Worthwhile Labor

Life is filled with toil. People spend a great deal of their lives laboring. They cook, clean, launder, maintain, repair, punch a computer, weld, enforce the law, collect the garbage, construct, manage wealth, provide healthcare and so forth. Most do this to collect a wage. How much of those labors will matter in eternity.

Jonathan Edwards, famous theologian, pastor and author, made an interesting comment about labor. In fact, labor was not even the focal point of his comment. It is worth sharing today. "Labor to get a sense of the vanity of this world." Read that again and let it sink in.

Edwards challenges us to labor or toil in our minds to remember this truth; everything in this world is temporary. It is vanity. It is empty. It will not last. Nothing in this world can ever produce never-ending joy. Don't believe that statement. Try it. Try love for instance. Even among the greatest love stories one of two things happen or most likely both. First, the love so promised at the wedding altar can be taken for granted, lost or suspended in fits of anger. Second, even if those things never happen love turns into grief when one of the spouses die. The surviving spouse may never quit loving but it will never be the same. Such love is temporary in nature. We make the same arguments with money, possessions, positions, accomplishments and so forth. All temporary.

And yet look at how we strive, toil and labor to get more of this world that never satisfies. Still we fiercely fight to get more and more of world all in vain. I know a couple that worked hard for decades. They were just about to retire and move to Florida to enjoy leisurely life when the wife was diagnosed with a brain tumor. She moved to heaven before the move to Florida. The husband moved but it was not the same. He still lives there with a hole in his heart.

It takes disciplined thinking, scripture reading and meditation to constantly remind ourselves this world is temporary. Chasing the elusive dream of superstar athlete kids playing select leagues is vanity. Still people spend enormous amounts of money and time in pursuit of this vain dream. I have seen athletes graduate with no greater purpose than what they accomplished athletically. Such people live their lives looking backward. They try to hang onto former glory.

We do the same thing with possessions. We work, save, sacrifice to get some long desired possession. In time it will rust, break, and end up on a scrap heap somewhere. It might decades but nothing lasts forever here. Don't believe me. Try this little experiment. As you drive around pay attention to houses or buildings dilapidated and in disrepair. Remind yourself that at some point those houses and buildings were brand new. They Brought joy. Now they are rubbish. Temporary.

Edwards made another short comment about labor. "Labor to become much acquainted with heaven." 

Does this happen among Christians? Are we drawn to a higher world, an eternal world filled with glory, majesty and where the mystery of God is revealed to us? Let's be honest. Aren't many people's concept of heaven more shaped by Hollywood and playing harps floating on clouds than the Bible. We cannot fathom what awaits us in heaven.

2 Corinthians 4:16-18 (ESV)
16  So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
17  For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,
18  as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.

1 Corinthians 2:9 (NKJV)
9  But as it is written: "Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, Nor have entered into the heart of man The things which God has prepared for those who love Him."

You would think followers of Jesus would devote more mental labor to becoming better acquainted with that place we will spend eternity. To focus on the next world requires intentional disciplined thinking. This present world wars incessantly to get us to forget about the next world. Every so often we are reminded of the temporary nature of this life when we attend a funeral, see a funeral procession pass by or read about someone famous dying. All reminders of the vanity of this world. May we labor to become better acquainted with the next world where the citizenship for the redeemed is recorded.