Where's the worth in work

Where's the worth in work?
Genesis 1-3; Colossians 3.22-4.1
21 October 2001, Milford Baptist

Tomorrow is Labour Day, the day when we celebrate our labour, our work, by abstaining from work. When I was working as a lawyer, friends used to delight in sending me demeaning jokes about lawyers. Here's a sampling from an email that one friend sent me...

Did you hear about the terrorists who took a whole courtroom full of lawyers hostage? They threatened to release one every hour until their demands were met.

How many lawyers does it take to screw in a light bulb? Three. One to climb the ladder, one to shake it, and one to sue the ladder company.

What are lawyers good for? They make politicians look good.

If a lawyer and a politician were both drowning, and you could save only one of them, would you go to lunch or read the paper?

What do dinosaurs and decent lawyers have in common? They're both extinct.

What's the difference between a mosquito and a lawyer? One is a bloodsucking parasite; the other is an insect.

We joke about work, but it's a pretty serious matter. Work takes up a large chunk of our time, our lives. They used to say that the average person spends a third of their life sleeping, a third resting and a third working. That's changing. The average worker now has about only 13 hours of discretionary time, free time, per month. That's only three to four hours a week for leisure. Now some of us are retired, others are unemployed or underemployed, but we still work. Whether its cooking a roast, or filling out tax returns, whether it's looking for paid work, or painting an oil colour, or running a friend to the doctor, we're working. We might not be paid for it, but we all work. We can't help it. And my question this morning is this: how do you feel about that? What do you think about work?

A curse or a chore?

For many people, work is a curse, a tragic and tedious consequence of the Fall. Work is something to be avoided, if at all possible, like envelopes with white powder or telemarketers at tea-time. There's nothing new about that. This attitude goes way back. In the classical period work was generally held in disdain: the city-state of Sparta, for example, even forbade its citizens from engaging in manual labour.

For many of us, work might not be a "curse," but we can often regard it as a meaningless chore. In the medieval period a hierarchy developed. Spiritual work - work in monasteries -was thought to be significant. But ordinary work in society was thought to have no lasting significance or meaning. "In modern society," Jaques Ellul said, "work has no meaning."

These ideas have certainly influenced contemporary Christian attitudes towards work. Don't we tend to prioritise different types of work? We exalt those professions that have obvious direct impact for the kingdom of God. Fulltime missionary work tops the list, doesn't it? And this is followed (in descending order of Christian value) by the people-helping professions (doctors and teachers), and then by intellectual and creative work, which is in turn considered more worthy than physical or manual work. Business, which can be "dirty," is near the very bottom of our unspoken list. At the very bottom are those questionable occupations, like law.

According to this view, the work of "Christian ministry" is valuable. It lasts forever. But most ordinary work in society has no lasting value. This sort of work is just a means to an end. For some of us, work is a means of survival. Have you seen the bumper sticker, "I owe, I owe, so off to work I go"? That's us. Or for others of us, work might be one of the primary means for establishing our sense of identity, (because we know that the very first question at a party is usually not, "How do you do?" but "What do you do?") And then, of course, we often see work as being just a means of enabling us to do what we really want to do? One law firm in town has the motto, "We work hard, so we can play hard." And for the more "spiritual" among us, work might be a means of freeing us for ministry in our discretionary time. But it's still just a means to an end.

Is this an adequate, or biblical or Christian, view of work? Let's listen to the timeless word of God. How does it answer these three questions: what is work, why do we work, and how should we work?

What is work?

First up, what is work? The Bible opens with God working. Turn with me to the first chapter of Genesis. We see him speaking, designing, crafting, and sculpting. God makes light and matter and space and time and sea and land and creatures. And finally, he makes human beings in his image: read Gen 2.26-28. Contrary to what most people think, the world was not made for humans, but humans were made for the world. We were not designed to dominate the whole of creation, but to make the whole of creation flourish.

But then the story takes a tragic twist. In chapter 3 we discover that our work has been cursed because of our sin, our self-centredness. Read 3.16-19. We see that there is now injustice (16), and pain and toil (17), and frustration (18), and sweat and futility (19). The Fall has turned some work into meaningless drudgery, but work itself is not a consequence of the Fall; work is the consequence of our creation in the image of God. Work is not a curse, it's a blessing (2.28): "God blessed them and said, 'Be fruitful...'" Work is good (2.31): "God saw all that he had made, and it was very good." So to dream of a workless paradise, to see retirement as a workless reward, is to seek something other than the purpose of God. What is work? Work is a blessing, not a curse.

Why do we work?

But this now leads us to the "why" question. Whether we're a pilot or a programmer, a manager or a labourer, a consultant or an accountant, a lawyer or a teacher, what is the good of working? Obviously work has some extrinsic value. It puts bread on the table. It enables us to help others, by sharing our excesses and paying our taxes. But does it have any value in itself? We tend to see the people-helping professions as having intrinsic value. But what about business or housework? Making a product, flying a plane, cleaning a carpet? Does this sort of work have any value or significance in itself?

You bet it does! Whether we're splicing a gene or collecting rubbish, sending a probe into space or putting a meal on the table, interviewing refugees or fixing a car, writing poems or planting roses, we are God's co-workers. Like Adam and Eve, we are engaging in God's work of making his world work, making his garden flourish. And so, like Adam and Eve, we are all priests or ministers. Through our work, whether it is in the church, at the office, in the playground or the kitchen, we are touching people and places - we are loving them - on behalf of God, and we are touching God - praying to God - on behalf of those people and places. Whether we realise it or not, we are all in full-time ministry, or service, for the Lord. "Ministry" is not just what some people do on Wednesday nights or Sunday mornings. It's something we all do, all through the week, whether we're young or old, active or retired, employed or unemployed. Our work is holy. It's significant. We can all rejoice in our work, whatever we do.

How should we work?

But that brings us to the third question. As Christians how should we work? The Apostle Paul gives some clues in his first letter to the Christians at Colossae. Turn with me to Colossians 3.22. Admittedly, Paul is talking to slaves, and we're not slaves. But in the ancient world slaves were generally treated with respect, like tenured employees. So what Paul says to Christian slaves, applies to us, as workers. Read Col 3.22-4.1.

Have you seen the advertisement for Steinlager Beer on television? Its catchy lines go: "Dance like nobody's watching. Love like you've never been hurt. Work like you own the business." That's what Paul says: Work like you own the business. In everything, obey your bosses with a sincere heart (22). Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart (23). In other words, work honestly and heartily. As my dad used to say, "Don't just do the minimum requirement," but give it your best shot. And Paul gives three reasons for this

First, he says, give it your best shot because the Lord is watching you (22). Unlike your bosses, God's eye is always in you. There was a man who took an interest in an addition to a shopping mall. This man would often stop and watch the activity. He was especially impressed by the conscientious work of a man who was operating a large piece of equipment. One day, after watching the operator for a while, the man told this guy how much he'd enjoying watching his scrupulous work. Looking somewhat stunned, the operator replied, "You mean you're not the supervisor?!" Paul implies here that the Lord is our supervisor, watching us all the time.

The second reason why these slaves should give 100% is that, Paul says, the Lord has appointed you (23-24). Paul says to these slaves, whatever you do work as though you were "working for the Lord, not for human masters" (23) because "it is the Lord Christ you are serving" (24). Amid the grind, we have a glimpse of glory. Although our work might sometimes seem meaningless and insignificant, we are actually serving God in our everyday tasks. He is our "Lord," our employer. We're working for him.

So Paul urges these slaves to give their work 100% because the Lord is watching them, because the Lord has appointed them, and thirdly because the Lord will repay them (24-25): "You know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward." The Lord will repay us for the good we do and the wrong we do. Our reward for our work comes not just in this life, but the next life. Our final pay cheque, our biggest pay cheque, comes from God. He is our supervisor, our employer, our paymaster.

A Copernican revolution?

In 1530 Nicolas Copernicus published a scientific treatise that shook the western world. Until that time people had believed that the earth was the centre of the universe around which the sun moved. Copernicus asserted that the sun was the centre, and that the earth actually orbited around the sun. This caused an extraordinary revolution in our understanding of the world.

We need a Copernican revolution in our understanding of work. Work is not a curse, but a blessing, a good gift from God. And all work is valuable and significant. Whether it is paid or unpaid, whether we are at home or in the office, whether we are active or retired, whether we are in church or society, the work that we do is a holy ministry or service for God. And so in all our work, whatever we do, let's give it our very best, because we are working for the Lord Jesus, we are working for an eternal pay cheque.

Only one life

'twill soon be past;
only what's done
for Jesus will last.

Questions

1. Alexander Schmemann said of the Genesis story, "Man [meaning men and women] was created priest of the world, the one who offers the world to God in a sacrifice of love and praise, and who bestows the divine love upon the world." Do you agree that in our work, whatever we are doing, we are priests serving God?

2. Do you think that your work, whether it is paid or unpaid, is significant? How significant?

3. "The work of "the ministry" is not greater than the ministry of work." What do you think?

4. How is our work a point of real connection with God. How might it be a "spiritual discipline"?

5. In the Old Testament the Levites had a compulsory retirement age of fifty, but thereafter they served as mentors for younger people. If you are in or nearing retirement, how do you intend to use the opportunities it provides to keep working?

6. A survey in North America about the attitude and performance of workers revealed that Christians were not the best workers. Their focus was often elsewhere. What about yours? In what ways do you fail to work honestly and wholeheartedly?