God’s Work, Man’s Work

What benefit can a worker gain from his toil? I have observed the burden that God has given to people to keep them occupied. God has made everything fit beautifully in its appropriate time, but he has also placed ignorance in the human heart so that people cannot discover what God has ordained, from the beginning to the end of their lives. I have concluded that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to enjoy themselves as long as they live, and also that everyone should eat and drink, and find enjoyment in all his toil, for these things are a gift from God. I also know that whatever God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it, and nothing taken away from it. God has made it this way, so that men will fear him (Ecclesiastes 3:9-14).

If life under the sun is futile, absurd, and a chasing after wind, what benefit or value can remain?

The Preacher has set forth many challenging truths in his discourse so far: all of life is futile and absurd (Ecclesiastes 1:1-2). Time is more cyclical than linear; what has been done will soon be forgotten (Ecclesiastes 1:3-11). All pursuits under the sun are like chasing after wind: a never-ending and ultimately futile task (Ecclesiastes 1:12-13). The three main pursuits of mankind cannot deliver on their promises: pleasure (Ecclesiastes 2:1-11), wisdom (Ecclesiastes 1:14-18, 2:12-17), and labor (Ecclesiastes 2:18-26) all ultimately prove futile and a chasing after wind. A time and a season exist for all things under the sun: yes, those things we enjoy, but also those things we work diligently to avoid (Ecclesiastes 3:1-8).

The Preacher established such things in order to compel the hearer to consider many of the vain pretenses under which he or she pursues existence. The hearer will naturally find what the Preacher establishes abhorrent; yet such contempt, disgust, and/or hostility stems from the exposure of such pretenses. Humans want their lives to matter and to be full of meaning. In their corruption, and in the face of death, humans are easily tempted to invest in various earthly projects in order to find that meaning and to make their mark on the creation. Who among us wants to believe we will be forgotten within a century, most likely left as an entry with a birth and death date on some future descendant’s family tree?

While the natural human within us wants to resist the Preacher’s message, we do better to heed his wisdom. Yet we can understand why many would find him nihilistic to this point: if life is so meaningless, then why bother? Thus the Preacher would go on to provide exhortation about what can be enjoyed about life and work in Ecclesiastes 3:9-22; and he began by speaking of God’s work and man’s work in this creation.

The pericope (or section) began asking again what benefit a worker can gain from his effort (Ecclesiastes 3:9). To answer it the Preacher made appeal to God and His work: God has given labor to humans to keep them busy (Ecclesiastes 3:10). The Preacher confessed how God made everything beautiful in its own time and way (Ecclesiastes 3:11). God has made the creation so that mankind cannot ascertain how God has begun it or how it continues, or even how long they will live (Ecclesiastes 3:11). The text maintains vagary about what God has placed in the human heart: we can read the text, along with the ASV, as saying God has placed eternity in man’s heart, or, along with the NET, as saying God has placed ignorance in man’s heart (Ecclesiastes 3:11).

We may have a preference regarding which way we want to read the text in Ecclesiastes 3:11, yet either would make for robust theology and reflection. God has made mankind in His own image, and God is eternal (Genesis 1:27, Revelation 1:4). Humans indeed have eternity in their hearts: we have strong intuitions that there is more to living than this life. Cultures throughout time have expected some kind of afterlife for a part of themselves which was not consigned to physical death. Yet even though we might have intuition of eternity, we remain woefully ignorant regarding the spiritual realm and its operations. We do not know how long we will live, let alone how things will turn out for us.

Many decry and lament such ignorance; they believe they would like to know how their lives will turn out. We might understand such a desire for a moment, but upon reflection we can hopefully understand how terrible it would be. Generally we humans want to know things in order to master them; we might imagine we can find out how things will happen so we can make corrections or whatnot. But if we changed some matters of our existence which we would not have otherwise changed, would it not change our trajectory, thus invalidating whatever we were shown would take place? Such is the time traveler’s dilemma: if we could travel back in time in order to change a circumstance or event, then the reality in which we would exist would reflect the changed circumstance; how could we then know the circumstance or event needed changing? We thus cannot master what would happen. To know our end could easily paralyze us into fatalism. We understand and sympathize with the anxiety regarding the unknown regarding the future; yet such an unknown also allows life to have its vitality. Despite what we may think, ignorance regarding our end under the sun remains bliss.

The Preacher confessed how God’s works will endure forever, without addition or elimination; God has made the creation thus to give mankind reason to fear and revere Him (Ecclesiastes 3:14). And God’s gift to mankind is life (Ecclesiastes 3:13). God has not given us the pretensions of the institutions, powers, and principalities over this present darkness; God has not given us the delusions of eternal satisfaction of pleasure, wisdom, or labor. But God has given us the ability to enjoy the creation He has made, to eat and drink, and to find some enjoyment in the work we do (Ecclesiastes 3:12-13).

The Preacher again devastates human pretension. No matter how much effort we put into this creation, we cannot add to or take away from it. There is as much created stuff at the end as there was in the beginning; we may have changed its form, eliminated life, built up the things we call “development,” but it is all still made of the basic elements of the creation which God has made. When it is all said and done, God will purge it by fire and reconstitute it all according to His good plan and purpose (Romans 8:18-25, 2 Peter 3:1-13). We remain part of the life cycle of this planet; we have not withdrawn ourselves from it, and we never will. Here the Preacher affirmed, in his own way, what Paul would set forth in Romans 1:18-20: the creation testifies to its Creator. We should fear and revere God because He made it all, we are merely part of the system He created, and we cannot find any lasting form of meaning or purpose outside of Him. If we try to find meaning or purpose in His creation, we give the glory due the Creator to His creation, and He will give us over to such debased thinking, and we will prove miserable (cf. Romans 1:25).

Thus we can strive for what endures forever through what God has done in Christ. But when it comes to life under the sun, we do best to “stop and smell the roses.” The “little things” we can enjoy in life remain the only joys we can fully expect to enjoy. We should enjoy the warmth of the sun and the majesty of what God has made. We should enjoy the taste of the food and drink with which God has blessed us. We should rejoice, cherish, and laugh with our family, friends, and associates with whom we share life. We need to find what we can enjoy in our labor and effort so as to make it worthwhile. The “little things” are ephemeral indeed. Yet so are we! Let us enjoy what God has given us to enjoy in His creation, and may we invest our hopes of eternity in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and obtain the resurrection of life in Him!

Ethan R. Longhenry

God’s Work, Man’s Work | The Voice 12.25: June 19, 2022

Gods of This World: Work

There is one that is alone, and he hath not a second; yea, he hath neither son nor brother; yet is there no end of all his labor, neither are his eyes satisfied with riches.
“For whom then,” saith he, “do I labor, and deprive my soul of good?”
This also is vanity, yea, it is a sore travail (Ecclesiastes 4:8).

Imagine, for a moment, that you are meeting someone for the first time. What questions are you most likely to ask that person in order to get to know more about them? You will most likely ask what their name is, perhaps something about family or place of origin; you will also most certainly ask what kind of work they do.

Work represents a very important and significant dimension of our lives. A “standard” 40-hour work week consumes almost a quarter of a person’s time; many people work many more than forty hours for their job. For most of us work does not end when we leave the workplace: we may have work to do for our jobs at home or are often thinking about work projects, or we have work to do for ourselves, our families, our friends, or to volunteer for other people, causes, or organization. In many ways our work also gives our lives meaning: we are doing productive things with our time. We may feel valued for the expenditure of time, skill, and effort in our work. Likewise, if we are not able to work, our self-esteem may plummet and we may wonder why we are even here; depression runs rampant among the unemployed and those with medical conditions that render them unable to work.

Work maintains this important place in the lives of humans because we were made to work (Genesis 2:15). The Apostle Paul decreed that those who will not work should not eat (2 Thessalonians 3:10; not at all meaning those who were unable to work or those who were willing but unable to find work, but those who could work but did not). Working, making a living, and having some extra to give to those in need is everywhere commended in Scripture (Ephesians 4:28, 2 Thessalonians 3:7-9). Work is a good thing.

While man was made to work, even in the Garden of Eden before sin entered the world, work was also cursed with futility when man sinned (Genesis 2:15, 3:17-19). Therefore we often work hard, obtain resources, use the resources, and must work hard again; we can accumulate some wealth but cannot take it with us (cf. Ecclesiastes 1:2-12:8). Work for work’s sake cannot be the ultimate good.

Especially in our modern world it has become very tempting to make work for work’s sake the ultimate good, making a god out of work and effort. This is not necessarily covetousness or greed; while many people will work hard in order to get money and make obtaining money the goal of their lives (Ephesians 5:3,5), a lot of people work and work, make far less than they probably deserve, and yet remain devoted to their work. We now call such people “workaholics,” those who seem “addicted” to work and effort.

“Workaholism” happens for many different reasons. Some people never stop working because they feel as if they are in competition with others and can only be the best if they work the most; some will even brag about how many hours they work in a given week. Others do not have strong personal boundaries established and cannot turn down requests for work or assistance. Some have a nagging feeling of insecurity and doubt, feeling as if they have never done enough even though their output seems astonishing. Some overwork themselves as a way of escaping the people and/or problems in their lives. Still others crave the attention and commendation that come from others from doing a job well done; many more think they will be able to give themselves that commendation if they just get a bit more finished. Work can even become an idol in religion: how many have attempted to do good work after good work in an attempt to atone for sin or to gain the pleasure of the divine?

All idolatrous forms of work derive from fears, guilt, perceived insufficiencies, and pain. It is easy to feel as if one’s acceptance by others and their worth is tied up in what they do; sadly, many people have experiences which seem to prove this feeling right.

Yes, man was made to work, but there is more to being human than working. The same God who made man to work also expected His people to rest (Genesis 2:1-4); not for nothing does Jesus offer people rest if they come to Him (Matthew 11:28-29). Jesus encourages us to find an understanding of our value in Him: God loved us so much that Jesus was willing to die for our sins so we could be saved, and we did nothing to deserve it, and can never do anything which merits it (John 3:16, Titus 3:3-8). If work serves as our drug of choice to help us feel better about ourselves or our condition, it will become as our god; instead, we do better to believe in Jesus, find our worth in Him, and be willing to work for Him on account of what He has done for us to God’s glory and honor!

Ethan R. Longhenry