On Work
Much of this is engaging with Oliver O’Donovan’s Entering into Rest, Chapter 5.
‘Work is a good thing for man – a good thing for his humanity – because through work man not only transforms nature, adapting it to his own needs, but he also achieves fulfillment as a human being and indeed, in a sense, becomes “more a human being”’. [1]
For something that is so intrinsic to human existence, including the lived day-to-day experience of most humans, work is notoriously difficult to define. The twenty-one definitions and senses in the Oxford English Dictionary, many with their own sub-senses and definitions, might be an indication of how fraught the task is. Moreover, the wide semantic range of words related to work, covering our career and vocation, our part time or casual employment, our leisure and hobbies, our volunteer toil and the unpaid labour of familial responsibilities suggests that we need a more sophisticated approach. It requires more than a word study to understand what something truly is; otherwise, we could be content to define work as any ‘effort’, and leave it at that. Stretching the meaning of ‘work’ to cover any conscious action makes too much of work. But restricting the meaning of ‘work’ to those things for which I get paid makes too little of work.
Theologically speaking, what is work? It’s worth acknowledging that more often than not, when Christian pastors and thinkers ask this question, they’re asking a question of theodicy: what is the point of work? The experience of work as drudgery, the alienation of labour from fruit by many workers, and the pervading sense of futility and pointless felt by others, it may be fair to ask’ What is it for?’
The twentieth century philosopher Hannah Arendt drew a distinction between ‘labor’ and ‘work’.[2] Labour is the acts and toil carried out to sustain our own lives; work is the acts and toil we do to contribute something to the world. As Oliver O’Donovan notes in his commentary on Arendt’s distinction, the divide between ‘labor’ and ‘work’ is best understood aspectually; that is, it refers not to the various things we do, but to the different ways in which we think and feel about the different things we do. Our meaning and purpose are pre-work, which means these things are gifts which are found outside of work. But O’Donovan notes that Arendt’s antithesis between ‘labor’ and ‘work’ never reaches full clarity. Are labor, work, and a third category called ‘action’ distinct activities (of the home, workshop, or agora)? Are they types of life or social classes?
O’Donovan also notes that the ancient world had a conception of work that was especially potent for the urban centres. Work belonged to the ‘poor’: artisans, tradesmen, slaves, and hired labourers. According to John Chrysostom, the poor was a broad term for anyone who had to work to stay alive. In contrast, public activities were not work, but the domain of personal dignity which resulted in ‘effective social pressure’. Meanwhile intellectual work was simply scholé, leisure. The origin of contemporary English words like scholar and school, scholé was time set apart for worthwhile pursuits, like education, by those who were not forced to personally labour to stay alive.
In contrast, O’Donovan notes that the late-modern world has ‘no way of distinguishing work from any activity apart from its capacity to find a market and support itself.’ However, the expansion of the scope of ‘work’ is found in the pages of the New Testament, where the failings and impermanence of work is overcome with purpose: ‘The limited horizons of human work – economic viability, productive effectiveness – always lie before a further horizon of more ultimate purposes, but whereas in the general discourse of ends this further horizon (“happiness”) is no more than an unfocused aspiration, it acquires a sharp focus through the representative resurrection of Christ and the call to Christian discipleship and witness. “Serving the Lord Christ” becomes the framework within which whatever service may be requires by earthly employers can now be given a definite purpose and a clear effectiveness (Col 3.23).
That work can be purposeful now in Christ recalls the original purposefulness to work in Genesis. Work is not a necessary evil, forced upon humanity after the entry of sin into the world. For in the beginning God worked (Gen 2.2-3). God’s work was generous, producing in order to share, forming and filling a world which would be hospitable for others to inhabit. God created humanity in his image and likeness; representing God in the world by participating in the ordering of the world. The work of humanity was to be both social and material, filling the earth with their descendants and tilling the very same dirt out of which they were made. Their work would carry authority and shape reality, reflecting in Adam’s naming of the animals. And it would have both a creative and a religious aspect to it; tilling and keeping the garden implying both the creation of culture, and the worshipful obligations which would fall upon Israel’s priests. Together, man and woman would steward God’s world, we were made to order- reorder, and subdue God’s world.
The catastrophic disobedience of our first parents ruptured the peace in which they were to pursue their work with a curse. Work became the location of pain, fear, and frustration. While the original goodness of work remained, and humanity continued to cultivate and create in the pages following Genesis 3, work has become perilous because of its ability to be turned each other and/or God. Work can now be experienced as toil and drudgery, and instead of being used to share, human work can be exerted to harm and destroy one another. Work then in this age can be experienced as either idleness, or idolatry; we can know both a lack of work, and over work. Not only is work frustrated and made challenging as we work by the sweat of our brow, but work can be made bad through toil and drudgery. The repeated applications of the gospel in the epistles to slaves show that it is possible to serve Jesus in these situations. But work doesn’t just become bad, there is bad work – work which is at odds with God’s plans and purposes for the world and undermine the nature of work
The possibility of bad work, should leave us circumspect about the prospects and potential of our work. Our work can be ruined by moths and rust, it can become selfish, it can be directed to nefarious ends. Hope for humanity then lies not in our work, but in the relief of work and from the painful toil of our hands (Gen 5.29).
God continues to do his work, rescuing Israel from slavery and establishing them as a ‘kingdom of priests’. Israel’s experience of work continues to be of both blessing and curse. The vanity of work directed towards the creation of empty idols, or the exploitation of the weak and poor by those with wealth and power become themes in Israel’s life constantly decried by the prophets. Yet the Israelites also know the blessing of God’s hand, providing what they don’t deserve but do need. Their prayer is that God would establish the work of their hands, for Qoheleth knows that there is nothing better than to enjoy your work. While work might offer fame and fulfilment, wisdom and wealth, and an ability to consume, these things do not last.
With the coming of Jesus, we see a labourer enjoying their work. For Jesus’ work is to do the work of his Father and bring it to completion, and that work he did perfectly. For in his death and resurrection Jesus has destroyed the power of sin and death. He has rescued us from work, in order to do the good works, he has prepared for us to do. Freed from the worries of what of food and clothes, Christians are able to pursue work with reinvigorated purpose, finding joy in even the most menial of tasks. Even slaves are able to work ‘as unto the Lord’, finding a new purpose and meaning in their work, regardless of its demeaning nature. Christians then are given the means by God’s Spirit to work in a distinct fashion, honouring God and bring him glory as they live such good lives among the nations. The work of the Spirit of Christ in our lives and community enables the possibility once again to share generously out of the fruit of our labours with others. Work is the means to use our hands to love and serve many, providing for those beyond ourselves. This even enables some within the church to step out of their work in order that they might labour amongst God’s people and seek to build Jesus body.
With Jesus’ resurrection from the dead, even death becomes a safe venue. Robbed of its ability to despoil and consume, the righteous dead rest from the labour, for their deeds follow them. Rest, long foreshadowed as the goal since the opening of the Bible, and teased throughout Israel’s history with both their compliance, or lack thereof with the Sabbath. The new creation is characterized by rest. Human destiny then is to be either restless without God, or restful with him (Rev 14:11, 13), which drives the urgency of gospel ministry to invite people to take up Jesus’ offer of rest (Matt 11:28-29).
In briefly recounting this Bible’s own story of work, we can consider the study and purpose of work. Without falling into the specifics of any particular type of work, the nature of work is comprised of the ordering, reordering and subduing the creation. These have material, social, and spiritual consequences, and the lack of these outcomes in our lives can be experience as a type of alienation. With this, we might return to the question, ‘what is work for?’ Andrew Cameron identifies three purposes for work in Scripture. These are not categories of work, nor types of work. But three ends, to which all of humanity is called to participate in.
Cameron’s three ends are:
· The work of creation;
· The work of community
· The work of the coming Kingdom of God. [3]
Our work has material ends, as we are called to steward the creation, with God-like powers to order and re-order the world. Our work is acted upon the created order. But we do not simply dominate the creation, for dominion implies responsible stewardship over our fellow creatures.
Our work also has social outcomes, as we seek to promote communities where people care for each other. Not all work explicitly results in people caring for each other. But our work may create the conditions which allows for communities of care. Work can be a communication for love by loving one another
The final outcome of work is the work of God, the work of the coming Kingdom. Work is now explicitly directed toward the future, by bringing people into fellowship with God through Christ.
Each of these ends is complimentary. And while most humans will find themselves occupying one particular end over the others through our employment, we are each called to honour God with each end to our work.
Pastors then, would help their people best not by becoming theological expects in each occupation. Instead, they are to prepare their parishioners to be the theological experts in their field. Our work places are schools of moral formation, shaping our ethical imagination and choices. In training people to think theologically about work, we increase the capacity of Christians to question or subvert the places where they work.
Those engaged in pastoral ministry also need to be able to say that the purpose of work is more than simply feeding yourself and support gospel ministry, otherwise they erroneously suggest that the purpose of work is consumption. Conversely, 1 Corinthians 3:12-13 warns against preaching and ministry that is motivated by the desire to make a name for yourself, consumption, or fulfillment.
Equally problematic are discourses around work and ministry that seek to place the significance of one or the other in the light of eternity. Whether my work lasts into eternity is not a question the Scriptures are seeking to answer. There are many good things in this age that we are told not to last, such as marriage. What will endure we are told is faith, love, and hope. Likewise, the Scriptures do not make the evangelical utilitarian argument that everything will be destroyed, ergo pursue gospel ministry. The Bible’s picture of our inheritance is found not in our labours, but in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The apocalyptic descriptions of the end of sin and death do no depict the eradication of creation, but the arrival of righteousness, rest, and peace. For the storyline of the Bible with regards to work does not elevate a certain kind of work over another (ie. the intellectual vs the contemplative life exemplified in the early church by Luke’s Martha and Mary), for the duality of the active and contemplative life must be embodying in every vocation.[4] Instead, we are encouraged to consider, in O’Donovan’s words, ‘the transforming moment of rest which must accompany all work’
[1] John Paul II, Laborem Exercens, 9. See Oliver O’Donvan, Entering into Rest, Chapter 5, 102-134.
[2] Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition, 79-93.
[3] Cameron argues that when you look at the definitions and shapes of work from the OED, they each relate to three different ‘kinds’: Basic sense: acting on the created order; Social sense: acting in order to share; Eschatological sense: acting in light of meeting God.
[4] Augustine, City of God, 19.20