Sermon Tone Analysis

*Introduction*

This is labor day weekend and many are away travelling getting the last little bit of holiday before the September starts.

In just a couple of days students will go back to school to get an education so they can get a better job, and adults will go back to work to help pay for their children’s college and university so their children can get a better job than they are working at.

I want to minister to you this morning from the word of God about our lives and the work place.

Before I do that though I thought I might share a few little stories I came across.

This first one is for the students in our midst.

This is advice from Bill Gates for Students.

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*Rules for the Real World* \\ \\

In Bill Gates’ book Business @ The Speed of Thought, he lays out 11 rules that students do not learn in high school or college, but should.

He argues that our feel-good, politically correct teachings have created a generation of kids with no concept of reality who are set up for failure in the real world.

\\ \\ *RULE 1* - Life is not fair; get used to it.

\\ *RULE 2* - The world won’t care about your self-esteem.

The  world will expect you to accomplish something /BEFORE/ you feel good about yourself.

\\ *RULE 3* - You will NOT make 40 thousand dollars a year right out of high school.

You won’t be a vice-president with a car phone, until you earn both a high school and college degree.

\\ *RULE 4* - If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.

He doesn’t have tenure.

\\ *RULE 5*- Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity.

Your grandparents had a different word for burger-flipping;they called it opportunity.

\\ *RULE 6* - If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine about your mistakes; learn from them.

\\ *RULE 7* - Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they are now.

They got that way from paying your bills; cleaning your clothes and listening to you talk about how cool you are.

So before you save the rain forest from the parasites of your parents’ generation, try "delousing" the clothes in your own room.

\\ *RULE 8* - Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life has not.

In some schools they have abolished failing grades; they will let you try as many times as you want to get the right answer.

This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.

\\ *RULE 9* - Life is not divided into semesters.

You don’t get summers off and very few employers are interested in helping you find yourself.

Do that on your own time.

\\ *RULE 10* - Television is NOT real life.

In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop to go to their jobs.

\\ *RULE 11* - Be nice to nerds.

Chances are you’ll end up working for one.

Ok Now here is one for those of you who have graduated from the school of Higher Education to the School of life and are working.

You may have just started working and like many have discovered you have to start at the bottom and work your way up, or perhaps you have been working and have made it to a management position.

Either way, there is something for everybody in this one.

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*You Must Be A ...* \\ A man in a hot air balloon realized he was lost.

He reduced altitude and spotted a woman below.

He descended a bit more and shouted, "Excuse me, can you help me?

I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don’t know where I am."

The woman below replied, "You’re in a hot air balloon hovering approximately 30 feet above the ground.

You’re between 40 and 41 degrees north latitude and between 59 and 60 degrees west longitude."

\\ \\ "You must be an engineer," said the balloonist.

"I am," replied the woman, "How did you know?" "Well," answered the balloonist, "everything you told me is, technically correct, but I’ve no idea what to make of your information, and the fact is I’m still lost.

Frankly, you’ve not been much help at all.

If anything, you’ve delayed my trip."

\\ \\ The woman below responded, "You must be in Management." "I am," replied the balloonist, "but how did you know?" "Well," said the woman, "you don’t know where you are or where you’re going.

You have risen to where you are due to a large quantity of hot air.

You made a promise, which you’ve no idea how to keep, and you expect people beneath you to solve your problems.

The fact is you are in exactly the same position you were in before we met, but now, somehow, it’s my fault."

And then finally, this is one of my favorites about…

*/(Illustration)/*

*Work Bones* \\ Someone has written that there are four kinds of bones in the world.

The */WISH BONES/* who spend their time wishing someone else would do the work; The */JAW BONES/* who do all the talking, but very little else; The */KNUCKLE BONES/* who knock everything that anyone else is trying to do; The */BACK BONES/* who shoulder the load and do the work.

Which one are you?

Do you enjoy your job?

Do you look forward to Monday mornings so you can see the boss?

Do you miss your fellow workers so much that you can’t wait be together again?

Well if you are like the “average Joe or Susan,” statistics say that 65 % of people do not like their jobs.

They simply go to work because it’s “I owe, I owe, it’s off to work I go!”

Many of these same people if they were honest would tell you that they are unhappy and their life feels like it has no sense of purpose.

But I want to remind  you of some things from the word of God that if you are one of those in the 65% category, it might help you to begin to see and realize your job is an opportunity to fulfill God’s purpose for your life.

*It’s All Sacred*

a.

Many try to divide life into sacred and secular

b.

There are two primary problems with this

                                  i.