Welcome to My Poetry Site


Hello there, I wrote this during lent but it can be relevent for other times.
I hope it blesses you
 
for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.
Philippians 2:13 NKJV
  
I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure. My heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labour.
 Yet when I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun.
Ecclesiastes 2:9-11 NIV
 
  
Both of these scriptures have the words work and pleasure in them. 

Lent, as we know has a link to giving things up.  The giving up is a means to an end.  The more we give up, the less clouded our vision becomes until the view of the power of the cross is fully in view.  Our whole lives are to be a continual turning away from the things that block our view of the cross.

Look at the contexts of love and pleasure here.  One person, Paul, is saying that it is God who works in us - He gives us our will, what we are to do - and the power to do it through the Holy Spirit.  God gets pleasure in doing His will through us (so do we as it is what we were created to do).

The other person, Solomon is lamenting over his life - that he used his wisdom to do great works and and did not deny himself any pleasure: however he concludes it was all meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

This may cause an internal battle within us.  Solomon was the richest man on the earth and he had everything he could ask for.  That must be the ultimate mustn't it? But then this other thought comes to us: we live in a world now where we have access to the lifestyles of the rich and famous, but we see a lot of dis-satisfaction and sadness.  Why?

It all has to do with the context of the words work and pleasure.

Paul says we are to have God work through us for His pleasure.  Paul is one of the most content people in the Bible.  Solomon lived a life of himself being the engine of his work and himself being the object of his pleasure.  Solomon became a very regretful person.
We know, when we have this internal battle, that there is something else to life (or someone else).  That someone is Christ.

Lent is linked to giving up.  We are to give up all to Christ and have Him work through us for His good pleasure.  In giving up to Him, the joy we receive out-does anything we could provide ourselves through our own efforts.  We receive Christ.  There is no greater joy.  This does not mean necessesarily that we are not to be rich.  It means that if God's will for us is to have riches, it will be He who works His power through us to gain riches for His pleasure. 

The key is our focus: Our selves or Our God.

Steve Harewood


Comment On This Poem --- Vote for this poem
GODLY WORK AND PLEASURE