0:04

Gets Wednesday, April Twenty Four, Two Thousand Twenty

0:06

Four and Albert Mohler in this is the

0:08

Briefing a daily analysis of news and events

0:11

from a Christian worldview. We have the rush

0:13

of headlines coming into so fast. sometimes we

0:15

miss the opportunity to talk about some big

0:17

picture issues and the Christian worldview. but today

0:19

I want to take time and look at

0:22

some of these because right now they are

0:24

very very much with us in the headlines

0:26

but other headlines or sometimes crying out for

0:28

the bigger national attention. So what are the

0:30

things are going be talking about? is the

0:32

U A W which is the United. Auto

0:35

Workers scoring big in the question

0:37

of unionization with a vote by

0:39

employees from a Volkswagen plant in

0:41

Tennessee. The big news here is

0:43

that this is a Volkswagen plant

0:46

in Tennessee and the headline comes

0:48

from the fact that seventy three

0:50

percent of the employees voting in

0:52

this election on the matter of

0:54

unionization voted for the union. Now

0:57

if this plant were located, say

0:59

in Michigan, The. News wouldn't be

1:01

nearly as big, this would not be headline

1:03

news when it would still make the news

1:05

in one sense, precisely because organized labor has

1:08

faced. So. Many losses over

1:10

the course of the last forty

1:12

to fifty years. So when the

1:14

big stories and the American workforce

1:16

has been there, organized labor has

1:19

been losing ground And one of

1:21

the reasons has been losing ground

1:23

is because he had overreached so

1:25

far and quite frankly had created

1:27

an elite of employees covered with

1:29

union jobs. That developments keeping many

1:32

others out from employment. And the

1:34

bigger issue was just the changes

1:36

that have taken place in the

1:38

economy. So you had foreign

1:40

competition. You. Go back to

1:42

the Nineteen fifties. Americans are basically buying

1:45

their cars and General Motors from Ford

1:47

from what was then American Motors. But

1:49

by the time you fast forward to

1:51

the Nineteen eighties, you're looking at a

1:53

radically different world. You have a Globalization

1:56

taking place in terms of the economy,

1:58

and so employees at a. The Board

2:00

plant in Michigan are competing in

2:02

terms of an economy with people

2:04

who are living in South Korea

2:06

working for a South Korea manufacture.

2:08

And then over the course of

2:10

say the last thirty years there

2:12

has been a further complication when

2:14

all the sudden sunday as made

2:16

right down the street Volkswagen is

2:18

made in Tennessee, Mercedes Benz, B

2:20

M W for that matter, Subaru

2:22

you are looking at. American employees

2:24

and American plants. But many of plants

2:27

are not in the North, which had

2:29

been the backbone of the auto industry

2:31

in the United States, the heyday of

2:33

the big three brands, the heyday of

2:35

unionization. Know, it is not by accident

2:37

that many of these new factories both

2:39

have some of the legacy American brands,

2:41

and even more so of these global

2:43

brands. They've ended up in the South

2:46

and the American South. You ask the

2:48

question why? Though it's not because of

2:50

the climate, it is because of the

2:52

labour climate. It is because of the

2:54

legal. Context And the cultural

2:56

context. And that's because. Many.

2:59

Of these plants of not virtually all

3:01

of them when they were established were

3:03

established as non union workplaces. Nice. You

3:05

look at a map of the United

3:08

States and you look at labour unionization.

3:10

It certainly true that there were

3:12

union jobs all over the South,

3:15

but it's also true that the

3:17

unions had far more political clout

3:19

and far more economic penetration. They

3:21

represented far more of the workplace

3:23

in the industrialized north, rather than

3:26

in that the more agricultural South.

3:28

Now when you have the factories moving into the

3:31

south. You. Had companies that were

3:33

seeking to create a new economic

3:35

reality in a new post industrial

3:37

age by putting automobile factories and

3:39

other related factories in cities in

3:41

the South. And that's what makes

3:44

this news just coming from Rica

3:46

Day so big it is because

3:48

this was a third effort by

3:50

some employees at this video be

3:52

a plant in Tennessee to unionize

3:54

the first who had failed. but

3:57

this on succeeded and again seventy

3:59

three percent. It exceeded

4:01

overwhelmingly. Is almost immediately

4:03

you've got political and economic factors that

4:06

are being evaluated. You get experts when

4:08

it comes to the politics of the

4:10

situation, in those related to the economics

4:12

of the situation. and they're all asking

4:15

the same question In that is, is

4:17

the South gonna turn into the North

4:19

when it comes to unionization? Even in

4:21

the North. What You see his resurgent

4:24

union power, for example, in the relation

4:26

between the United Auto Workers and the

4:28

current Democratic President of the United States.

4:30

Joe Biden Nine fancies himself as. The

4:33

friend of the Working Man when it

4:35

comes to these labor unions and you

4:37

have a very tight relationship between the

4:39

by the administration and big labor in

4:41

particular the U A W The U

4:43

A W A Legacy brand and American

4:45

Labor has been gaining recently under the

4:48

leadership of Sean Fame John Thain. By

4:50

the way, we are told a not

4:52

even met President Joe Biden until recently

4:54

and now he's even serving as a

4:56

surrogate for Biden on the campaign trail.

4:58

That tells ya a whole lot about

5:00

what's happening on the cultural front. Here.

5:03

So the big question is is this a sign

5:05

to the future or is it a flu can?

5:07

Either way, what does this mean for the American

5:09

economy? I want to sit back and say. That.

5:11

Is an important question. But according to the

5:14

Christian worldview, the bigger issue here is the

5:16

role of work in our lives and how

5:18

we as Christians are to think these things

5:20

through. So in terms of unionization, good thing

5:23

or bad thing. Well. Over

5:25

the course of American history, it has

5:27

been both. To be honest, I think

5:29

at one point there is no doubt

5:31

that given the fact that workers were

5:33

virtually with out protections, there were no

5:35

basic regulations coming from the administrative state.

5:38

there wasn't an administrator state of any

5:40

size. Given the fact that much a

5:42

business was unregulated, there's no doubt that

5:44

there were some corporations taking advantage of

5:46

American labor. Now in Christian biblical terms,

5:49

The. big issue here is not what the marches

5:51

would talk about in terms of the alienation

5:53

of labor know the big issue for the

5:55

biblical worldview would be exactly what you find

5:57

in scripture and that is stealing a person's

6:00

labor is in effect the

6:02

same thing as stealing money from him

6:04

or her. So you're looking at the

6:06

fact that we're talking about the theft,

6:08

the theft of labor. The biblical principle

6:10

that is so clear here is that

6:12

there ought to be a righteous and

6:14

just link between labor and reward. That

6:17

is clear in the New Testament as

6:19

it is clear in the Old Testament.

6:21

Jesus even in his parables makes reference

6:23

to this. So the worker should be

6:25

worthy of his hire, something that's explicit

6:28

in the Old Testament and cited again

6:30

in the New Testament. So

6:32

the Christian worldview also reminds us that we

6:34

are made to work. We're not made

6:36

not to work, we are made to work.

6:38

Work is a part of how the creature

6:41

glorifies the Creator. He made us able as

6:43

human beings not just to work in the

6:45

way that say beavers build a dam because

6:48

after all they're just doing what by instinct

6:50

they are born to do. We are

6:53

actually far beyond that in that we

6:55

can self-consciously made in God's image labor

6:58

in such a way that we

7:00

seek to glorify God with our

7:03

labor and frankly there's a moral

7:05

accountability here. Now I'm not sure

7:07

exactly what industrious beavers do to

7:09

punish slacker beavers but that's

7:11

quite different than what takes place in the

7:13

human workforce where we all understand there are

7:15

huge moral questions that are involved here. If

7:18

you go back to the early 20th century

7:20

there's no doubt that labor unions played a

7:22

very important role in American politics but here's

7:24

the problem when big

7:26

labor became as big as it became

7:29

all the problems that

7:31

were big in the economy they

7:34

became a part of the labor union picture as

7:36

well and this came with mob corruption it came

7:38

with all kinds of things that also came with

7:41

the political alliance of labor unions

7:43

with the Democratic Party which

7:45

led by the way to a

7:47

part of the alienation of labor

7:49

from the Democratic Party in the

7:51

1970s precisely because you had blue-collar

7:53

workers at auto plants for example

7:56

in states like Michigan and Wisconsin and they

7:59

weren't going along with the Democratic

8:01

Party falling increasingly into the hands

8:03

of hippie leftists. And so

8:05

you had, for example, big labor not

8:08

support the Democratic nominee when that nominee

8:10

was George McGovern in 1972. Richard Nixon

8:12

won his election in 1968,

8:16

then overwhelming re-election in that 1972 election

8:19

with an incredible amount

8:23

of support from Union Labor,

8:25

Union votes. The same

8:27

thing happened in a big way in 1980 with

8:29

the election of Ronald Reagan. Over

8:31

then President Jimmy Carter and then

8:33

Jimmy Carter's Vice President Walter Mondale,

8:35

there's no doubt that workers weren't

8:37

going with the Cultural Revolution. They

8:39

were far more likely to go

8:41

with the Republican candidate even if

8:43

the Republican Party and big labor

8:45

were largely alienated. And that

8:48

just continued as a pattern until more recently

8:50

the relationship between the

8:52

Democratic Party and big labor has grown only

8:54

stronger and quite frankly big labor like other

8:57

sectors of big society become increasingly politicized

8:59

on the left. But there's another huge

9:01

thing that plays into this and this

9:04

is human freedom. And so

9:06

one of the things we need to recognize is that

9:08

you can talk about red states and blue states, you

9:10

can talk about northern states and southern states, eastern states

9:12

and western states. But one of

9:14

the major divisions is between states that have right

9:16

to work laws and states that do not. Well

9:19

just to say in some of the old

9:21

line states of huge historic labor influence, there

9:24

is no right to work without joining the

9:26

labor union. So you can have labor workplaces and

9:28

if you're going to work in that site then

9:30

you are going to be a member of the

9:32

labor union and you're going to pay your labor

9:34

dues whether you want to or not. Now

9:36

one of the reasons why many of these plants

9:39

located in the south is because many

9:41

places in the south they did not

9:43

have labor work sites. Which is to

9:45

say that yes there's federal legislation that

9:47

says how workers can organize and can

9:49

eventually hold a vote and can vote

9:51

to go labor. But the

9:54

two complications are these. You have

9:56

states that made that easier and

9:58

harder in terms of policies

10:00

and legislation. You also had states that

10:02

even if there were to be a

10:04

pro-labor vote did have right-to-work provisions so

10:06

that the union vote didn't

10:09

mean that everybody had to become a member

10:11

of the union, pay their union dues and

10:13

all the rest. But big labor has been

10:16

very dissatisfied with that for a matter of

10:18

decades and so there's been an effort to

10:20

try to reverse right-to-work laws. States like Wisconsin

10:23

are key battlegrounds in that effort

10:26

and you also have the labor unions

10:28

and in particular the UAW running point

10:30

here seeking to unionize the South. Now

10:33

here's something else to recognize. When

10:35

you look at a massive auto plant say

10:37

in the middle of Alabama or Mississippi you

10:40

have to ask the question why is that plant there? Why

10:43

is that plant not for example in

10:45

Michigan or Minnesota or Ohio and the

10:47

answer is because of the

10:49

economic reality that made it very

10:52

attractive for this auto manufacturer to

10:54

put that plant say in the

10:56

middle of farmland in the

10:58

state of Alabama or Mississippi or the state of Kentucky

11:01

and so for instance you've got major

11:03

installations in a state such as Kentucky

11:05

or such as these even further deep

11:07

South states and the reason they're

11:10

there is because there was an economic

11:12

advantage to these manufacturers to put their

11:14

plants there precisely because it was

11:16

not going to be a union site. Now

11:19

when those plants went in let's just say you put

11:21

a plant in the middle of Alabama if

11:23

you put that plant in and it doesn't matter

11:25

in this case whether you're a domestic or a

11:28

foreign car manufacturer the likelihood is that you're creating

11:30

hundreds and hundreds of jobs that are going to

11:32

pay not only very well but are

11:34

going to pay better than the prevailing wage in

11:36

the area. Now the unions came in and

11:38

said you know you need to unionize

11:40

because we can promise you even more

11:43

and here's something else we

11:45

need to recognize with the workers at this Volkswagen

11:47

plant in Tennessee voting this way there

11:49

are big questions about whether this is going to spread

11:51

throughout the South. Now I can just tell

11:53

you what the result of this will be it will

11:56

be that these auto manufacturers will decide well

11:58

if we're going to put a plant somewhere

12:00

in the United States and it's not going

12:02

to matter in terms of unionization where we

12:04

put it then we will put it in

12:06

the place that will make the greatest economic

12:09

sense for us. I'm not saying that there

12:11

will never again be a major new plant

12:13

in the American South if the unionization spreads

12:15

I can simply say that one of the

12:17

major reasons why those plants have been there

12:19

for the last couple of decades that's

12:22

going to disappear if this labor union vote

12:24

is a sign of what takes place throughout

12:26

the region. Furthermore in worldview terms there's something

12:29

else going on here and that is that

12:31

when you look at some of these votes

12:33

some of the employees are saying you know

12:35

I think we can get more. Now the

12:38

answer is it's almost sure

12:40

that you can get more that by

12:42

labor unionization the labor union is going

12:44

to produce some kind of marginally better

12:47

situation and as I say I

12:49

want to be intellectually honest there have been times in

12:51

American history where unions have played a very important role

12:53

there but right now we're in an

12:55

economy in which one of the

12:57

big issues is where are the permanent jobs

12:59

or at least the long-lasting jobs going to

13:01

be in this society and I will say

13:03

it makes very little moral sense right now

13:06

to make a bet that you can

13:08

squeeze one job and seek to

13:10

make your situation better without recognizing

13:12

that this just might shut down the incentive

13:14

for anyone else to build a plant here

13:17

in this very same community or even in

13:19

this state and so it is

13:21

rather revealing to hear some people say that

13:23

their concern is just basically for themselves and

13:25

for the people who are working in this

13:27

plant right now if there are

13:29

no future hires then let those people worry about

13:31

themselves but at the same time

13:34

you've got southern governors who are all of a

13:36

sudden saying you know wait just a minute if

13:38

this happens and you remove an incentive for these

13:40

companies to build plants and bring jobs to our

13:42

state then they're not going to do so so

13:45

you do have some huge worldview issues that

13:47

are invoked here so this is something we're

13:49

going to have to watch but we as

13:51

christians need to look not only at the

13:53

facts and at the figures we need

13:55

to see not only the headlines we need to ask ourselves the

13:57

question What does this actually mean? In

14:00

biblical worldview terms about the meaning of

14:02

work. And. How we are

14:04

to live in this world, and how

14:07

we are to show the glory of

14:09

God in our lives in this world.

14:11

That doesn't mean that every questions a

14:14

union yes or no is going to

14:16

have a really clear, unambiguous, simple answer.

14:18

Although I think over time than answers

14:21

become increasingly clear. but it does mean

14:23

that our way of looking at this

14:25

will have consequences. Are decisions will have

14:28

consequences. And we as Christians these recognize.

14:30

The. Consequences were worried about are not

14:33

just about ourselves when also our

14:35

children and our children's children. That.

14:37

Too is a part of the biblical worldview.

14:39

Now that's one dimension of how these issues

14:42

arise in the news. I want to look

14:44

at another one. And. To do

14:46

this, I want to look at yesterday's

14:48

edition of Usa Today the front page

14:51

of the Money section Headline: millennials want

14:53

to retire by sixty Than asking the

14:55

question, can they afford to Daniel Davide

14:57

is the reporter here on the story,

15:00

and he's telling us that does surveys

15:02

indicate research indicates that the average millennial

15:04

hopes to retire somewhere around age sixty?

15:07

That was there in the headline. He

15:09

begins by writing this quote: The average Millennial

15:11

is thirty something and age by which most

15:13

of us are well versed in the ups

15:16

and downs of financial. I see it may

15:18

come as a surprise them that the average

15:20

Millennial expects to retire before sixty quote, a

15:22

goal not many of us can afford to

15:24

attain. Well indeed, it's absolutely true the not

15:26

many workers can afford to retire at sixty,

15:28

but it turns out the the Millennials. Who.

15:31

Are aiming at a younger retirement age

15:33

than those who are older, are actually

15:35

saving less money, and almost assuredly are

15:37

going to be in a situation in

15:39

which it isn't even rational to think

15:41

that the vast majority them could retired

15:43

anything like sixty. So. you

15:46

have a collision between some kind of

15:48

expectation and reality year the numbers are

15:50

this quote in a poll in february

15:52

you gov as millennials when they expected

15:54

to retire the largest year thirty percent

15:57

chose the age range of fifty one

15:59

to sixty Another survey by Principal

16:01

Financial found that the average millennial expects

16:03

to retire at age 59. That's

16:06

pretty astounding. The obvious truth was

16:09

spoken by Sam Knottzinger, identified as general

16:11

manager of brokerage at an investment platform

16:13

in New York known as Public. He

16:15

said, quote, there's a huge difference between wanting to retire

16:18

at 55 and actually

16:20

retiring at 55. Now,

16:22

it is tempting at this point to

16:24

make light of the numbers because the

16:26

numbers are pretty devastating. So, for instance,

16:28

take this, quote, one recent

16:30

report from Northwestern Mutual found that millennials believe

16:33

they will need 1.65 million

16:35

to retire comfortably. To date,

16:37

however, millennials on average have amassed only $62,600

16:39

in retirement savings. Just

16:43

get to the bottom line in case you haven't done

16:46

the math, quote, that means a retirement gap of more

16:48

than $1.5 million, end quote. So,

16:51

in other words, they say they are

16:53

going to need $1.65 million to retire

16:55

comfortably by their definition, and yet they

16:57

have saved far less than 10% of

16:59

that. Well, I'm not going

17:02

to go further into the data because I think we see

17:04

the big picture already. And frankly, this

17:06

isn't just about millennials. This

17:08

is about millennials in the sense that

17:10

the research is about millennials who say

17:13

they want to retire by, say, age 60, but

17:16

are, frankly, in no financial position to believe that

17:18

that might be possible. But

17:20

nonetheless, it's about the issue of what we

17:22

are made for and what retirement

17:24

means and how that is to fit into

17:27

life according to the Christian worldview. And

17:29

I just want to go back to the fact that this

17:31

can be a problem on the front end of life. Frankly,

17:34

there are too many young adults who aren't adulting to use

17:36

the bad English, but a very telling word.

17:38

They're simply not growing up. They're not working.

17:42

God made us to work. And

17:44

I speak particularly to the

17:46

fact that God made us in His image and

17:48

gave us an assignment. And in Scripture, this comes

17:50

first of all in the fact that He gave

17:52

to the man And the Woman in

17:55

the Garden the mandate of dominion, which is

17:57

to be fruitful and multiply and fill the

17:59

earth.. And we are to work.

18:01

We are to do things or to

18:04

exercise that dominion. And that doesn't mean

18:06

work. It means location. That. Was

18:08

a key development during the Protestant Reformation

18:10

where he had the Reformer say you

18:12

know As it turns out, Every.

18:15

Single one of us should understand we

18:17

have a vocation from God and Martin

18:19

Luther, the Great Reformer, went so far

18:21

as to say you're There are people

18:23

who want to see as the Roman

18:25

Catholic Church clearly taught that the main

18:27

division is between those who are the

18:29

spiritual working in the priesthood or say,

18:32

monks in a monastery or nuns and

18:34

a nunnery. And then they were the

18:36

common people. Martin Luther said this. He

18:38

said the milkmaid is just as called

18:40

to her work as his. I'll.

18:42

Use my language, the preacher of the

18:44

Word of God. So the Protestant Reformation

18:46

dignified work and also made very clear

18:48

the biblical principles that there is to

18:50

be a tie between work and reward,

18:52

that is this a labor and income

18:54

and that it is a good thing

18:56

to build the community by exercising that

18:58

dimension of the dominion the God has

19:00

given to us. And that's why people

19:02

talk about the Protestant work ethic and

19:04

point to the United States has evidence

19:06

of how the Protestant work ethic works.

19:08

And there's a reason why. were you

19:10

have an economy where the majority. Of

19:13

people understood that adulthood is to

19:15

be tied to constructive work in

19:17

the society is a reason why

19:19

those societies work and other societies

19:21

that have a much looser relationship

19:23

between labour and reward. Don't.

19:25

Work. And by don't work, I mean. Literally.

19:28

Don't. Work Now in. When says or talking

19:30

about here is really only made possible

19:32

in the modern age. We're talking about

19:35

a very modern picture in which people

19:37

enter the workforce at a certain age

19:39

and when I mean by this being

19:41

a new situation is historically contingent. Just

19:43

think about the fact that the majority

19:45

people majority boys in particular got to

19:47

do with their dads did As the

19:49

father was a blacksmith, they became Blacks

19:51

are so much so that this often

19:53

became the surname by which a family

19:55

was known. There wasn't much economic mobility,

19:57

people were. moving from one class

20:00

to another. If you were

20:02

a blacksmith, your son was a

20:04

blacksmith. And furthermore, in an agrarian

20:06

society, everybody worked on the farm.

20:08

And by everybody, eventually that meant

20:10

everybody, mom, dad, the children, all

20:12

put to work for the glory

20:14

of God in the context of

20:16

making a farm work. We're in

20:18

a situation now in which in

20:20

the industrialized age, in the age

20:22

of a modern industrial or post-industrial

20:24

economy, you have people going to

20:26

work. Now there are huge issues

20:28

here. For one thing, you

20:30

have the basic question, is there a difference between

20:32

men and women? That is one of

20:35

the big issues the biblical worldview answers

20:37

pretty clearly, but our modern age has

20:39

confused pretty pervasively. It raises other

20:41

questions. What about children? Should they be put

20:43

to work? Well, there

20:45

was a very, very strong moral judgment

20:48

made. I think very consistent with biblical

20:50

Christianity, so much so that the evangelical

20:52

churches were on the front lines of

20:54

arguing that children should not be forced

20:56

into labor. But now we have

20:58

a situation in which I think we can understand

21:00

there needs to be some kind of correction because

21:03

there are an awful lot of children who, quite

21:05

honestly, in their late 20s or early

21:08

30s still aren't working all that much.

21:10

Furthermore, I'm of a generation that can

21:13

remember that as a teenager, I had

21:15

my first job and you know what?

21:17

I learned very fast how the work

21:19

ethic works. Robbing teenagers in that

21:21

kind of experience doesn't help the society. It

21:23

doesn't help those individuals, which is why you

21:25

look at a state like California just making

21:28

now fast food restaurants pay $20

21:30

an hour. Basically, that's going to cut teenagers out. I

21:33

think that's going to be a very

21:35

dangerous thing for the entire society. That

21:37

then raises the question about retirement. After

21:39

all, this news story is one prompted by

21:41

the fact that you have a

21:44

majority, or at least a plurality of

21:46

millennials saying that they want to retire

21:48

by age 60. Is that right or

21:50

is that wrong? Well, I'll simply

21:52

say this. It would be absolutely wrong

21:54

to say from a Christian perspective that there is an

21:56

age at which all of a sudden we're just to

21:58

expect to disengage from work. As.

22:00

A matter of fact, there's nothing in

22:02

the biblical worldview about retiring from making

22:04

a contribution. Now we understand that doesn't

22:06

mean you're supposed to hold your job

22:09

into your eighties or nineties as.the point?

22:11

what it does mean is that in

22:13

the Kingdom of Christ we are to

22:15

be deployed in some sense working for

22:17

the glory of God and for the

22:19

extension of a Kingdom of Christ or

22:21

the up building of the church. Regardless

22:23

of our age, christians should understand that

22:25

the question of retirement isn't a question

22:27

of just stopping work and entering into

22:29

a long period of leisure. It

22:31

is taking advantage of the fact that

22:33

we're no longer tied to a specific

22:35

job, where the and to make a

22:37

contribution and many other ways. It doesn't

22:40

mean that you expect a seventy year

22:42

old to work in the same context

22:44

according to the same schedule, with the

22:46

same expectations of a forty year old,

22:48

much less a twenty year old. It

22:50

is to say that in the Kingdom

22:52

of Christ we recognize that we are

22:55

all workers together in the fields of

22:57

the Lord. Your The sad thing about

22:59

this Usa Do article about. The Millennials

23:01

and against the Millennials are alone in

23:03

this. This article just happens to can

23:05

a single them out for their expectations.

23:07

The expectation seems to be that leisure

23:09

is what we are made for and

23:11

work is the imposition. The Biblical worldview

23:13

actually says the opposite. By the way,

23:15

the Biblical worldview does not say no

23:18

to leisure is the Christian worldview that

23:20

understands that our leisure is also a

23:22

part of what it means to live

23:24

to the glory of God. And

23:26

to seek the glory of God

23:28

in all things, there is not

23:30

only nothing wrong as everything right

23:32

with fishing in a creek or

23:34

enjoying a hobby, or doing any

23:36

number of things that might reflect

23:38

leisure. But what leisure does not

23:41

mean is the reputation of work.

23:43

There is something for all of

23:45

us to do. There's a vocation

23:47

for all of us, and you

23:49

know what? That vocation is not

23:51

lesser if it does mean milking

23:53

the cow is Luther said of

23:55

the. milkmaid and her calling and

23:57

we're in a society in which

24:00

Quite frankly, growing up into work or

24:02

failing to do so seems

24:04

to go right hand in hand

24:06

with failing to grow up into

24:08

other responsibilities as well, including marriage

24:10

and parenthood. Oh, and on the

24:12

other side of that, let me point out that

24:15

a parent's job is absolutely never done. There are

24:17

seasons of life and there are

24:19

blessings and challenges to every season of

24:21

life. And I can say as a

24:23

grandfather, and I'll say this with the

24:25

complete support of my wife, as a

24:27

grandmother, there is nothing sweeter than being

24:29

in the situation in which you see.

24:32

The deployment at this stage of life as

24:34

grandparents is even sweeter than we could

24:36

have imagined. The idea that somehow all

24:38

work means is an economy squeezing something

24:41

out of us until we decide it's

24:43

not going to squeeze us anymore. The

24:46

idea that that's what life is all about and

24:48

that's what work means is just foreign to the

24:50

biblical worldview. You know, I think

24:52

Jesus speaks so powerfully to this in John

24:54

chapter 9 when he says we must

24:56

work the works of him who sent me while it is

24:59

day. Night is coming

25:01

when no man can work. And

25:03

so until that final night

25:05

comes, there is good work

25:08

for all of us as Christians to do.

25:10

That transforms the equation. It also changes

25:12

the way we look at the headlines.

25:15

Thanks for listening to the briefing. For more

25:17

information, go to my website at albertmogler.com. You

25:19

can follow me on Twitter by going to

25:21

twitter.com/ albertmogler. For information on the

25:24

Southern Baptist Theological Cemetery, go to spts.edu.

25:27

For information on Weiss College, just go to

25:29

weisscollege.com. We'll meet

25:31

you again tomorrow for the briefing.