Work. You love it, hate it, or kind of like it. Both the world and the True and Living God value hard work. However, the world and the god of it, satan, is known for taking the things of God and twisting them until God’s commands seem like burdens. When it comes to work, the world has a rule, but God has a pattern. The rule of the world is to work hard to get what you want, and then work some more to get more. However, the pattern set by the Creator Himself is to work hard and then rest. What’s the difference between the rule and the pattern? It’s simply one word: purpose.

Work begins in the very first chapter of the Bible, when God creates the world and lays the foundation for all things in and around it. After He created, Genesis 2:2 says, “God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work.” At first glance, it seems odd that the Almighty Creator needed to rest. However, the word for “rest” simply means “to stop”. His work was complete, all was good, and it could get no better. Conversely, most children learn the concept of work by spending time cleaning up their mess if possible, and if you grew up anything like me, you’ll remember the stinging smell of bleach and the blaring sound of gospel music on an early Saturday morning that indicated the whole house would be cleaned, then the kids sent outside to play. Either way, work is God’s design, and God’s design has been contorted by the fallen world.

The rule of working from the world’s perspective can be summarized as: “grind until you die.” As one grows, one begins to learn the value of money, and as we all know, money gets you things in this world. This is where the pattern becomes distorted for most people because when we get what we want, we want more. As a result, if money is not handled properly, it becomes your god rather than a resource. Work then becomes a means to the wrong end. Solomon, the wisest man in all of creation, puts it this way: you’ll work hard, anxiously striving in grief and pain in order to eat, drink, and be temporarily satisfied, but the cycle of anxiety in your work begins all over again because you’ll chase that temporary satisfaction you once had. What’s even worse is that when you die, you’ll leave what you earn to someone else who may squander what you worked so hard to earn. Thus, King Solomon concludes in Ecclesiastes, without God as the focal point of your work, it is all “meaningless” (Ecclesiastes 1:2, 2:17-23).

Although work has been distorted by the sin that shrouds this world, God is a redeemer. He gave His people one of the most ignored commandments out of the ten: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:8-10). Before sin, there was no burnout, but since we live in a sin-sick world, God came up with a way to protect us from that. Remember the word rest from earlier? It’s where the word sabbath comes from. God gave the command to His people to rest. In the Gospels, Jesus promotes this concept both by word and by His actions. He says, “Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath ” and elsewhere He is stated as One who “often withdrew to lonely places and prayed” (Mark:2:27-28, Luke 5:16). Jesus reminds us of what we often forget: our work should glorify and lead us and others back to the One who created it all (Colossians 3:23-24, Matthew 5:16).

Let’s close with an introspective question: What are you working for? Perhaps the world that will soon forget about who you are, quick to whisk away to the next trending thing (Ecclesiastes 2:14-16), or a bank account that will hold no weight in eternity. I implore you, remember the words of the One who died for your sin, “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:19-21). As we learn to rest, may our hearts, our treasure, our worth be not found in what we can do or how much people are impressed by our work, but in God alone, who set the proper pattern of work for us.