slack in it, what am I saying? It's loose, right? Loose, it's not tight, okay? So when the Bible talks about dealing with a slack hand, it means that you're kind of dragging. You're not really working hard and serious about what you're doing. Look at chapter 12 just a few pages over, verse 24, and by the way, it said the hand of the diligent maketh rich. When we go to work, it shouldn't just be in our mind, hey, I want to make money for myself, we should also want to make money for the company too because they're the ones that are employing us, they're paying us to do that job and we should have a heart that says I want the company to succeed because that's who I'm serving here and ultimately I'm serving the Lord. But the Bible says in Proverbs 12 24, the hand of the diligent shall bear rule, but the slothful shall be under tribute. Look at verse 27, the slothful man roasted not that which he took in hunting, but the substance of a diligent man is precious. So over and over again, go to chapter 21, but over and over again, God is praising the diligent man and he is rebuking the slothful man, the sluggard. He says in chapter 21 verse 5, the thoughts of the diligent tend only to plenteousness, but of everyone that is hasty only to one. And again here we see another opposite to the word diligent, the hasty man. That's the man who wants to just hurry up and get it done, not do a good job, because this is not working quickly because you're working hard and getting it done and excited, but rather just in a hurry to just sloppily get something done. That's the man who's hasty in his work as opposed to the one who is diligent. But notice the first words of verse 5 here, the thoughts, do you see that? The thoughts of the diligent tend only to plenteousness, but of everyone that is hasty only to one. Again we're talking about doing things heartily, doing them from the heart, having the right thoughts, okay, thinking about what we're doing, caring about what we're doing and doing it from the heart. Now I just looked up diligent in the dictionary, listen to what it says in the dictionary. Number one, constant in effort to accomplish something, attentive and persistent in doing anything. So the words that I see there in that definition are number one, effort, putting forth effort, being attentive, what does that mean? Paying attention to what you're doing, not having your mind and your heart somewhere else. And then the second definition that it has for diligent is done or pursued with persevering attention, persevering attention. And today so many people are so distracted with so many other things that they don't focus on what they're doing at the time. And in order to do something heartily, your mind, your heart, your attention have to be focused on what you're doing at that time and you're not just distracted somewhere else. Where your heart is somewhere else, you know, you're physically there doing the work but your heart is somewhere else. Now you say okay, is this just about my job? Well no, because God said whatsoever you do, do it heartily, and servants was only one of the categories. He also said fathers provoke not your children to anger lest they be discouraged. The Bible says that fathers should not provoke their children to wrath but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Go to Deuteronomy chapter number six, Deuteronomy chapter number six, Deuteronomy six being diligent. Not just diligent at work, although that's important. And by the way, people who succeed at work, it's because they're diligent people. The Bible says the hand of the diligent shall bear rule. You know what that means? Be made supervisor. Climb the ladder. That's what that's saying. Because you're diligent, because you're working hard, because you're paying attention to what you're doing, because you're not sloppy and sluggardly and slovenly and because you don't have a heart that's somewhere else and think oh this isn't that important. What time is it? What time do I get out of here? What time is it till five o'clock? No, you're focused on the task at hand and you take it seriously and you do it as unto the Lord and you take pride in the work that you do as a man when you go to work. You take pride in it and you care about doing a good job and you care about the success of the company that you work for. You say well I don't like the company I work for but you do it unto the Lord anyway. Even if you don't like the company, you do it for the Lord because God told you to do it heartily because you're doing it in the name of the Lord Jesus. And notice whatsoever you do, he's not just talking about spiritual activities, we're not just talking about soul winning, we're not just talking about going to church, we're talking about anything that you do. I've heard it said anything that is worth doing is worth doing right the first time. Anything that's worth doing is worth doing right the first time. If it's not worth doing then why are you doing it? And if it is worth doing then do it heartily as unto the Lord and do a good job and pay attention to what you're doing. People who try to get everything done end up getting nothing done. The key to getting things done is to focus on one thing and get it done. Put your whole heart and mind and energy into that one thing and get it done. You can't get everything done but you can get something done and get it done as unto the Lord not unto men. And not only servants, God also addresses fathers in that list of five groups bookended by those two statements. Whatsoever you do, do it for Jesus and do it heartily. He says in Deuteronomy 6, 4, Hero Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul and with all thy might and these words which I command thee this day shall be in thine heart and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children. Notice the word diligent. Notice the word heart that has come up repeatedly already. Thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house and when thou walkest by the way and when thou liest down and when thou risest up. So again we see the concept of doing it heartily and being diligent when it comes to parenting, being a parent. The Bible tells us to do it heartily as unto the Lord, to have our heart in it. We need to spend time giving attention unto our children and actually being there and being attentive and doing it heartily not just being distracted and going through the motions. Now we're all busy. We all have things that we need to do. Men have things that they need to do when they go to work and make money and get things done and then obviously ladies have a lot of work that they need to do around the house and homeschooling and spending time with their husbands and all the different chores and errands that they have to do. But as parents we need to take some time to raise our children and to bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord and the Bible says that we need to teach them the word of God according to Deuteronomy 6.7 and we need to talk with our children and we need to do it heartily. We need to do it diligently, not half distracted, not thinking about everything else but here's what I'm trying to say. When it's time to go to church, be in church and pay attention in church and listen in church and don't be thinking about everything else that's not church. And when you're at work, be at work and focus on work and do a good job at your work and don't just have your mind on everything besides work and when it's time to spend time with your children, spend time with your children and focus on your children and pay attention to your children and don't have your mind on work and don't have your mind on everything else but rather be diligent with whatever task you're performing at that time and do things heartily. Don't have one thing in your life that you think is important and say well when I do that I'm going to put my heart into it. I'm going to pay attention to it because that's important to me but all these other areas of my life, they're just not really that important to me so I'm really not going to do them heartily. You know my job is just kind of a menial job and I, you know, my children, my spouse, my work, no it's all important and if it's not important why are you doing it? And if it's important then do it heartily as unto the Lord and put thought and effort into it. It says of the word of God, of the commandments of God, thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children. That means with attention, with effort, hard work, putting some time into teaching, your children, yeah I bring them to church, no that's not what the Bible says here. Bringing them to church is great but the Bible says that you as the parent should diligently teach your children and there is a difference because I can tell you this, I grew up in church and I grew up with Christian parents and there are more important doctrinal things that I could point to right now that I learned from my parents than what I learned in church because the things that your parents teach you from the word of God stick with you more than what you learn in church from the word of God. That's been the case in my life and so church is not a substitute for you diligently teaching the word of God unto your children and speaking to them when you walk by the way, when you sit in the house. He said when you lie down, when you rise up, this is multiple times per day, spending time with your children, talking to them and not just talking about things that don't matter but actually talking to them about the things of God. Go to Proverbs chapter number 3, Proverbs chapter number 3 we're talking about doing things heartily, doing things from the heart, serving God from the heart, serving our employer from our heart, raising our children from the heart, putting our heart into it, paying attention to what we're doing, caring about what we're doing, wanting to do a good job and not just on the outside, not with eye service as men pleasers, not just because somebody's looking or because well, you know, I have to go through these motions because it's my job. No, because we actually have a heart that wants to do those things and wants to do a good job and wants to do right. Look what Proverbs chapter 3 verse 1 says because again we're talking about children also. We saw the servants. We saw the fathers. Now we see the children. It says in Proverbs chapter 3 verse 1, my son, forget not my law but let thine heart keep my commandments. Do you get that? Not just children who just obey their parents and on the inside they're grumbling. Flip over to chapter 23. Not just a child who hears the command, hey, go clean your room, go do the dishes, but their heart is somewhere else. You know, they're mindlessly doing the job and by the way, then they goof it up. And then the parents are upset. You know, why didn't you do a good job? You're told to sweep the floor and you didn't do a good job or you're told to do this job and you got sidetracked because your head is in the clouds because you don't think it's important because your mind is on Legos and toys and riding your bike and on the books that you're reading instead of having your heart and your mind on the job that you've been given and doing it heartily as unto the Lord. If your parents give you a job to do, you need to do it and you need to have a heart to do it. And the rules, do this, don't do that, need to be obeyed, yes, but they also need to be obeyed from the heart. The Bible says my son, forget not my law but let thine heart keep my commandments. Look at Proverbs 23, 15, it says my son, if thine heart be wise, my heart shall rejoice even mine. Look at verse 19, hear thou my son and be wise and guide thine heart in the way. Verse 26, my son give me thine heart and let thine eyes observe my ways. God is saying over and over again and this is about a father to a son, he's saying don't just give me outward obedience, give me your heart. Do it heartily and just as a father wants his son to obey him from the heart, our heavenly father wants us to obey him in all things from the heart. God cares about our heart, not just what we do, not just the actions that we perform, not just going through the motion, but he wants our heart to keep his commandments. He wants our thoughts and our minds to be right before him. And as children, as servants, as fathers, we need to work hard to have the right heart. Not only that, but husbands, because the Bible said in that passage in Colossians 3, he said husbands, love your wives and be not bitter against them. Now when the Bible says husbands love your wives, that needs to come from the heart. Not just going through the motions, not just saying I love you, but actually a heart that deep down truly loves and cares for his wife and God is saying whatever we do as a husband, we need to do it heartily. Whatever we do as a servant, we need to do it heartily. Whatever we do as a father, do it heartily when you spend time with your children. And when the Bible says children, he's saying whatever you do children, do it heartily. Whatever job mom and dad give you to do, do it heartily. Husbands, be a husband and do it heartily. What do I mean? You know, if it's time to spend time with your wife, you should focus on your wife and not be distracted and focused on everything else. You know, if you're going to spend time with your wife, you're going to take your wife on a date or if you're going to have some time set aside where you're maybe going to have dinner with your wife or just spend time with her in whatsoever way you do, you need to do that heartily and not be doing this the whole time. Uh huh, yep, uh huh, right. Are you really doing it heartily when you're on your phone? No, I'm not saying that the phone is a bad tool, but how would you like me to pull out the phone in church while someone's preaching and I'm just, oh I'm listening. I mean are you really in church heartily? You know, you're here bodily and when you spend time with your spouse, and this goes for husbands or wives, you need to do that heartily and spend time with your spouse, but you know what this means when you pull this out and you're fooling around on this when you're supposed to be spending time with your spouse, you know what that means? I don't consider time with my spouse very important at all. In fact, it's not important so I need to do something important at the same time so I don't waste my time here with my wife or waste my time with my husband. That's what you're saying when you're fooling around on the phone because you're basically saying this is not an important enough task for me to put all my attention into it and all my thought into it so that's why in order to stay entertained I have to do something else in order to stay productive because what I'm doing right now is not productive and doesn't matter so I'm going to do this so I can get something done. That's what you're saying to your spouse when you're ignoring them or half, well I'm half with my spouse and half with this, and by the way it's not just the phone, it could be TV. I don't have a TV and the TV is nothing but trash anyway but honestly if you're going to sit there and have a TV on and you're looking at the TV that's your time with your spouse or you're on the phone or you're on the computer or you're reading a book at the same time. When I used to go to school, you know what I used to do? Read a book in school. I would go to school and I'd sit in school all day and I'd have my book under my desk like this and I would sit and read a book the whole day at school and you know what that's how I actually learned something in school, my reading. Why because I didn't think that what I was learning was important because school was boring because I had no respect for the school that I went to because I was just going through the motions because I just wanted to get a piece of paper that said I'm finished with high school and I felt that it was unimportant and so that's why I brought a different book to read and I sat there and read that book and learned something. You know why? Because I didn't find it important but you know what? Your husband is important and your wife is important and your children are important and church is important and your job is important and it says you're not important when you pull out something else and get distracted with other things. I better move on. It's really quiet in here. Must have really hit the nail on the head with that point. It's true though. Proverbs, that's the message that you send when you're not doing it heartily is that you don't think that what you're doing is important but you know, where did I have you turn? Did I have you turn anywhere? Where are you? You're still in Proverbs, huh? Well anyway, Colossians 3 is where I was but I was just pointing out that husbands are on the list there to love their wives and then it also says be not bitter against them and what does it mean to be bitter? It means that you've not done what? Means you're not forgiving. It means that you're holding a grudge, right? So when the Bible is telling us not to be bitter or to forgive or not to hold a grudge, you know what he's saying? Do it heartily, meaning don't just do it outwardly. Don't just say, yeah, I forgive you and you're still bitter. You're still holding a grudge. You're still hanging it over their head. Okay, that's not doing it heartily but whatever we do as husbands, do it heartily. When we go to our job and provide for our family, we need to do it heartily. When we spend time with our wife and when we take her out somewhere or spend time with her at home, we need to be focused and put effort and attention into our relationship with our wife. Same thing with wives. The Bible says wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands as it is fit in the Lord. Whatever the wife does should be done heartily. Whatever the child does, whatever the husband does, whatsoever we do, the Bible says, we need to do it heartily and as a wife, everything you do should be done heartily. Even the menial tasks of cleaning the house and cooking meals and whatever the case may be should be done heartily and especially the meals, do them heartily. There's an easy way out on the meals, just some frozen dinner, stick it in the microwave. That's not doing it heartily. I'm serious. Just a lack of effort toward doing a good job at your job, you know, of just not taking the time and the energy to think that cooking is important, to provide a good meal that tastes good, that's nutritious, you know, to make your family happy and healthy and so forth. Do it hard. Care about it. Take it serious. Not just, oh man, you know, I have to, you know, cook another meal. They keep, you know, it seems like three times a day everybody wants to eat in this house, you know. No, do it heartily. Be enthusiastic about it. And the Bible says whatever you do as a wife, do it heartily. So, you know, again, spend time with your husband, pay attention. And by the way, let me say this. If you want to have a good marriage, it takes effort. It takes you putting your heart into it. And anything in life, if you want to succeed at it, you must put forth effort. And the less you put into it, the less you're going to get out of it. It's that simple. You put little effort into child rearing. You just put very little time and effort into it. You're going to get a very small result. And you're going to have children that grow up and do not follow your ways and do not obey you and do not do the things that you taught them. And if you put very little effort into your marriage and it's real low on your priority list and you don't put a lot of thought, and look, we're not just talking about actions here. The heart, the mind, attention. If you put thought and effort into it, you will have success. If you don't, you're going to fail. And so many people, they don't consider their marriage to be important at all. And then that's why their marriage falls apart. Because they didn't put effort into it. They didn't care. They cared about their job, maybe. They cared about the children, maybe. They cared about the house. They cared about their finances. But they didn't put a lot of effort into their marriage because they just take it for granted and just think it's always going to be there. And then it falls apart. And then all of a sudden they care about it and it's too late. We need to put forth effort in all areas of life. And marriage is one of them. Putting forth effort to do a good job at everything we do. If you look at the virtuous woman in Proverbs chapter 31, the thing that stands out about her is diligence and hard work. That's really the main attribute there of someone who cares about doing a good job as a wife. And succeeding as a wife. Whether you're a wife, whether you're a husband, whether you're a child, whether you're a father, whether you're a servant, we should do all things heartily. Think about this scripture. Matthew 15 8. You don't have to turn there. But it says, this people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth and honoreth me with their lips but their heart is far from me. Jesus rebuked the children of Israel for going through the motions of serving him but not doing it heartily. Not having a heart that was in it. It says in verse 23, go to Ecclesiastes 9, I'll close with this, Ecclesiastes 9. But in Proverbs 23 the Bible says, apply thine heart unto instruction and thine ears to the words of knowledge. That means when you're in church you should be focused on being in church and applying your heart to the instruction that's being given and caring about what you're listening to and hearing. You know when you go out soul winning, you need to have your heart in it when you're out soul winning and not just robotically give people the gospel. You know when you just go out there and you're just going through the motions and you just robotically go through the gospel and in your heart you really don't care whether that person gets saved or not. No we need to care. We need to have our heart in it and to heartily preach the gospel with the desire that that person be saved and with compassion and love in our heart for the person with whom we're speaking and you'll get more people saved if you go out soul winning and do it heartily than if you just go through the motions. When you come to church, do it heartily. When you're doing anything, whether it's song leading, don't get up here and just go through the motions of song, you say well I just don't think song leading is that important. Then don't ever do it and if you don't think playing the piano in church is important then don't ever play the piano in church because anybody who does anything in this church needs to do it heartily and if somebody gets up to read the scripture before the sermon they need to do it heartily and the piano needs to be played heartily and the preaching needs to be done heartily and everything that we do in this church should be done from the heart not just a liturgical going through the motions. There are all kinds of religious people who go to church every week to a false religion where they stand up, sit down, stand up, sit down, you know, go through all this, you know, say all kinds of things and chant things, right? Hail Marys and our fathers, but it's not from the heart when you're chanting it 25 times, it's a vain repetition and we don't want to be guilty of that as Baptist where we come to church and just vainly, you know, sing through the songs and Jesus loves me, this I know, the Bible tells me so, little ones to him belong, they are weak but you know. Man what are we doing for lunch? You know and just thinking about everything else and just, or you know what, I'll say this, I remember when I was running my fire alarm business, sometimes it would get really hectic and really stressful and the thing about this, when you own your own business, you're never really off because when you're an employee, you clock out, you got the weekend off unless you're on call or whatever but you can usually just kind of shut off the phone and just have a few days and it's great, that's one of the benefits to being an employee, right? One of the benefits of owning the company is you make more money but you also have all the stress and everything like that and I remember there were times when my business would get really busy and really stressful and sometimes it would get to work for six days a week, man, that's all I did sometimes, I mean I just work, work, work, work during busy times but you know on Sundays, I would always just let everything go to hell in a hand basket and just say, you know what, I don't care how bad things are, I don't care how much paperwork is stacked up, I don't care how stressful things are, I would just focus on church, focus on soul winning, you know, do church in the morning, soul winning in the afternoon, church at night and just not think about work, not even think about it, not just okay, I'm going to stop working and go to church and then bite my fingernails the whole time thinking about, and somebody's been biting their fingernails because I keep finding little piles of fingernails in this auditorium so this sermon's for you but anyway, you know, not come to church and be biting my fingernails thinking about work but honestly I had to learn to just forget work and by the way, during that same period, if I was going to hang around with my wife, you know what I have to do, put away the stress of work and not be with my wife but my heart's still at work. That's not quality time with my wife or I'm with my children but my heart's still on business. That's not quality time with my children. Whatever we do needs to be done heartily and you need to learn to focus on what you're doing at that time. Now there's a place for multitasking, I actually do a lot of multitasking but there are certain times when multitasking is not appropriate and when it's time to just focus on what you're doing at that time whether it's church, soul winning, whether it's business and there's a time to be focused on business when you're working and then a time to turn off business when you're with your family and just spend some quality time with them and send a message to them that says hey you're important enough for me to take some time where I'm just only hanging out with you and you alone and I'm not thinking on everything else and worried about everything else and even though I'm physically here with you my heart and mind is somewhere else. But let me just give you this verse to close with Ecclesiastes 9 10 it says whatsoever thy hand find it to do, do it with thy might for there is no work nor device nor knowledge nor wisdom in the grave with thou goest. He says in that verse whatever you find to do, do it with your might. What's he saying? Put effort into it. Put your strength into it. Do your best. Whatsoever you do, he said in Colossians 3, do it in the name of the Lord Jesus and he said whatsoever you do, do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men and he highlights wives, husbands, children, fathers and servants. Do it heartily. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father we thank you so much for your word Lord and we pray that you would just help us to focus on the things that are important in our lives Lord and not to always be distracted, have our head in the clouds, not paying attention to what we're doing Lord but rather help us to realize what is important and then on those important things which are work, our marriage, our children, our parents, help us to do them heartily and when we go to church, when we go soul winning Lord, help us to be in the moment and not somewhere else mentally and in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.