About 10 years ago a book was published by the title “Why America Doesn’t Work.”  The authors talk about the “Christian work-ethic” of the last century, as if it’s a thing of the past.  The truth is that more and more Americans, young and old, want as much pleasure with as little work as possible.  People complain about work: It’s “too hard” or “too boring;” they are not receiving a “fair wage.”  Many would rather not work at all.  They look to retirement as an “escape” from the burden of their work!

It wasn’t always like this.  God created the first man and placed him in the garden to “tend” it.  Man’s daily work was pure pleasure in paradise.   But then God had to say to fallen man: “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten of the tree of which I commanded you, saying ‘You shall not eat of it’: Cursed is the ground because of you; in sorrow you shall eat of it all the days of your life; thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to you, and you shall eat the herb of the field, until you return unto the ground; for out of it you were taken; for dust you are, and unto dust you shall return.”  (Gen. 3)

Eating our bread “in the sweat of our face” is part of the judgment for sin which ends in temporal and eternal death!   But let’s be sure we understand. It’s not the work itself which is the curse;  it’s the burden which man’s sin brought to work; the “thorns and thistles” of our work; the increasing weakness of our bodies until we finally return to the earth through death!  Add to this the sins of the people with whom we work, and live.  Then we can see why our work seems so demanding, frustrating, and sweaty at times, whether we are businessmen, farmers, laborers, professionals, homemakers, students, or whatever.  

But don’t you know, dear friends, that the “mercies of God” are able to renew the joy and meaning of our work?  The old Disney movie, “Snow White” popularized the song of those hard-working seven dwarfs: “Whistle While You Work.”  The inspired apostle suggests something even better:

So it is that everyone born into this fallen world knows and feels the wrath of God.  Man is reminded daily of his sins by the hostility of the creation — by such painful and even deadly hostility as the bites of fire ants and mosquitoes, for example!     Driven by the fear of Death, man cannot relax and breathe freely in this life.  He is driven by his natural religion to think of God only as the Judge of sinners.  He is driven by fear to use his time for pleasure before time runs out and he must return to the earth in death.

But you and I, dear Christian friends, are no longer under the law, but under “grace.”  (Rom. 6:14)  Paul reminds us  that we know the mercy of God by which He has saved us from the curse of the Law and Death.  Through Christ, our God has taken away all our sins which once separated us from Him.  Even Death itself, once a curse, has been changed by His grace into a blessed door by which you and I and all believers in Christ will enter eternal life with God.  In His abundant mercy God has begun to restore us to that divine image which we lost in Eden.  Because of this great mercy toward us in Christ, we have nothing but everlasting life and pleasure ahead of us in the presence of God, and we are free to offer ourselves to our God with joy and without fear!
 
Now Paul reasons, “since you are no longer threatened by eternal death, since heaven’s glorious life lies before you, and since you are no longer driven by the fear of death, present your bodies to God as a living sacrifice”!   What could be more reasonable?   Why not return our body and life to the God Who has mercifully redeemed us from Sin, Death, and Hell?  When we freely and willingly offer ourselves to God while working or playing, we are showing the work of His saving grace and mercy in us!  We breathe easily with a joy like that of Adam before the Fall into sin.  That’s why Paul wrote to the Christians in Colossae: “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)

The true Christian is not like a jack-in-the-box that remains hidden throughout the week and only pops out when it’s cranked up on Sunday morning!  The true Christian, Paul says, wants to present his body as a “living sacrifice” to God throughout the week. For the unbeliever and the hypocrite, Sunday is a spiritual day, and the rest of the week is purely secular when he thinks little or nothing of his Savior’s mercies or his own service to God in the living of his life.

Do you see yourself as a Christian who works, or as a Christian worker?    If you regard your work during the week only as something you to make a living, or something you do to earn a good grade from your teacher, then you are only a Christian who works.   What have you done then with that joyous faith which you have received by the mercies of God?  For the moment, or the day, or the week, you have separated your faith from your work.   You have robbed yourself of the joy and meaning of your work by regarding yourself as a Christian who works, rather than as a Christian worker!

Before the Lutheran Reformation, people were taught that the only work which was truly acceptable to God as a service of worship was the work of a priest, a monk, or a nun.  But the Gospel of Christ teaches that it’s not the type of work a person does which determines whether his work is acceptable to God as a spiritual service of worship.  Instead, the gospel teaches that every sinner is acceptable to God through faith in Christ alone.  Therefore whatever work this believer does is also acceptable to God as a spiritual service of worship, because of his relationship with to Christ.   

Your Savior has called you in your particular area of work.  Your calling to be a Christian worker is just as sacred as my calling to serve as a public minister of the Gospel of Christ.  This is not because of what I am, or what you are, but because of what Christ is to us.  Christ is not merely the God of church services and ministers.  He is the Lord of tent-makers, tax collectors, factory workers, homemakers, miners, carpenters, law enforcement workers, teachers, bricklayers, or whatever.  Every moment of your redeemed life is precious to your Savior — from the taking out of the garbage in the morning to the taking out of your teeth at night.  “Therefore whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of (your) God.”

When the boy, Jesus, was found in the Jerusalem temple, His mother asked him: “Why have you dealt this way with us?”  Jesus answered: “I must be about my father’s business.”    And then, immediately, Jesus “returned to Nazareth with His parents and was subject to them.”  In the home and at the carpenter’s shop, Jesus was as much about His Father’s business as He was in the temple.  He was turning out “good work at a fair price — all to the glory of His Father!

By the mercies of God, our own daily offerings of faithful sweat and tears are regarded by Him as acceptable sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving in connection with Christ.  Even the annoying difficulties we must deal with in our work serve as blessed reminders of our need for our Savior God Who has redeemed us from the curse of sin, and promised that there remains an eternal rest for the people of God.   Because of the mercies of our God, let us also be moved to present our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God — also in our work — for this is our spiritual service of worship.  We may not be able to whistle while we work, but we can always worship while we work.   Amen.