Last March as our family sat around the kitchen table on
Dad’s birthday, we talked about why we were thankful for our father. Everyone chimed in with something sweet, and
many of our remarks centered on one concept:
work.
From cows and chickens, to pigs and sheep, to ducks and
turkeys—my parents have raised just about every farm animal imaginable. And planted a garden—one that stretched
endlessly to the eyes of a seven-year-old weeding it. Summer days included some time for play, but found
us mostly at work—watering trees, baling hay, picking raspberries and corn, or
completing any number of other tasks.
Work was always a way of life for us, and it’s important to
God, as well. In fact, when God set Adam
and Eve in the garden, He commanded them to keep it—to work tending it. First Thessalonians reminds us that we are to
study—to labor, to strive, to vie—to “work with [our] own hands.”
Once a missionary visited my parents’ home for close to a
week. We children marveled at his work
ethic, for he seemed never to stop applying his hand to some endeavor. At the dinner table, he explained his
secret: “I find it relaxing to work at
different tasks,” he told us. “When I
have exhausted myself splitting wood outside, for example,” he explained, “I’ll
go in and study my Hebrew Bible.” Thus
he found himself continually employed in labor but simultaneously refreshed.
I’ve often thought of that missionary’s words. Relaxation isn’t necessarily the absence of
work; it may be a different task, but it may still be work.
As believers, we ought to carefully apply ourselves to working
with our hands. According to commentator David Guzik, “Manual labor was despised by ancient
Greek culture. They thought that the better a man was, the less he should work.
In contrast, God gave us a carpenter King, fisherman apostles, and tent-making
missionaries.”
As in Thessalonica, modern Americans often despise
work. Many spend hours on video games,
social media, and the like, foregoing important responsibilities and forgetting
work that needs completion. As Christian
women, working with our own hands should be part of our daily reality.
The right hand is often pictured throughout the Scriptures
as a source of strength. I am
right-handed and love to consider the words of Psalm 121:5— “the LORD is [my] . .
. shade upon [my] right hand.” As I complete
my many tasks, God is there. His shade provides
perfect rest that can soothe and cool me in the heat of the day, in the midst of
the conflicts of life. And yet how easy
it is to go at our tasks alone, unaware of this abiding presence of our
God. How wonderful to realize that we
can bask in the shade of His goodness and strength as we complete the work He
has ordained!
But sometimes those tasks seem
confusing. At what responsibilities should
we most endeavor? Which are more important? Less important? Not important? What of the duties that others seem to throw
upon us? First Corinthians 11:3 alludes
to the simplicity that is present in Christ.
When we find ourselves overwhelmed with the complexity of life's work, we
may have missed that clarifying simplicity.
Christ’s simplicity is reflected
in the words of Matthew 4:19, “And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will
make you fishers of men.” Understanding
that following Jesus results in our being fishers of men will help other
jobs find perspective.
Evangelist Mark Cahill explains it
this way: “Life is very simple. The
world complicates it.” In a sermon
entitled “Watchmen on the Wall,” Cahill says, “I stand at the front door before
I walk out [each day] and I say, ‘God the Father, I’m all Yours today. Order my steps. Move me …how you want to move me…” And He asks God to use him. Mark has countless stories of amazing
spiritual conversations he’s had with people about Jesus. People he’s met as he’s gone about his daily
work—in hotels, on airplanes, at restaurants.
Early this January, I realized that
even though I might consider myself a hard worker in the physical and academic
sense of the word, I’d failed to embrace the call of “fisher of men” upon my
life. While I didn’t waste time at many
things, I’d failed to completely embrace the reality that every day I could do
something to win lost souls for Jesus.
So I decided that, by God’s grace,
I was going to go into the world each day looking for someone with whom I could
share Christ. I determined, by God’s
grace, to seek to have a spiritual conversation with at least one individual
each day. This decision has had a
remarkable influence upon me in the past few months. I have found that understanding this one purpose
has marked my daily Bible reading with passion, for I crave God’s influence
upon me and His power through me. Surrendering
my all to Him has helped me be aware of others and brought me to a more regular
habit of praying in the Spirit, for without Him I can do nothing. And I am finding that living with the reality
that lost souls are all around me is bringing incredible clarity concerning the
labor of my hands.
Shopping has become an opportunity
to look for lost souls and to demonstrate the compassion of Christ. Work, which is good and ordained of God, can be
properly placed so that it does not consume me to the point that I lack time to
remind others of eternity. In fact, my
every endeavor can be filtered through the lens that every person will meet an
eternal destiny. Laboring with other
believers offers moments to edify. Working alongside the unsaved provides
opportunities to see them reached for Christ.
Psalm 90:17 expresses beautifully
a prayer we can offer to God concerning our every endeavor: “And let the beauty of the LORD our God be
upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our
hands establish thou it.” We can work,
but only God can establish everything we do. How amazing to realize that as we
labor daily, God’s beauty can be upon us!
That beauty of Christ is so necessary in winning a lost world to Him! The
world and other believers can see Jesus reflected through us as we perceive
that following Christ means fishing for men.
In all we do, in every task at which we work, let us labor,
understanding our call to the work of our blessed Master!
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