Showing posts with label Work. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Work. Show all posts

Saturday, July 31, 2021

Mining the Minors: Amos (26)

In Genesis 3, when God cursed the ground on account of Adam, he assured Adam — and all those to be born of Adam — that under this new order of affairs which man had brought upon the world, his efforts to feed himself and his family would for the foreseeable future be accompanied by pain and sweat.

Naturally, being what he is, fallen man has spent the better part of the next six millennia trying to find ways to do an end-around God’s edict.

Saturday, February 29, 2020

Time and Chance (25)

As I write this, I haven’t had breakfast yet. I will shortly. There’s food in the fridge, and money in the bank if I opt to step out for a bite.

That covers this morning, and this afternoon, and maybe even the rest of this week. However, if I were to stop going to work, I would have a problem before long. The refrigerator would be empty, and the bank balance would dwindle until it hit rock bottom.

Saturday, February 15, 2020

Time and Chance (23)

Work is not in itself a product of the Fall. God made man to “have dominion”. Even ruling is not a passive undertaking; it requires doing something from time to time. God put Adam in the Garden of Eden not to be a man of leisure but “to work it and keep it”. Apparently it would not keep itself, even in an unfallen world. There is no suggestion this was in any way unpleasant, but it was man’s lot up until the Fall.

However, when Adam sinned, God declared, “By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread.” Work got a whole lot harder. The word “pain” appears for the first time in the respective curses. This was the new “lot” of mankind, and coming to grips with it required serious reflection.

Back in Ecclesiastes 5, the Preacher has given it some.

Saturday, January 25, 2020

Time and Chance (20)

One thing I have neglected to point out over the last two weeks of posts in this series is that the first seven verses of chapter 5 of Ecclesiastes are different from everything that has come before them. They are the very first commands we have encountered in the Preacher’s writing.

Everything up to this point has been description; the Preacher looking around at his world and telling us what he observes in the absence of divine revelation, most of which he finds disappointing and confusing. But chapter 5 commences with a short series of what we might call prescriptions. The Preacher has actually begun to issue the occasional instruction. “Guard your steps,” he says. “Be not rash with your mouth. Let your words be few. Do not delay in fulfilling your vows.”

Saturday, December 28, 2019

Time and Chance (16)

We all know people who we think work too hard. But what is “too hard” really? If we are honest, it’s a bit of a subjective call.

John the Baptist got by on locusts and wild honey, and was happy with one coat of camel’s hair and a leather belt. It’s pretty clear he didn’t have a day job. The Son of Man had nowhere to lay his head, and while he certainly labored non-stop, it was not with a view to acquiring earthly possessions. Still, nowhere in scripture do we find the expectation that all should live life the way Jesus or John lived. In fact, one of the reasons both John and the Lord Jesus were morally free to devote their lives to their respective missions was that they had incurred no earthly financial obligations to others.

For most of us, life is a bit more complicated. Not better, necessarily, but certainly more complicated.

Saturday, December 21, 2019

Time and Chance (15)

The expression “keeping up with the Joneses” may have originated with the 1913 comic strip of the same name, but more likely was coined in reference to a family of mid-19th century New York bankers known for their conspicuous consumption.

Either way, it means envy. If my neighbors have one, then I must have one too ... and preferably a bigger, better and glossier model. And to keep consuming, I need more money.

Solomon had this figured out long before there were any Joneses to keep up with.

Saturday, November 16, 2019

Time and Chance (10)

What does it mean that God has “put eternity into man’s heart”? The statement is baffling and comprehensible in near-equal parts.

It is impossible to imagine mere human beings are capable of any substantive grasp of the transcendent or even the nature of our own being. That’s the baffling part. We are not fully equipped to understand ourselves, let alone anything more significant. We are more animals than angels: tiny, exceedingly finite beings concerned primarily with matters of comparative trivia.

The comprehensible part is that on some undefined level we all understand that the Preacher’s statement is true. We know it because we feel it.

Saturday, November 02, 2019

Time and Chance (8)

Christians work not just because we are commanded to, or because we enjoy it, or because we think toil is intrinsically meritorious. We work because work serves a higher purpose.

One example: the apostle Paul reminded the Thessalonians, “[W]e worked night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, while we proclaimed to you the gospel of God.” Paul, Silvanus and Timothy were deeply concerned about the example they set for the people to whom they preached, and so they labored ceaselessly to make sure their actions were consistent with their words, and thus validated the principles and precepts they taught.

They did this, Paul says, out of affectionate desire. Their hearts were full of love, and so their toil was joyful and purposeful rather than vain and frustrating.

In this, Christians are more than a little unusual.

Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Eden: Take This Job and Love It

We’ve been considering some of the things we can see about the character of God as they appear for us in a pre-sin moment in Eden. Eden uniquely provides an unhindered look into the relationship God wants between Himself and His creation.

First, we considered that God is shown in Eden to be primarily a God of unfettered fellowship; that He desired to share knowledge of Himself with humanity and that humanity was unashamed in the full presence of their Creator.

Second, we considered that God revealed Himself in the first moments of time to be a God who loves to bless and wants to be known as a rewarder of those who seek Him.

The third thing of note then is this. Adam and Eve had something you and I crave: They had worthwhile work.

Rather foolishly, when I have been having a tough day on the job and finding my efforts unsuccessful, I have wistfully said to someone who was listening — and ideally there wasn’t anybody listening — “Well, you know, work is a curse”.

But I was wrong then and you’d be wrong to think it now. Work isn’t a curse.