Why Work?
The following is the text of a 5-minute video: WHY WORK? To view the video, click here.
Why work? People all through history have asked that question. But for many today, COVID has made it more difficult to answer. For example, since the pandemic, more than half of younger workers are finding it harder and harder to stay motivated to work.
This video and those that follow aim to help answer that “why work?” question. Having solid reasons will make it easier for you to get out of bed and go to work. Knowing the purpose of your work will make it meaningful. And that will spur you on to “work at it with all your heart.”
The usual reasons for having a job are still around. To pay the bills. To feel productive. To socialize. To fight boredom. Each of these has its place. But none of them reaches down deep to tap into who you were made to be and made to do.
Each of those reasons for working—survival, fulfillment, companionship, distsraction—attempts to pull meaning out of your work. But even magicians cannot really pull rabbits from hats. No, instead of trying to drag meaning out out of your work, you need to pour meaning into it. In other words, work is a container, not a source. To pour meaning into your work, you need to tap into the Source, to draw the meaning from the Original Worker.
We meet the Original Worker in the first five words in Genesis: “In the beginning, God created . . . .” Word four—God—tells us he is. Word five—created—tells us he works.
Later, in that first chapter of Genesis, we learn that we are made in the image or likeness of the working God. This means God intends each of us, every human being, to serve as a God-reflector. He made us in such a way that we can project into his world valid representations of what he is like.
Sin has stolen from the world any clear idea of what God is like. It’s all too easy to imagine that God, if he even exists, just doesn’t get involved. The Greeks, for example, invented lazy gods who did not work.
Let’s return to the question we began with: Why work? What meaning can we bring into our work, whether it is paid or unpaid work? Consider this: As people made in the image of God, we can—by working—provide the world with illustrations of what he is like. The very act of working with integrity, then, becomes a way of bearing witness.
Let’s assume you are able-bodied. And further, let’s say you have a sound mind. What if—in spite of all that ability—you refuse to engage in work that contributes to the benefit of the planet and its inhabitants? That brings us back again to the thief. Your unwillingness to work means you are robbing the world of glimpses of the God who works.
God works for the well-being of others. His greatest example? The death of Jesus on the cross so that our sins could be forgiven. By doing that work, Jesus reflected the generous, self-giving love of his Father.
God will never send you to do the work only Jesus could do. But you can reflect his generosity by giving yourself away in work that helps life on his earth to thrive. Through your work, you can write “shalom” into the lives of those who benefit from your work.
If you are a welder, let your work speak of the God who so carefully joins together. Are you an accountant? Then let your ledgers mirror God’s integrity and honesty. Do you serve as a teacher? Display something of the God who instructs his children in the ways of wisdom. Are you an architect? Let your work mirror the God whose universe brims over with careful design. Are you a reporter? Then echo God’s way of working by using words that communicate truth.
Why work? What meaning can you pour into your work—whether paid or unpaid? What should motivate you to get up and begin your workday? First, remember who you are: a God-reflector. Then find ways to do your work so that it flashes small sightings of his wonder into his world.
What is your work? How can it reflect something of your Creator into his creation?
God’s Kingdom Reasons for Working
This book explains many of the Kingdom-related purposes of God in sending so many of his people into everyday work.
