Vain Work: Hebrews 4b

I remember times when I worked hard on difficult, energy-draining projects. There were hot summer days helping a farmer down the road bale hay. There were times when it was just me, and the farmer's son. I would be up stacking them in the loft, and he would be loading the bales onto an elevator. I got paid for this, but I will admit, I hated the work! Back in those days, I often would get asked to help during hay-baling season. Dexter was still a farming community, and a lot of us were familiar with hard work!

There were other times, though, like the Summer of 1980, during a record-breaking heat-wave in Texas. I and some other men re-roofed the Shamrock Advent Christian Church. Except for some of the best cooking I have ever known in my life, none of us got paid to do this work. Yet, I loved it. My memories are positive. It was like play.

What was the difference?

It was all about motive. In one case, I was working for money. In another, I was serving others, and along the way having some excellent fellowship with a group of godly men.

The writer of Hebrews talks about our promised "rest," our reward for serving God. There will come a time when the curse is defeated, the curse that doomed us to work and toil throughout life, subject to thorns and thistles, disease and death. But one day, God promises, we will rest from our labors.

Now, we could just rest on Sunday, or Saturday (if you are a 7th Day-er). But how many of us actually "rest" on our Sabbath?

In Hebrews, this rest is treated as though it has already come. What is meant?

So there must be a Sabbath's rest still waiting for the people of God, and whoever finds this rest has rested from his own labors as God once rested from His.

Our final reward, our eternal rest, is still in the future, without doubt. But here we seem to be able to claim the rest today. How can we do this, when there is obviously work to be done? Who will mow the grass? Who will pay the bills?

I think it's all about attitude. Some people make a big deal out of work. They make noise while they're "working." They comment about it after "Whew! I'm whipped! Been canning beans all evening!"

Or, "I troubleshot 16,000 lines of code. Took six hours."

Or, "I work myself to the bone and no one lifts a finger to help me!"

We keep going back to work . . . to works. How we crave, and long, for attention!

Have you noticed how much little children want you to notice what they have done, or are doing? It is because children of all sorts are activity-focused. They are works-oriented. They only know activity. But adults should move beyond that! Their purview should shift from drawing attention to themselves, to focusing more on others. Becoming more Christlike . . . not more busy!

So yes, it is possible to rest, even while you are working yourself to the bone! You can work because you are doing it for the right reasons. You do not care who gets the credit. And if your bones begin to protrude through their protective layer of skin, smile about it! God is good and He will take care of you! But if you have to complain about how hard you have worked, or brag about it, then you have ruined it for yourself and everybody! You just turned an act of cheerful giving (in which you actually did feel refreshed afterward), into work. You have stepped back into the curse.

Once I was working with an older male relative. Over time he began to get critical of me. He pointed out things for me to do, that I was already doing. He found little nit-picky things to comment on - suggesting changes that he wasn't even doing himself. Little arguments erupted.

I had gone into the work project feeling cheerful, eager for the time and fellowship with this trusted elder. And while we were getting along, it was not work at all. It was fellowship. Worship. Rest.

Finally I said - "I love work when it's fun. But when it ceases to be fun I hate it."

"Baloney!" was his terse response.

This person was stuck in the paradigm that work has to be work. It has to be laborious. It isn't supposed to be fun. If you are having fun, you aren't working.

Baloney, indeed!