Colossians 3:22-4:1: Thinking Christianly About Work
In all labor there is profit, But idle chatter leads only to poverty. (Proverbs 14:23)
Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. (1Cor. 10:31)
Introduction
This lesson is part of a larger series that I intend to preach intermittently on learning to think Christianly about various aspects of the world and our lives in it. I am indebted to Harry Blamires, an Anglican theologian, whose book The Christian Mind taught me the terminology of thinking Christianly. In the second chapter of that work, Blamires explains the expression in this way:
“To think secularly is to think within a frame of reference bounded by the limits of our life on earth: it is to keep one’s calculations rooted in this-worldly criteria. To think christianly is to accept all things with the mind as related, directly or indirectly, to man’s eternal destiny as the redeemed and chosen child of God.
“You can think christianly or you can think secularly about the most sacred things--the sacrament of the altar, for example. Likewise you can think christianly or you can think secularly about the most mundane things--say, about a petrol pump. You would have to think secularly about the sacrament of the altar if you were required to budget financially for a year’s supply of wine and wafers for your parish church. At the other extreme, to think christianly about a petrol pump would be to ponder the place of petrol and of motor vehicles generally in the ethos and practice of a Christian society in a God-given world.”
--Harry Blamires, The Christian Mind, 44-45
There are many different topics we might study under this heading, some of them appropriate from the pulpit and some in classes or other venues. If our Lord wills, we will get to many of them. But today I want us to begin by studying how to think Christianly about work.
It might surprise some people to discover how practical the Bible is. Of course, some folks read the good book the way they read a collection of self-help advice, and that’s not at all how we want to read or treat the Scriptures in this pulpit or congregation. But at the same time, the fact the Scriptures are more than counsel for life does not mean they are less. We should not moralize the sacred text, but neither should we so spiritualize it that we fail to recognize its applicability to all of life. We want all there is to have and know of Jesus Christ, and we need him for every part of life.
The Bible has a lot to say about work, and we could profitably study it over many weeks, unpacking the various texts and themes which are related to forming a theology of labor. But this lesson is simply an outline, a prospectus or starting point for that larger and longer study. I plan to give you the lay of the land here, and I hope some of you will find it useful to explore the territory further in family worship, private study, or small group Bible studies. I will offer five propositions as a starting point for thinking Christianly about work and then conclude by noting how these ideas in Scripture connect to the most important work of all: the work of Christ.
#1: Work is a Blessing from God, Not a Burden
Many people imagine that human beings have to work because of sin. Because of the Fall we have to get up in the morning, turn a wrench, push papers, answer to a boss, and sweat until we are tired every evening. If only Adam hadn’t eaten the fruit we could sleep late every day, lounge around the garden, munch on fruit, ride a Tyrannosaurus, and feast late into the night. But in fact, work was not a result of the curse of sin. Work is a creation mandate, part of the pre-fall world God appointed for man’s blessing. The curse exacerbated our work. We must survive by the sweat of our brow, and our labor produces thorns and thistles as well as vegetables and sweet fruits. But we were made to have calluses on our hands. Human bodies were made to work, not sit on a couch or lay in the bed. God made man to work, and he re-makes us in Christ for the same (Eph. 2:10).
Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it (Gen. 2:15). Tend and keep means to work and to guard. Adam was to be a farmer and a protector. He was to build and cultivate the garden, and he was to watch and defend it from all enemies. You may be thinking there weren’t any enemies for Adam to guard against, but how did the serpent get in? Adam’s negligence began before his act of explicit disobedience. When Eve was created, she was employed in the same work, appointed as Adam’s helper in fulfilling God’s mandate. Together they were to: “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth” (Gen 1:28). The dominion mandate applied to both men and women, mankind. Though we have different roles to play in fulfilling it, we are commanded to work together in doing so. And though that mandate is ultimately fulfilled in the triumph of Christ, it remains part of our calling as image-bearers of God and as sons of God renewed and adopted in Jesus Christ.
God made us to work, to tend and guard the garden from which we were expelled, but also to multiply and fill the earth until the entire world becomes the garden of God. Having made us for this purpose, God designed us for the same. Humans are healthier and happier when we work. The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eats little or much; but the abundance of the rich will not permit him to sleep (Ecc. 5:12). We weren’t made to sit on our backsides all day, and since this is the position in which many of us do a lot of our work, we might need to seek out opportunities to plant, hoe, gather, build, and chop off snakes’ heads for our own good. Depression is often, but certainly not always, associated with indolence and spending too much of our time indoors. We were made to work in the sun, made to labor in community in building the City of God. You were not made to binge-watch Netflix, eat fast food, and have your primary human interaction on social media. Work is a means of blessing, and we will be sicker, poorer, and sadder if we neglect it.
Thus thinking Christianly about work begins by recognizing it is a creational and moral good, not a curse, not an evil. Yes, it will sometimes be burdensome. No, we will not always enjoy it. But we can enjoy our work, and at least much of the time, we should. You may not enjoy what you have to do at a given time as part of your work, but you can be thankful to God for the gift of work. You may be tired and ready for your work to be done, but you can be glad God gave you tasks to be occupied with so that your fatigue at the day’s end will be satisfying and sweet.
#2: Work is a Duty for Man, Not an Option
Work is a blessing, but not only a blessing. It is not an optional opportunity God has given to us. It is a duty, a divine command, an obligation we have as God’s image-bearers. God works in creating the world, and when creation was completed, we as his image-bearers are to carry on the work of maintaining, filling, and subduing the world God made. The Scriptures are very clear on this point. I have never seen anyone placed under church discipline for laziness, but the Bible says laziness is a sin for which one might be subjected to the discipline of the Church.
But we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw from every brother who walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which he received from us. For you yourselves know how you ought to follow us, for we were not disorderly among you; nor did we eat anyone’s bread free of charge, but worked with labor and toil night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, not because we do not have authority, but to make ourselves an example of how you should follow us. For even when we were with you, we commanded you this: If anyone will not work, neither shall he eat. For we hear that there are some who walk among you in a disorderly manner, not working at all, but are busybodies. Now those who are such we command and exhort through our Lord Jesus Christ that they work in quietness and eat their own bread. But as for you, brethren, do not grow weary in doing good. And if anyone does not obey our word in this epistle, note that person and do not keep company with him, that he may be ashamed. Yet do not count him as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother. (2Thess. 3:6-15)
Some people deny the dominion mandate has anything to do with our work as Christians. I disagree. But even if we set aside Genesis 1, we can still find the obligation to work in the moral law of God summarized in the Ten Commandments. You don’t remember there being a Thou shalt work command, but it’s right there in the Fourth Command:
“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. (Exod. 20:8-11)
God means for man to work, and if we neglect to do so or avoid it whenever possible, then we are disobeying the Law of God.
The command to work is an “integral part” of the command to rest on the Sabbath.
“The day of rest has no meaning except as a rest from labour. It is rest in relation to labour; and only as the day of rest upon the completion of six days of labour can the weekly sabbath be understood.” --John Murray, Principles of Conduct, 83
“The stress laid upon the six days of labour needs to be duly appreciated. The divine ordinance is not simply that of labour; it is labour with a certain constancy. There is indeed respite from the labour, the respite of one whole day every recurring seventh day. The cycle of respite is provided for, but there is also the cycle of labour. And the cycle of labour is as irreversible as the cycle of rest. The law of God cannot be violated with impunity. We can be quite certain that a great many of our physical and economic ills proceed from failure to observe the weekly day of rest. But we can also be quite sure that a great many of our economic ills arise from our failure to recognize the sanctity of six days of labour. Labour is not only a duty; it is a blessing. And, in like manner, six days of labour are both a duty and a blessing. If this principle were firmly established in our thinking, then the complications and hypocrisies often associated with the demand for a five-day week would not have so readily afflicted our economy, and moral degeneration would not have proceeded at the pace we have witnessed.” --Ibid.
Murray’s point is intriguing and, from a biblical standpoint, inarguable. How many social ills are the result of our society’s reluctance to work and characterizing it as a burden to be shunned rather than a duty to be embraced? How many ill effects do we see from neglecting the Sabbath? It seems as if American society simultaneously despises work and works too much. We avoid work and do it poorly and distractedly but continue to work for seven days, failing to rest and worship God.
Idleness is a sin. That doesn’t mean we are supposed to work 80 hours a week at a job. It doesn’t mean we are never allowed to take days off or that it is wrong to relax with your family. (It is wrong not to do so! The Sabbath is also a command.) But idleness is a sin. God made us to work and commands us to work, and we are to embrace that duty joyfully, not grudgingly.
Prov. 6:6-11: Go to the ant, you sluggard! Consider her ways and be wise, Which, having no captain, Overseer or ruler, Provides her supplies in the summer, And gathers her food in the harvest. How long will you slumber, O sluggard? When will you rise from your sleep? A little sleep, a little slumber, A little folding of the hands to sleep—So shall your poverty come on you like a prowler, And your need like an armed man.
Prov. 12:11: Whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits lacks sense. (ESV)
#3: Work is an Instrument for Progress, Not an Idol
Work is good for us, a command of God, and appointed to improve our lives, but work is a means, not an end. It is how we work toward specific goals, but it is not the goal toward which we strive. Work is part of the fundamental pattern of our life, but not the fundamental purpose. Man’s chief end is not to work but to worship. It is only valuable insofar as it helps us glorify God.
The Book of Proverbs has a great deal of practical wisdom to teach us on this point. This is not the primary purpose of Proverbs. It is not just a how-to-live manual. Proverbs is a book about how to live in the fear of God and how to recognize Christ as the wisdom of God. Most of the proverbs are not commands, per se, but are statements which reflect on life under the sun. Are we pursuing wisdom in the fear of God or foolishness and vanity in disregard of him? Work and the wealth it can bring is instrumental. It is a useful tool, a servant, but it makes a terrible master.
Prov. 10:15: The rich man’s wealth is his strong city; The destruction of the poor is their poverty.
Prov. 11:4, 28: Riches do not profit in the day of wrath, But righteousness delivers from death…. He who trusts in his riches will fall, But the righteous will flourish like foliage.
Prov. 23:4-5: Do not overwork to be rich; Because of your own understanding, cease!
Will you set your eyes on that which is not?
For riches certainly make themselves wings; They fly away like an eagle toward heaven.
Prov. 27:23-27: Be diligent to know the state of your flocks, And attend to your herds; For riches are not forever, Nor does a crown endure to all generations. When the hay is removed, and the tender grass shows itself, And the herbs of the mountains are gathered in, The lambs will provide your clothing, And the goats the price of a field; You shall have enough goats’ milk for your food, For the food of your household, And the nourishment of your maidservants.
Ecc. 2:18-26: Then I hated all my labor in which I had toiled under the sun, because I must leave it to the man who will come after me. And who knows whether he will be wise or a fool? Yet he will rule over all my labor in which I toiled and in which I have shown myself wise under the sun. This also is vanity. Therefore I turned my heart and despaired of all the labor in which I had toiled under the sun. For there is a man whose labor is with wisdom, knowledge, and skill; yet he must leave his heritage to a man who has not labored for it. This also is vanity and a great evil. For what has man for all his labor, and for the striving of his heart with which he has toiled under the sun? For all his days are sorrowful, and his work burdensome; even in the night his heart takes no rest. This also is vanity.
Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God. For who can eat, or who can have enjoyment, more than I? For God gives wisdom and knowledge and joy to a man who is good in His sight; but to the sinner He gives the work of gathering and collecting, that he may give to him who is good before God. This also is vanity and grasping for the wind.
We work to provide for ourselves and our families. But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever (1Tim. 5:8). We work so that we will have something to give those who are in need. Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands what is good, that he may have something to give him who has need (Eph. 4:28). We work so that we will have resources to invest in the kingdom of God. Honor the Lord with your possessions, and with the firstfruits of all your increase; so your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will overflow with new wine (Prov. 3:9-10).
We do not work merely to accumulate. We do not work merely for our own comfort and pleasure. We do not work because we imagine that by obtaining wealth we will attain fulfillment, security, and the good life. Fulfillment, security, and the good life can only be found in Christ, and we look for them in vain from the products of our own labor. If we make our work an idol, it will destroy us and leave us empty, even if we die with great wealth in the bank. If we make work our servant, then we will find joy and satisfaction in knowing that our labor brings glory to God, and we will have everlasting peace, even if we have little or nothing as measured by this world.
Work is one part of your vocation--about which we will have more to say in a moment--but it is not your ultimate vocation. You are an image-bearer of God, and therefore, like God, you are to work. If you labor in his Name and for his glory, what you build and plant will be good. But your ultimate calling is not as a mechanic, banker, truck driver, academic, or even as a pastor. Your ultimate calling is as an image-bearer. Man’s chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever.
#4: Work is Profitable, Not Pointless
Alongside our society’s professed abhorrence for work and our unbalanced and erratic engagement in it, we see an unhealthy and unbiblical attitude toward specific kinds of work. We think very little of manual labor, but we idolize professional athletes, YouTube content creators, and social media influencers. We assume that every young person ought to go to college and that it is reasonable to take on thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars of debt in order to do so. And we give our young people smartphones and Internet access so that their role models become people who make millions of dollars recording whiny performance art or making impossible trick shots. I’m not suggesting it is immoral to be creative, and you can argue some of this content is just that, a creative exercise in publishing a product that consumers value. But the incoherence of what we value proves we are not thinking about work biblically or Christianly. It is just as reasonable to ask why a Christian young man must take $40K in student loan debt in order to have a good life as it is to ask whether putting on makeup while 40,000 people with nothing better to do watch is a proper use of time and valuable work to perform. Maybe the young man is pursuing higher education for the glory of God--and none of us want a doctor that is solely self-educated. Maybe the young woman is developing a business consistent with Christian principles that helps other women look beautiful for their husbands--and none of the husbands I know would be opposed to that. But have we actually thought through these questions, or are we allowing popular culture to lead us around?
In all labor there is profit, But idle chatter leads only to poverty. (Proverbs 14:23)
See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. (Eph. 5:15-17)
If it is lawful for a man to make his living as a professional athlete (and I think it is), then it is lawful for a person to make his living creating content for entertainment. But rather than simply assume that whatever our society values is valuable, shouldn’t we think Christianly about it? Entertainment may be lawful. But not all forms are. Some entertainment may be profitable. But an excessive or self-aggrandizing expression of it would not be. Lawful, profitable labor is one way that we redeem the time, making the most of the opportunities we have to the glory of God. I can thank God for the opportunity to do anything that is lawful, but the fact it may be lawful does not necessarily mean it is useful and wise. We must learn to think Christianly.
Our society and young people are suffering from the popular deprecation of manual labor. Of course, we know someone has to be a trucker driver, construction worker, plumber, or janitor, but if a person is really smart or ambitious, he will leave such work for those who are not. Do we pity the young person who doesn’t want to go to college but instead work with his hands? What about the young woman whose ambition is to be a wife and a mom? Do we imagine she is failing to live up to her potential? As if working for a boss is more fulfilling and valuable than managing her household, sustaining her family, and raising her children to be servants of Almighty God! We act as if it is better to be a white collar professional than a garbage man, but driving a big truck with a mechanical arm looks like a lot more fun than anything that you will ever do in an office. Whose contribution to your life is most valuable: the YouTuber or the garbage man? You may miss daily vlogs about what your favorite Internet celebrity is eating if his channel is taken down, but if the garbage men go on strike, your life is going to become far more unpleasant very quickly!
The point here is not to glorify manual labor over administrative or intellectual labor. I am not deprecating creative content online, even if I think much of it needs to be examined in light of biblical principles of usefulness and service to others. Any of these fields may be profitably and lawfully pursued to the glory of God. Almost any kind of work can be profitable. Better to work hard creating content for people to enjoy than to live your life simply consuming such content. That is the point. Work for the good of others. Plant, build, gather. Contribute in some way that is useful to the maintenance and good of society. Work for the Lord. Such work is profitable.
#5: Work is Worshipful, Not Neutral Activity
Ultimately, work is only lawful and good insofar as it is done to the glory of God. Whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God (1Cor. 10:31). Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him (Col. 3:17). Whatever is not from faith is sin (Rom. 14:23b). These are the three characteristics of a work that is good in the sight of God. It must be done in obedience to the Word of God, consistent with his revealed will. It must be done in the Name of Christ, trusting him and his providence, not in our own strength or goodness or plans. And it must be done to the glory of God, with gratitude for the strength and opportunity he gives us, desiring that he would be honored in what we do, not ourselves. This is the key to thinking Christianly about our work. As John Murray explains:
“God-service is the first principle of labour, and it alone is the guardian of virtue in all our economic structure.” --John Murray, Principles of Conduct, 88
Whatever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance; for you serve the Lord Christ (Col. 3:23-24). You can pick up garbage, repair a car, cook a meal, change a diaper, clean a toilet, unclog a sink, write a legal brief, compose a novel, film a video, win a tournament, lose a footrace, sell insurance, build a skyscraper, develop a vaccine, patrol a city, die in battle, or simply straighten hymnals for Sunday all to the glory of God, if you do it heartily and diligently, with gratitude and seriousness, conscious that you are serving the Lord, and seeking to please him and not men.
Vocation is a reference to one’s calling in life. We already mentioned that ultimately our calling is not related to whatever job or career we may have. Our job or career, like all of the rest of the work we must do, is only an expression of and outlet for pursuing our fundamental calling as divine image-bearers, children of God, servants of Christ, vessels of the Holy Spirit. I am living out this fundamental calling whether I am writing or preaching a sermon, holding hands and praying with a sick or dying person, taking the kitchen trash out the back door, or cleaning up vomit while a sick baby cries. But at the same time, every one of us needs to see the place of calling in the roles and responsibilities God has providentially assigned us in our lives. I didn’t plan to be a pastor, and I didn’t really want to be one. But that was what God called me to do. I can resent it, which is sin, or accept it with gratitude and be diligent. God gave me a wife, so I am also called to be a husband. I can gripe and complain about the burden and obligation, which is sin, or I can accept that calling with gratitude and seek to be diligent to God’s glory. God gave me children, so I am also called to be a father. Where did God call you? You do not have to read the tea leaves of providence to figure out his will. Wherever you find yourself, there you are.
“The last thing to be observed is, that the Lord enjoins every one of us, in all the actions of life, to have respect to our own calling. He knows the boiling restlessness of the human mind, the fickleness with which it is borne hither and thither, its eagerness to hold opposites at one time in its grasp, its ambition. Therefore, lest all things should be thrown into confusion by our folly and rashness, he has assigned distinct duties to each in the different modes of life. And that no one may presume to overstep his proper limits, he has distinguished the different modes of life by the name of callings. Every man’s mode of life, therefore, is a kind of station assigned him by the Lord, that he may not be always driven about at random…. it is enough to know that in every thing the call of the Lord is the foundation and beginning of right action. He who does not act with reference to it will never, in the discharge of duty, keep the right path. He will sometimes be able, perhaps, to give the semblance of something laudable, but whatever it may be in the sight of man, it will be rejected before the throne of God; and besides, there will be no harmony in the different parts of his life. Hence, he only who directs his life to this end will have it properly framed; because free from the impulse of rashness, he will not attempt more than his calling justifies, knowing that it is unlawful to overleap the prescribed bounds…. in all our cares, toils, annoyances, and other burdens, it will be no small alleviation to know that all these are under the superintendence of God…. Every one in his particular mode of life will, without repining, suffer its inconveniences, cares, uneasiness, and anxiety, persuaded that God has laid on the burden. This, too, will afford admirable consolation, that in following your proper calling, no work will be so mean and sordid as not to have a splendour and value in the eye of God. --John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion III.10.6
Wherever you are, God calls you to be grateful and faithful there. It is your duty station, your assignment today. It may be something else tomorrow, next week, or next year. But wherever you are today, that is where God calls you to live, work, and serve, faithfully and to his glory.
Thinking Christianly About Work in Light of the Work of Christ
How does all of this connect to the greatest work of all, the work of Christ? You are not justified by what you do, but by what Christ has done. Your work is not acceptable to God because of its intrinsic value or quality; it is acceptable to him having been cleansed and offered through faith in his Son. But it is God’s sovereign providence and redemptive purpose that has placed you where you are in this world in order to do the work that you do. He does not save us by our good works, but he does save us so that we might do good works and thereby glorify him (Eph. 2:10).
Because God created, we are called to be constructive. Because he makes crops to grow, we are called to gather and saute them. Because Jesus died and rose again, we are called to die to sin, self, and this present world and live so as to manifest and magnify the glories of the new creation to which we belong.
For none of us lives to himself, and no one dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and rose and lived again, that He might be Lord of both the dead and the living. (Rom. 14:7-8)
By the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain; but I labored more abundantly than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God… with me (1Cor. 15:10)
For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works. (Tit. 2:11-14)
This is a faithful saying, and these things I want you to affirm constantly, that those who have believed in God should be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable to men. (Tit. 3:8)
It is by God’s grace that we labor; we cannot do so profitably or well in any other way. We work for his glory, for the good of his people, for the expansion of his kingdom, and for the moral and spiritual improvement of our souls. Our work doesn’t make us more or less acceptable to God. We are accepted in and by Christ alone. But God is pleased with our work performed in and for and by means of his Son, and this is what we are called to. How do we think Christianly about work? We think about it in relation to the gospel, and we pursue it diligently to the glory of God. Amen.
--JME
