Thank God It's Monday

Most of us never quite close the gap. The gap between Sunday morning, when our hands are lifted and our hearts are soft, and 8:47am on Monday, when we're dragging ourselves into the office or the classroom or the kitchen sink. Pastor Josh named that gap this week, and then he went after it.

This is week three of our Celebrating Work series. We've already seen that work is woven into our DNA from Genesis: to create, to care, to contribute. We've seen how sin contaminated work and turned a gift into something we try to escape. And we've heard that punchy line from Ephesians 4 that "sin is not doing nothing wrong, but sin is about doing nothing with your life." Today we land in Colossians 3, where Paul gets practical. If you've been raised with Christ, what does the rest of your week actually look like?

The Sunday-to-Monday Question

Pastor Josh opened by admitting he felt a little distracted. Some of the church family were away, scattered across campuses and holidays. He grew up cherishing Sunday service, sometimes to a fault. It tipped into legalism. But his old pastor was onto something important, and the question has stuck with him for decades:

How do we connect the Sunday worship and posture and spirit and heart to our Monday to Saturday worship that God is expecting from the followers of Jesus?

Sunday is not the destination. It's the launch pad for the rest of the week.

Set Your Mind on Things Above

Paul writes Colossians into a Roman, polytheistic world where Jesus was being slotted in as just another god on the shelf. Paul's response is to insist on the excellency of Christ. He's not one of many. He is all in all. And because of His finished work, our entire framework changes.

So Paul says: put to death what is earthly. Sexual immorality, impurity, evil desire, covetousness. The whole package YouTube and Instagram keep trying to upsell you on. Have this, it'll make your life happy. This is the full life. The Bible says no. Set your mind on things above.

But there's a second half Pastor Josh didn't want us to skip. After "put off" comes "put on." Compassionate hearts. Kindness. Humility. Meekness. Patience. Bearing with one another. Forgiving each other. And above all, love.

One of the things I see, the symptom of legalistic people is they're good at putting off. They're actually exerting that and taking their eyes off from all the impure things. But they're lacking putting on. They're lacking love. They're lacking humility. They're lacking kindness.

You can be very, very clean and very, very unloving. The Bible isn't impressed.

The Tesla and the Old Lady

Then came the story. Pastor Josh had parked his Tesla at Bunnings when he heard a bang. He walked out to find that an older lady had swung her car door wide open straight into his paintwork. Not a scratch. Paint off. He was furious.

"That moment, momentarily, I forgot I was a pastor."

Instead of apologising, the lady tried to cover it up. Maybe I didn't do it. It was already there. The car is already dirty. She was elderly, with some kind of injury on her face. He took a photo of her car, told her he'd contact her if it cost money, and walked off. And then the Holy Spirit, never one to leave a man alone, stepped in.

What's wrong with you? Were you kind? Were you humble? Were you meek? Were you patient?

It was a tiny scratch. He'd cop an earful from his wife and life would go on. Meanwhile this old woman was probably driving home terrified. Was the moment of self-righteousness worth it for a follower of Christ? He'd remembered to put off the anger. He'd forgotten to put on kindness. That's something you intentionally have to do every day of your life.

Whatever You Do, Work Heartily

From verse 22 Paul addresses bondservants, and yes, Pastor Josh paused to address the elephant in the room. In ancient Rome, one in two people were enslaved, and the gospel reached them too. Galatians is clear: in Christ there's no slave or free, no male or female, no Jew or Gentile. The Bible doesn't condone slavery. And when people in another era twisted this passage to validate American slavery, that was, in his words, "gaslighting and false doctrine" coming from people who weren't anchored in any real theological framework.

The principle for us is simple. If you work for someone, this passage is talking to you. Don't be an eye-server. Don't pretend to grind only when the boss is watching. Then comes the verse Pastor Josh wants us to memorise. The one he wants us teaching our kids until it's a load-bearing wall in their lives:

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men.

"Heartily" comes from the Greek for soul. With your soul. The Cambridge Dictionary says it means to do something with sincere enthusiasm, energy or gusto. Wholeheartedly, without reservation.

Notice it's not about results. Sometimes you pour your soul into an exam and the mark doesn't come back. Sometimes you scrape through with no effort and somehow it works out. The Bible isn't grading on outcomes. You know whether you gave a hundred percent. And God knows.

TGIM

So how do you walk into Monday? Pastor Josh wasn't subtle:

When you go to work on Monday, do you have that posture, attitude like "Oh, it's Monday"? I rather go to church and worship the Lord. It is worldly work. NO. That is hypocrisy right there.

The new acronym he's pushing: TGIM. Thank God It's Monday. Bring the energy. You don't need to walk into the office shouting "Hello everyone, God bless you," especially if, as he joked, you're a bit shy, a bit Asian, and that's just not your style. But you know where your heart was that day. So does He.

Posture and Preparedness

Working heartily isn't a vibe you summon when you wake up. It's posture, attitude, and preparedness.

Think about Old Testament sacrifices. They didn't chuck a lamb on a fire and stroll off. They chose carefully. Killed it carefully. Carved it. Took out the fat. The whole thing was an exhausting, deliberate act of worship. The worship team doesn't wing Sunday morning. They practice on Thursday and roll in an hour early. And the man preaching this sermon? He didn't leave his room from Friday onwards. "Whether I preach well or not, I get my best shot. That's my journey for the last thirty years."

Joseph is the case study. Same posture as a slave in Potiphar's house. Same posture in prison. Same posture in Pharaoh's palace. The circumstances flipped wildly. The heartily-working spirit didn't move. Excellency came. Favour came. He was worshipping God in every room he was placed in.

Different Bosses, Same Heart

"I'm a pastor. I'm not working for you. I'm working for God." That reframe scales into every relationship the Bible names. Wives obeying husbands who can be hard to obey. Husbands loving wives who can be hard to love. Parents not exasperating their children, because, Pastor Josh confesses, "I love my children, but at times we all struggle."

He shared about visiting his parents on Friday. They're in their eighties and nineties and still finding things to fight about. Three hours is plenty. But the command stands.

I don't want to look back when they're gone and say I didn't really obey them heartily. I don't want to give any regret in my life.

And then the most relatable confession of the morning: he was a spoiled brat. His mum never let him touch the kitchen. Thirty years into marriage his wife is finally getting some help around the house. "Honey, do the dishes." She watches over his shoulder. "You missed the spot." His comeback?

"I'm doing it heartedly. Both of us have a different boss. You're not my boss. I'm doing it unto the Lord."

To make sure we didn't miss the point, he reached back five hundred years and pulled in William Tyndale:

There is no work better than to please God: to pour water, to wash dishes, to be a cobbler or an apostle. All are one. To wash dishes, to preach, are all one, touching the deed to please God. All one in Christ.

The dishes and the pulpit are the same altar.

Closing the Gap

Tomorrow is Monday. Pastor Josh left us with five things to carry into it.

One. Work is your calling. Not your occupation. By the way you were created, you are a working being.

Two. Work is your worship. Don't make Sunday the special day. Every day is special.

Three. Knowing your true boss gives you a new posture. Jesus is your boss. Best boss of the year. Every year.

Four. Define your own destination of "heartily." What does it actually look like for you to give 100%? Name it.

Five. Work and prayer cannot be separated. Pray before. Pray after. Ten seconds on the train. Come to Early Morning Prayer. Finish the day with "thank you, God."

And to anyone in the church still without a job, still searching, still waiting: your heart hasn't changed. You're still serving the Lord. Whether the payslip lands or not.

The full life Paul writes about in Colossians isn't somewhere down the road. If you're in Christ, you already have it. The only thing left is the part where we put it into practice.

What we hear on Sunday and what you practice on Monday, that gap is a reason why you're not having full life.

So tomorrow morning, smile on your face. Say good morning. Wash the dishes like the dishes matter. Send the email like Jesus is reading it over your shoulder. It will change your heart. It will change the atmosphere around you.

Thank God it's Monday.