"The secular made sacred" by Rod Bayley, 13 April 2008, Eccles. 2:17-5, Eph. 6:7-8, 2 Thess. 3:6-13, 1 Thess. 4:11-12

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Last week we considered the big picture on work, an overview of what
the bible says. We did this under the headings: work and creation,
work and the Fall, work and redemption, and work and the new
creation. Today we are going to focus on how Christ’s coming
transforms our work. We’ll do this by considering the frustration
that the Fall has brought to our work, and then think about the change
of perspective the Christian should now have.

Well, have you ever thought that you had a bad job, or a difficult
role to fulfil? I discovered an American website called worstjob.com
in 2005, which encouraged people to email the details of their daily
drudgery, and then got people to rate them in order to select the
worst jobs in the country. I thought the ‘funeral director and
embalmer’ had a good case, when he described a 12 hour working day,
and a 6-day routine, while still being ‘on call’ at night and most
weekends. Apart from dealing with bodies when funerals were
scheduled, he was expected to clean every nook and cranny of the
mortuary and pick up all the garbage, while the owner usually wandered
downstairs at 10am and announced he was playing golf for the day. And
when the owner returned after golf he was expected to wash and vacuum
his car as well. All this after attending four years of college and
one year of mortuary school.

But I’ve found an even better website that considers how there have
always been terrible jobs down through the centuries. Channel 4 in
Britain has a section on their website which summarises a series
they’ve had on the worst jobs for the last 2,000 years. The series
was then run here on the ABC in 2006. One example provided was from
the Victorian age of the 19th century where you could be employed as a
‘rat catcher.’ They summarise the occupation as follows, “Join the
world of pest control and tell the cats to move aside. If the idea of
despatching the poor little rodents with your own hands offends your
sensitive stomach, don’t worry - you can keep them alive. Just bag up
the little bundles of fur and take them around to your local pub.
There you’ll be handsomely rewarded for your trouble, and the dogs in
the rat pit will do the dirty work for you, to the delight of the
crowd.”

Of course, an occupation doesn’t have to be disgusting to make us
loathe work, or to at least feel that it’s frustrating and ultimately
meaningless. We laugh at stories of people being required to dig
holes that they are then asked to fill in the next day, but there is
often a sting in the tail to such stories, because we sense that our
own jobs often don’t amount to much more. There is a haunting sense
of the purposeless nature of our work, which is often undone next
year, if not next week or the next day. All this serves to highlight
our first point today, which is that the Fall has corrupted work and
made it toilsome and frustrating.

Well, if you’ve ever thought that way, you are in good company. The
writer of Ecclesiastes makes this point quite strongly. Turn with me
to Ecclesiastes 2, verses 17-20:
“So I hated life, because the work that is done under the sun was
grievous to me. All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.
18I hated all the things I had toiled for under the sun, because I
must leave them to the one who comes after me. 19And who knows whether
he will be a wise man or a fool? Yet he will have control over all
the work into which I have poured my effort and skill under the sun.
This too is meaningless. 20So I began to despair over all my toilsome
labour under the sun.”

Here work is bad, it hurts you, it debases you - the writer uses words
like ‘grievous’, ‘meaningless’, ‘toil’, ‘effort’, ‘labour’, ‘despair’,
‘misfortune’, ‘anxious striving’, ‘pain and grief’, even a ‘mind
[that] does not rest’ at night. Despite us being created in the image
of God the worker, and work initially being an unspoilt part of God’s
good creation, it is now marred and corrupted due to the entry of sin
through Adam and Eve in Genesis 3. This is reflected in Ecclesiastes 2
where work is ultimately meaningless because it will eventually be
undone - it has no lasting effects. There is no lasting legacy to work
as it is erased or forgotten so quickly, and so the writer argues that
it needs to be viewed as meaningless in the long term.

When I was towards the end of high school, I used to work for my
father who managed my grandfather’s building supplies firm. They sold
sand and gravel and cement and other things. Now it was a great place
to visit as a young kid, because I would get to have a ride on the
forklift or the tractor and run up and down the sand-hills. But when
I worked there at the end of high school and through uni, it was a
terrible place to go. No one let me drive the tractor or the
forklift, and instead of running over the sand piles I was bagging the
sand for ten hours in the hot sun. Although they had a bagging
machine which brought the sand along on a conveyor belt, it was no
picnic. There was a lot of lifting 30 to 40 kilo bags onto pallets
and operating a machine which could give you industrial deafness it
was so loud, and all this in the blazing sun of summer. At the end of
the day when you were burnt to a crisp and sore all over, you had some
small satisfaction of looking at this huge mound of sand bags ready
for sale. But often before the day ended some builder would come in
and buy the whole pile, and you would leave looking as if you had done
nothing. I would have nothing to show for all my effort under the
sun.

This is the kind of picture that we are given in Ecclesiastes 2. Even
if work has provided a sense of achievement during our life, our death
means we lose control over anything we have achieved or accumulated.
Notice in this passage that death is ultimately the enemy of our
work. In verses 18, 19 and 21 he talks of leaving the things he had
toiled for to someone else who may be a fool, or who has at least not
worked for it.

But despite this sense of despair with regard to our work, the writer
of Ecclesiastes still can say that we should seek to find satisfaction
or fulfilment in our work. Notice what is stated in verses 24 and 25:
“A man can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find
satisfaction in his work. This too, I see, is from the hand of God,
25for without him, who can eat or find enjoyment?”

God’s plan is still that we should work - his creation mandate, our
God-given tasks of Genesis 1:28 have not been rescinded - we are still
to work in the world and in the home. We are still made to work - we
bear God’s image, and like Him we are to work. And some level of
satisfaction in our work should be sought.

However, Ecclesiastes is not the only piece of O.T. wisdom literature
which addresses work. The previous book, Proverbs, also has a lot to
say about work, and it’s statements are generally more positive. Turn
with me to chapter 10 verses 4 and 5:
“Lazy hands make a man poor, but diligent hands bring wealth. 5He who
gathers crops in summer is a wise son, but he who sleeps during
harvest is a disgraceful son.”

In the world of Proverbs work is good - in verse 4 work brings wealth,
it brings a reward. In verse 5 it is wise to work, and in contrast it
is disgraceful to be lazy, and so presumably to fail to provide for
yourself and your family. Elsewhere in Proverbs this is again
emphasised where work is said to bring food. Despite the struggles
highlighted in Ecclesiastes, work still has its positive ends - work
is wise, and work can bring rewards.

In summary, we can gather from the O.T. that work is not all good due
to the Fall, in fact there is a certain meaninglessness to our
endeavors; and yet work is still central to life for all humanity,
because God’s creation mandates have not been removed - we are still
to fill the earth and rule it under Him. And as we work we see that
it is a means to an end, that we can therefore eat, and more than
that, there is some reward or satisfaction in working.

Having considered how work has been corrupted by the Fall, we now turn
to our second point: ‘Redemption and our secular work.’ What
difference does Christ’s death and resurrection make for the Christian
at work - how can our salvation redeem the ultimately meaningless
nature of our work? Turn with me to Ephesians 6:7-8, where we are
given some very important principles of how our perspective on work
has been transformed, and how we should work as Christians. Ephesians
6:7-8:
“Serve wholeheartedly, as if you were serving the Lord, not men,
8because you know that the Lord will reward everyone for whatever good
he does, whether he is slave or free.”

Now when we consider such a passage we can be thrown off by the
context of slavery and feel that this cannot apply to our workplaces,
no matter how much we might feel like the slave of our manager or
CEO. But this apprehension is often drawn from our understanding of
slavery in the last 2 or 3 centuries, where it was nearly always
demeaning and oppressive and driven by racial prejudice. However, the
‘slavery’ of the first century doesn’t equate with this sort of
system. Without trying to romanticize the Roman slave system, for
many were harshly treated, it was more a part of the economic system
in that slavery could be freely entered into in order to pay for
debts. So a person could sell himself into slavery and pay off his
debts, and had the possibility of buying his freedom again, or having
family members do so on their behalf. And so there are closer
parallels with our modern employer-employee relations than we might
think. Notice also in verse 8 that Paul explains how the principles
relate to the slave and free, and so I believe can easily be applied
to our work today.

The big change of perspective for the Christian is that we now work
for Jesus - we are on a mission from God. This is a foundational
principle that must be grasped. Your CEO or manager is not your
ultimate boss - no, God is now. And this means that our work takes on
new purpose - you are not just fulfilling a function that makes your
manager look good, or that earns profits for the company and its
shareholders - no, you now view your work as worship and service to
God, which is the nature of your whole life now. From this broader
perspective, all of life is work, not simply the 8 hours at your desk
or wherever - you are always serving or at work for God. And so Paul
says in verse 7 that the result should be that you work
“wholeheartedly”, because you’re not just serving men - you don’t
slacken off or act lazily, even if you’re ahead of schedule. No, your
work should always demonstrate diligence and integrity - you work to
serve God and please Him. And there is another motivation in verse 7
- we will be rewarded by God for whatever good we do.

Now with regard to rewards, an employer may not appreciate or even be
aware of the good work done, perhaps because he or she is indifferent
or because someone else takes the credit for what is done. But we are
assured here that God knows and God rewards. The earthly rewards may
not come, but God will reward us in heaven. On judgment day all
actions will be accounted for. And so the lack of reward spoken of in
Ecclesiastes is now overturned by the Cross - for the Christian, death
cannot remove the legacy or ensure that no reward will come - no, we
have the hope of heaven, and so death is not the end.

The story is told of an elderly missionary couple who were returning
home on a ship after many years of sacrificial service in Africa. On
the same ship was Theodore Roosevelt, the American president of the
day, who had just completed a highly successful big game hunt. As the
ship docked in New York harbour, thousands of well-wishers and dozens
of reporters lined the pier to welcome Roosevelt home. But not a
single person was there to welcome the missionaries. As the couple
rode to a hotel in a taxi, the man complained to his wife, “It just
doesn’t seem right. We give forty years of our lives to work for
Christ in Africa and nobody knows or cares when we return.” But as
they prayed together that night, the Lord seemed to say to them, “Do
you know why you haven’t received your reward yet my children? It is
because you are not home yet.” Our reward is not here - we’ll receive
from our true boss, God, when we see Him in the new creation.

Secondly, our salvation not only means that God is our new boss whom
we serve wholeheartedly, but also we embrace his creation mandates -
we don’t seek to live a life of idleness, but actually value work. In
2 Thessalonians 3:6-13, Paul makes this point strongly - he actually
commands Christians to stay away from, to not associate with, fellow
Christians who are idle. I’ll just read verses 6 to 10:
“In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, we command you, brothers, to
keep away from every brother who is idle and does not live according
to the teaching you received from us. 7For you yourselves know how
you ought to follow our example. We were not idle when we were with
you, 8nor did we eat anyone’s food without paying for it. On the
contrary, we worked night and day, labouring and toiling so that we
would not be a burden to any of you. 9We did this, not because we do
not have the right to such help, but in order to make ourselves a
model for you to follow. 10For even when we were with you, we gave
you this rule: ‘If a man will not work, he shall not eat’.”

We read here that Paul was at pains to demonstrate a clear example of
working for your own bread or daily needs. Though Paul was an
exception as a missionary apostle and could have asked for support, he
deliberately didn’t, so as to clearly demonstrate the priority of work
to these new Christians. In verse 11 and 12 we learn that he is
stressing this to the Thessalonians because there were some who were
idle busybodies. Notice what he states in verse 11: “We hear that
some among you are idle. They are not busy; they are busybodies.”
And his response in verse 12 is: “Such people we command and urge in
the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the bread they eat.” So
idleness, laziness, isn’t acceptable - work is still central to our
lives and it now has new purposefulness - we need to work diligently.

Thirdly and finally, the N.T. offers another motivation for our work
this side of the Cross which is related to the previous point - our
witness to non-Christians. Turn with me to Paul’s first letter to the
Thessalonians - 1 Thessalonians 4:11-12:
“Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business
and to work with your hands, just as we told you, 12so that your daily
life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be
dependent on anybody.”
We are given two related motivations for having a strong work ethic,
which combine to make one point. If realising that we are now working
for God is not motivation enough, we’re told in verse 12 that we
should desire to win the respect of outsiders, and that this will be
achieved by not being dependent on others. Not being a burden on
others was also brought out in Paul’s second letter to the
Thessalonians which we’ve just considered, and here it is again.
Being idle would obviously mean that you would need to rely on others,
and there was often a system of rich benefactors in Gentile towns in
the first century, who could provide such help in return for political
support. Not only should Christians avoid this and work for their own
bread, but in doing so they would avoid the bad example of idleness
before non-Christians, which would bring the gospel into disrepute.
Working hard is part of our witness.

As we conclude our thinking today about work, I want to restate our
two main points. Firstly, we need to acknowledge that work will bring
it’s frustrations, and that this is due to the Fall. We cannot expect
it to be more than partly fulfilling, because God has made our work
painful toil as part of his judgment on Adam and Eve and all humanity
- our experiences are part of the consequences of sin. Rather than
being constantly frustrated by work, the Christian needs to grasp the
bible’s perspective and affirm that although work is central to our
lives, our career is not the goal of our life where we will find true
satisfaction. True satisfaction comes in bringing glory to God with
our whole life, and our goal is to enter God’s rest in heaven.
Secondly, in centuries past there has been a lot of talk about the
Protestant work ethic. One of the doctrines to come out of the
Reformation was the elevation of all work. Luther and others rightly
gave greater honour to all work, rather than seeing secular work as
less than the sacred work of priests or those serving in the church in
some way. In fact, all work is made sacred by a person’s faith in
Christ - our redemption means that the secular is now sacred, that all
that we do is for God. And this means that we are to work
wholeheartedly, to have integrity in our work. Work is now service,
it is part of our worship. We work for the Lord ultimately, and our
diligence will not only mean that we support ourselves rather than
burdening others, but it will be a strong witness to unbelievers.

So ask yourself the following questions: ‘Do I see my work as service
to others and worship of God?’ ‘Do I realise that my diligence will
support my gospel witness, and my lack of it will undermine the
gospel?’ If the answer is ‘no’, pray that your thinking will be
aligned with God’s word. Jesus has transformed the secular into the
sacred.