A “Labor Day” Article
Today is Labor Day, September 2, 2013, a day on which we celebrate the American, working class. Labor Day Weekend is typically marked by a number of celebrations. At the top of the list is that much-deserved day off of work. This often includes Labor Day sales, outdoor festivities, and the liberal consumption of food and football. While Christians certainly appreciate the break from work, many are still left wondering:
What significance does my 9-to-5, workaday world job really have in God’s plans?
Because such thinking can lead to apathy concerning our work (and even despair), this is a relevant question, both for laymen and pastors: for laymen because the question directly concerns them, and for pastors because the majority of their congregants are laymen. When we look to Scripture, we learn that all Christians can take a healthy pride in their jobs, whether in pastoring or farming or something else [1]. We see this, first, by looking to how God creates and saves us.
Making Sense of Our Lives
The Bible tells us that God creates each person with unique gifts and talents, interests and personalities, likes and dislikes (cf. Ps. 139:13; Jer. 1:5). These God-designed characteristics form the choices we make, which often lead us to our jobs and careers. Gene Veith writes, “The doctrine of vocation has to do with the mystery of individuality, how God creates each human being to be different from all of the rest and gives each a unique calling in every stage of life” [2]. “God has made us able to work,” adds Albert Mohler, “to fulfill a vocation” [3]. We can believe that what we do in our jobs matters. God creates and directs us with them in mind.
Just as God creates us with our jobs in mind, He saves us with them in mind too. We see this in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. In chapter 2, he caps off a passage concerning our salvation with this statement: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them” (Eph. 2:10). Here Paul explains that God creates and calls us in Jesus Christ for the purpose of walking in good works. In chapter 4, he goes on to “implore [us] to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which [we] have been called” (4:1). As Paul explores in chapters 4-6, this is a call to Christian living in every sphere of life, including (significantly) our jobs.
Several implications follow: First, our callings aren’t our own. Instead, God gives them to us. These callings necessarily include our jobs (which are part of our vocations). In fact, vocation means calling. Therefore, our jobs bear importance, whatever they are (waiter, hairdresser, construction worker, sanitation worker), because God calls us to them in the first place, and He accomplishes His work by our being obedient to His calling. “The doctrine of vocation, though it has to do with human work, is essentially about God’s work and how God works in and through our lives,” writes Veith [4].
Kentucky farmer and author Wendell Berry illustrates this point well in his novel Jayber Crow (2000). Its protagonist is a barber. As he looks back upon his life’s work, he says, “Surely I was called to be a barber.” He then makes this observation: “[I]t looks to me as though I was following a path that was laid out for me . . . and I have this feeling, which never leaves me anymore, that I have been led” [5]. Again, we can take great encouragement in the biblical truth that our jobs have significance in God’s eyes and work. He calls and leads us to them. We need not develop inferiority complexes regarding our jobs, or allow discouragement or despair to plague us. These same jobs have a purpose in God’s plans! And we honor Him by carrying out His sovereign purposes for our lives.
Remembering the Rule of Love
Having established that God’s call on our lives affects even the work sphere, Paul writes, “Walk in love” (5:1). This explains the manner with which and/or the purpose for which we pursue our Christian callings. Paul’s exhortation to “walk in love” is a direct application of the “good works” for which God created and saved us (cf. Eph. 2:10). Here, Paul echoes Jesus’ teaching of the second great commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Mt. 22:39). This “rule of love” concerns how we treat and interact with those around us—at home, church, and (yes!) at work. As we exercise our God-given abilities and talents in our respective vocations, God calls us to love our neighbors within those callings.
Practically then, we should always ask ourselves, “Who is my neighbor at work?” and, “How can I love this person in a Christian manner?” These will include subordinates, co-workers, bosses, customers, and much more. Believers should ask these questions of every person they meet throughout their careers. After all, it is in that context that God provides occasion for us to share His love with people we’d have likely not otherwise met.
Although God calls us to vocation and tells us to practice Christian love towards our neighbors there, we will fall short of our callings at times (cf. Rom. 3:23). Total depravity means total depravity. As original sin has infected everything, even vocation has fallen subject to its poison (cf. Gen. 3). In fact, Veith describes sin as the “violation of one’s calling” [6]. Despite this challenge though, we can respond with faith, prayer, and trust in the sovereign God Who calls us to vocation in the first place.
However, with that said, there are some jobs to which God will never call any of His children—case closed. Such jobs cannot fall under the rubric of biblical vocation as a matter of course, by virtue of their very nature. The reason for this is at least twofold: (1) some jobs will simply fail the rule of love; and (2) as such, these jobs will stand contrary to God’s character of love. Take prostitution as an example. In no scenario could this profession ever be an expression of Christian love and God’s character. I could offer other examples. However, barring this important caveat, God calls His children (collectively the Body of Christ), to all sorts of vocations, including many that we might not expect.
Understanding Our Roles in Church and at Work
When God saves us, He doesn’t call us to solitary existence, but into the Body of His Son, the Church. Again in Ephesians, Paul explains that the Body is one (cf. Eph. 4:4-6). Our singular purpose is to love and serve others in Jesus’ name unto the whole world. Yet this corporate priesthood of all believers (cf. 1 Pet. 2:5-9) is also composed of individuals. Though singular in purpose, we often work separately in our respective callings according to our unique, God-given interests and talents (cf. 1 Cor. 12)—what Veith describes as a “divine division of labor” [7].
Thus God accomplishes His mission, not only through the Church as an institution, but also through the Church as a Body of component parts working within the world and among its people. This is “Christ transforming culture” in every, God-honoring job sector imaginable: in architecture and construction; goods and services; the arts and entertainment; filmmaking, music, and the media; writing and journalism; biotechnology, science, and research; preaching and teaching; local, state, and federal politics and government; and much more [8]. In short, this is part of the “where” of the Great Commission (cf. Mt. 28:18-20).
What does this mean for how we balance our church-lives and our work-lives? It means that we should prayerfully consider what God’s primary vocational callings upon our lives are, and strive to keep them primary. We mustn’t allow ourselves to be overworked (even for the church) to such an extent that it takes away from what God is doing through us in our primary vocations. This does not mean that we have reason to not serve the church (cf. Gal. 6:10). No, God desires fellowship among His Body. It simply means that we establish appropriate boundaries, keeping God’s primary callings upon our lives primary. Veith puts this way:
We indeed have a calling to serve in our local churches, but it must be emphasized that our so-called ‘secular’ vocations are actually ‘holy offices’ where we are to serve our neighbors and live out our faith. . . . Churches should not demand so much ‘church work’ from their members that it takes away too much time from their primary vocations [9].
Conclusion
However we celebrate this Labor Day, we should be encouraged and take pride in our work. God has created and saved us as unique persons with vocation in mind, where we honor Him and love our neighbors. Labor Day is more than a holiday. It is a celebration of God’s call on our lives.
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[1] (I have explored this broader topic in a previous article. With this article, I pick up where I left off.)
[2] Gene Edward Veith, Jr., God At Work: Your Christian Vocation in All of Life, 52. Through the course of this article, I will use Veith as my “conversation partner” as we explore this topic together.
[3] Albert Mohler, “Leisure and Labor—Two Gifts from God,” Albert Mohler, September 4, 2006, accessed September 1, 2013, http://www.albertmohler.com/2006/09/04/leisure-and-labor-two-gifts-from-god/?utm_source=Albert+Mohler&utm_campaign=548f2f9d5e-The_Briefing_2013&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b041ba0d12-548f2f9d5e-307593669.
[4] Veith, 59.
[5] Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow: The Life Story of Jayber Crow, Barber, of the Port William Membership, as Written by Himself (New York: Counterpoint, 2000), 66.
[6] Veith, 135.
[7] Ibid., 40.
[8] H. Richard Niebuhr, Christ and Culture (1951).
[9] Veith, 140.
September 3, 2013
Really good article on how our jobs can glorify God. Thanks, Matthew!
September 5, 2013
Blake: Thanks for reading, and thanks for the encouragement. I appreciate what you do. Keep it up.