“And you yourself must be an example to them by doing good works of every kind. Let everything you do reflect the integrity and seriousness of your teaching.”

An entrepreneur whom I advise described how he thinks about his work.  He said that he thinks of his work as “play” but with all the seriousness of playing chess.  Great chess players must take their game seriously at all times (did you see The Queen’s Gambit?).  But yet, at the same time they enjoy playing the game.  It’s an interesting way to balance how we think about our work and jobs.  Can we approach them as “play” knowing that what we are putting our time and energy into has to be done with all seriousness to be the best we can be?

And so we can have joy and fun in life, but never forget the seriousness of our faith.  When we get this right, our lives are abundant and we find that there is balance within what we do, how we do it and what we receive from our efforts.  This also says to me that the more serious we are about our teaching, and applying it to how we work and live we can feel more like our work and life is an enjoyment, like “play”.

Yes, seriously!

Reference:  Titus 2:7 (New Living Translation)