September 4, 2020
This Monday we Americans celebrate Labor Day. Until doing a search on the Internet, I couldn’t have told you that the first Monday in September has been a national holiday since President Grover Cleveland signed it into law on June 28, 1894. Work has changed a lot over the past 126 years! So much work now takes place online, or at home, or in the gig economy, or in the sharing economy, or in a plethora of new jobs that no one could have imagined in 1894 - or even in 1994 as the internet was just beginning to connect the world. Think how much COVID alone has changed the ways some people work.
But one thing has not changed: what God thinks about work. The Bible has much to say about labor, and we ignore it to the dishonor of our Creator and Redeemer, and to our own sorrow.
Work is not a result of the fall into sin. Genesis 1-2 teach us clearly that Adam and Eve worked in the Garden of Eden before Satan tempted them to rebel against their Maker (Genesis 2:15). God commanded Adam and Eve to fill the earth and subdue it, and to have dominion over all creatures (Genesis 1:28). I love how John Murray expounds this dominion mandate: “When we consider the manifold ways in which the earth is fashioned and equipped to meet and gratify the diverse nature and endowments of man, we can catch a glimpse of the vastness and variety of the task involved in subduing the earth, a task directed toward the end of developing man’s nature, gifts, interests, and powers in engagement with the resources deposited by God in the earth and the sea” (Principles of Conduct, 37). For God’s glory and his own good mankind was made to work, imitating his Maker, as we see implied in the Sabbath ordinance of Genesis 2:1-3. So we must recognize that work is a blessing, not a curse; it is part of the “very good” of Genesis 1:31. Manual labor and mundane labor are not undignified, and the wide variety of our various callings is built into the very fabric of our humanity.
Work is difficult because of the fall into sin. After Adam sinned, God cursed the arena of man’s work (Genesis 3:17-19). Now the creation works against us, and thorns and thistles are our constant companion. Work is hard, sweaty, toilsome, painful, and frustrating. Things fall apart. Futility sets in. Not only is the arena of work affected by the fall, but we workers have been impacted as well. Our motivations have been skewed by sin: we struggle with discontentment, envy, working merely for the weekend or retirement, or just to get rich. Sometimes we are just plain lazy. We bow down to the idol of comfort and convenience. Professor Murray helps us again: “The Christian ethic strikes not only at conspicuous idleness; it strikes also at the sloth, the laziness, which is too frequently the vice of professing Christians. It strikes at the dissipation of time and energy of which we all must plead guilty. The principle that too often dictates our practice is not the maximum of toil but the minimum necessary to escape public censure and preserve our decency” (Principles of Conduct, 85). At other times we make work itself an idol, seeking our identity and satisfaction in our accomplishments on the job, being ruled by our callings rather than by the one who has called us to them.
We are still called to work. In spite of our fallen nature, work is still a part of our calling as humans - and as Christians. The creation mandates have not been revoked. Work, though hard, is still a blessing. We only eat as we toil and labor. “If anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat,” writes Paul in II Thessalonians 3:10. We are to make it our ambition to lead a quiet life and attend to our own business and work with our hands, so that we will behave properly toward outsiders and not be in any need (I Thessalonians 4:11-12). We are also to work so that we will have something to share with the one who is has need (Ephesians 4:28; see I Timothy 5:8).
We must work in the ways God tells us to work. God’s word tells us how we as redeemed sinners in Jesus Christ are to approach our work. Here are just a few of God’s instructions for His people:
1) Work six days, and rest one. The fourth commandment is still binding upon God’s people, though the day of rest has changed to the first day of the week in light of the resurrection of Jesus from the dead on that day. We are commanded to work - in all its forms, whether at our places of employment or around the house - for six days, and then to take that blessed God-given day off from work to remember His mercies in the gospel alone with Him and together with His people.
2) Work for Jesus. “Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. It is the Lord Christ whom you serve” (Colossians 3:23-24). Jesus is our ultimate boss. So whether anyone recognizes or notices our work, we know that He sees it all - thus we strive to please Him in all we do (I Corinthians 10:31).
3) Work with all your might. “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might…” (Ecclesiastes 9:10). Whatever God has called you to do, glorify Him in it by doing it to the very best of your ability. If you have retired from your lifelong employment, ask the Lord to how you how you might continue to be used of Him to be a blessing to your neighbors and your brothers and sisters in the church.
One of the tragedies of the pandemic of 2020 has been the number of people in our country who have lost their jobs or seen their hours reduced. Many who want to work are not able to do so. As you enjoy your holiday this Monday, continue to pray for God to provide us and our neighbors with work, the ability to work, the will to work, and the skills to work. Pray that God might continue to use the labor of man to give us what we need and what we enjoy. Pray that we as His people would show forth the goodness of labor in all that we do, so that we might bring forth honor to our Savior, and the fruit of our labor for the benefit of our fellow image-bearers.