9/11/55

Scripture: John 6: 22-37 (RSV)

Text: John 6: 27; “Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life.”

A motion picture which I saw this summer was a kind of mystery story, keeping one guessing until the end of the story as to who would be the new general manager of a mythical and highly successful automobile firm. Each of three men, and their wives, were being closely scrutinized by the president of the company. Each wanted the job with a fierce ambition. And yet, in a sense, they did not want to leave the location, friends and other surroundings where they were already successfully established. It was evident that the job of “general manager” meant challenge and prestige which each wanted. And these, rather than any need of bread, or clothing, or housing, were what the men desired. Their wives were also pictured as wanting that which was beyond, or other than, bread. (Their husbands were already successful enough to relieve them of any worry on that score). One wanted to continue the home life she and her husband and children knew back in the midwest. Another wanted home happiness and health for her husband much more than any further business responsibility for him. The third wanted New York surroundings and social life for herself, beyond everything else -- not even excepting her home.

Man does not live by bread alone, but by a lot of other things. --(Perhaps he lives mostly by other things in the imaginative realm of the movies, where physical want is seldom suggested.) Man really lives by the rewards which he gets, or hopes to achieve, from his labor. So, not only “a job,” but the direction and fruition of a job is important to each worker.

To those whose primary interest is in the material rewards of living (food and physical comforts), Jesus once said: “Do not labor for food which perishes.” [John 6: 27]. Not like the cattle of the field whose primary interest is fodder, but like people who are made in the spiritual image of God - this is the direction of man’s labor. If one’s work is, in some vital sense, an effort in growth toward God -- in goodness, and service and constructive achievement -- then it becomes not a drudgery, but a fascination.

A lot of us are returning to the usual duties of our jobs -- the renewed obligations, or the new challenges -- after summer vacations of various length, spent in various places. Some of us have traveled, seeing interesting places and people. Some have rested at home, or in some cottage in the woods or by the water. And as one returns to his responsibilities somebody is apt to remark: “That’s the trouble with a vacation or a trip -- you always have to go back to work.” Isn’t that more than a bit superficial? If a vacation has achieved its real purpose, is it not a means of making the “work” more vital in quality and interest?

I knew a man whose work consisted partly in meeting people constantly. He was an administrator of a very responsible school. He taught some of the students in courses himself; he supervised and consulted with the other teachers constantly; he spoke often in public; and he even wrote books in the midst of his busyness. He really needed the vacation which he was able to get in the late summer before the school year opened. But even there he filled his life with study and ideas and preparation as well as with the necessary relaxation. It happened that I was in the outer office of the school when he had returned, by train, from his vacation. The office secretary greeted him cheerfully as he blew in like a brisk autumn wind. Had he had a nice vacation? Yes he had! “But I can hardly wait to get back to work right here,” he said. And he bolted for his office with all the eagerness of a little boy headed for the neighborhood football scrimmage. One could not doubt that he loved his work, with all of its rewards and disappointments, its frustrations and successes, its plans and its hopes for himself and, much more, for his students and his fellow workers.

It was as if he might have said: “Thank God for the end of this vacation and for the work to which we are returning. Thank God that there is work to be done, and that I can do it. Coming home is the best part of my trip. And that means, ‘back to work.’”

You and I have seen people who had no work, and they were not happy. In days of depression and unemployment, faces get anxious, tempers are shortened, and cynicism and unrest mount. Those without work are unhappy.

There are those who have no steady work because of financial independence. They may move from place to place, or from tour to tour, seeking an interest, and yet find themselves bored, and tired and unhappy, until they find those points at which they can make a real contribution to the life of their community or church or neighborhood. Then life begins to glow again.

I once knew a musician who had retired to rest and die. He settled in a beautiful in a mild climate. Well, he eventually died, all right, but at a really advanced old age. It turned out that his idea of “rest” was pretty vigorous in terms of community service. He played the piano, with spirit, for the weekly meetings of his Service club. He was substitute organist in more than one church. He arranged two musical programs each week for the Army and Navy YMCA -- 104 each year, often doing the accompaniments himself. He became an avid stamp collector, so skillful in his knowledge that he could pay for an entire trip to the east and back with his business in the exchange of rare stamps, and countless kids got a friendly boost at their stamp collecting from him. He was a rugged individualist who inspired many a young fellow out of a job in depression times, to go out and make a job for himself!

He had retired, all right, in the sense that he was no longer on the professional musical platform in concert work or in directing musical affairs. But living was not loafing for him; and he thrived on the work that he created for himself in his supposed leisure. It brought pleasure to others and to himself, even though much of it had no connection with earning any bread for himself and his wife.

To lack work is usually a tragedy for any person. Sometimes this is a discovery for us rather than an inherited teaching. Even in the church we think we read our Bible to the effect that Adam and Eve originally lived without effort. Their garden of Eden was supplied by the Creator even before they were put into it. All they had to do was to enjoy the fruits of its growth. And then, because they disobeyed God, He took them from that life of ease, and, as punishment, made them go to work to gain their bread, and all else, by the “sweat of the brow.” And we conclude therefrom that work is foreign to man’s original nature. But such is not the case!

The story of Adam and Eve in the garden has great value as an illumion on the problem of sin, of disobedience to the will of God --- to the way of goodness. But the command to work is an expression of the wisdom and the goodness of God, rather than a thunderbolt of His anger. It is as if God were saying to man, “You lost the Eden I gave you, through your own sinful disobedience. Now, work and create a garden of your own fruit and satisfying accomplishment. By this path of effort you will find your place, your happiness, and your salvation.” God gave mankind work, not to crush us with a burden, but to bless us. Useful work, cheerfully and effectively done, has always been the finest kind of expression of the human spirit.

Of course this fact is not to be exploited by others who may be in position to “pile it on” to workers in some fields, with profit to themselves and without regard to the burdens of labor on the others. Both employers and employees, in the modern balance of exchange involving labor of arm and mind and skill, do well to seek for the kind of working conditions that create a fair sense of accomplishment, pride of production, consciousness of service.

To those who know that their work is blessedness, work is no curse. Was it not Carlyle who said: “The great law of culture is: ‘Let each become all that he was created capable of being.’”

Out of man’s labors come the forces and the factors that bless. We prize that which we earn. And all of our useful work is noble. The necessity, and some of the unpleasantness of our work, are not its only nor even its important dimensions.

Our lives demand activity, and the old saying is that when hands are completely idle, the devil finds something for them to do!

I. Work keeps us busy. Do you recall the complimentary sayings concerning a good woman that are found in the book of Proverbs? “She eateth not the bread of idleness.” Instead,

She rises while it is yet night

and provides food for her household

and tasks for her maidens.

She considers a field and buys it;

with the fruit of her hands she plants a vineyard.

She girds her loins with strength

and makes her arms strong -------

She puts her hands to the distaff,

and her hands hold the spindle. [Proverbs 31: 15-19].

That is: she is a busy person, doing all in her power to make her place in the earth worthy of life and love.

Saint Paul had an attitude toward women which was a bit lordly and sometimes critical. When writing to Timothy he commented on widows who had become idlers, “gadding about from house to house; and not only idlers but gossips and busybodies, saying what they should not.” [I Timothy 5: 13]. The widows among them needed, and received, help from their church, for there were few ways for a woman to earn a livelihood apart from co-labor with husband or father. But Paul was convinced that they qualified for help from the church only if their living was attested by good deeds; by the care of children, by hospitality, and by the innumerable important tasks wherein one seeks to accomplish the good.

Well, what Paul says about widows applies equally well to widowers, to bachelors and maidens, to husbands and wives, and to children according to their capacities. And what the Book of Proverbs says concerning the industry, thrift and concern of a good woman applies just as insistently to a good man.

It is just as well that we are surrounded by some circumstances that compel us. They are commands to a task. The alarm clocks, the calendars, the deadlines, the needs of clients, of patients, of children, of friends, are the urges that keep us vigorous and growing, even in advanced years!

It was always a marvel to me to see how my Grandmother Kingdon’s face lit up and her whole being took on an air of importance when she knew that she was needed somewhere. The illness of a grandchild or anything else that put unusual strain on the household of one of her sons or daughters, would bring Grandmother, willing and eager, despite her advancing age and serious lameness, to help. And the amount of work she could turn off, despite that crutch of hers, was astonishing! But the moment she felt in her own mind that she was no longer needed, she retreated to her own cottage. No amount of cordial inviting or coaxing could get her to come “just to visit” if there were no work for her to do.

Life is complete and happy for the busy person; it is incomplete for idle hands and minds.

II. And, then, life gains direction and purpose from our work. See a young man who says, “I’m going to be an engineer.” How well he fits together the course of his studies, the direction of his efforts, often even the hobbies in which he engages. A grade school boy in what was then the “west,” was assigned during “writing period” to put on the board, in good hand, something he wished to write there. And so the Carson boy wrote out, in brief couplet, his own ambition:

Harlan P. Carson, he

Intends to be a parson.

Well, he wasn’t fooling! He did become a minister. He served the cause of Christ through the Presbyterian church all of the rest of his life, and did it well.

The world calls for destiny-minded people. And in this world it is a scandal to have no more direction or purpose or ambition than a puff of wind-driven smoke.

To know that one is about business that has significance in the world of accomplishment, is to know the satisfactions of direction and purpose.

Three men worked in a stone quarry; one just to cut stone in monotony and repetition; one to earn his measly paycheck; but one to take his part in building a magnificent cathedral. All three performed the same task. But one knew the direction and purpose of the work that gave him lift and vision.

One man despises the labor of collecting the city garbage. Another worker takes pride in the assurance that the work makes him a partner with doctors and nurses and engineers in keeping the city clean and healthy. He’s proud to be a “part of the health service.”

III. And, of course, work does enable us to secure the necessities of life. Basic food and clothing and shelter and transportation are essential to physical existence. Justice and fair play demand that opportunities be kept open for all to work to secure these necessities. He who works should have them. (Whoever won’t work when opportunity is provided, has no claim on the state or his neighbors. Nor has he who does his work shoddily.) But he who works well deserves his opportunity and his pay.

But the necessities of life are not limited to food, clothing and shelter. Some beauty, creative hobbies, recreational opportunities to keep us healthy and on center, social fellowship and service -- these, too, are essential.

Our needs are more than what fills the mouth, or covers the back. People are spiritual, aesthetic, gregarious, curious. And these needs must be met in community.

There is pride and satisfaction in teaching a church school class, advising a youth group, leading Cubs or Scouts, singing in a choral group, serving on essential committees and boards, even though duties do attend the privilege. For these also fill a need.

IV. And, of course, work expresses our faith in God. Faith without works is a contradiction of terms. We applaud the epistle of James wherein it is written: “Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith --- Faith apart from works is dead.” [James 2: 18, 20].

All useful work is a furthering of the purposes of God. The petition in the Lord’s Prayer: “Give us this day our daily bread” is no request for a handout. It is a petition for the opportunity to earn what is needed for body and for soul. It is an expression of recognition for the blessedness of work. As Jesus said, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.” [John 5: 17]. So must we all -- and not alone for the food which perishes, but for that which never-ceasingly nourishes our growing and maturing souls.

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Dates and places delivered:

Wisconsin Rapids, September 11, 1955.

CWMA (Port Edwards) September 12, 1955.

Wisconsin Rapids, September 9, 1962.