You're Working Too Hard - Ephesians 2:1-10
How many of us know someone who is
a workaholic? Maybe we are the
workaholic? Just how many hours in the
office, or on the job, does it take to qualify someone as a workaholic? Is it 70 a week, 60 a week, 50 a week, 40 a
week, more than that, less than that? Do
they work without taking a holiday, vacation day, or sick day (even though they
might be running a 110 degree fever and bleeding profusely from a missing limb)? Just what constitutes a person being a
workaholic? How much work is working too hard? I surveyed several of my friends, and not
counting the folks that are retired or working part-time, and definitely not
counting the housewives who work 168 hours a week, the average fulltime
employee is putting in around 49 ½ hours a week. That’s almost ten hours more than what is
considered to be a 40 hour work week (that in many places now is down to 37 ½
to 38 hours for fulltime employment).
How does that compare with history and the world? Well, 49 ½ is pretty close to the 48 hour
work week in some countries around the world and the standard of the first two
decades of the 1900’s. It is far less
than a few nations, and the 1800’s standard of working 10 to 14 hour days five
to six days a week. However, before we
start suggesting that we are not working anywhere near hard enough, let us
consider that in many nations, we already work far more than they do—the
average work week in Spain, Denmark and Ireland is 31 hours, France and
Belgium—30 hours, and in the Netherlands and Norway, workers only average 27
hours a week. Another thing to consider
is that while we have an average of 10 days paid vacation in the US, many
nations offer 20 to 30 days paid vacation and additional 9 to 13 days of paid
holidays, compared with the US’s 0 to 12 paid holidays. (However, if we want to talk about national
holidays, we might want to travel back to the 4th century Roman
Empire where 175 holidays were observed.)[i] So where is the line between not working hard
enough and working too hard?
I cannot completely answer that
with regards to the secular world—economists, business owners, and others all
have differing opinions on whether longer or shorter working weeks and hours
would be beneficial. In that regard, the
comment from God’s Word is that both work and rest are important…from warnings
against idleness to commands to observe that Sabbath and rest. However, it is not that type of work that is
our focus this morning.
As Moses was leading God’s people
through the wilderness after their flight from Egypt, God presented, through
Moses, the Ten Commandments and the rest of the Law. The people received God’s Law, and it was
understood that they were to obey the Law in order to live holy lives and be
pleasing to God. In all, there are 613
commandments within the first five books of the Old Testament. People would work hard to try and fulfill all
these laws, because they knew that if they did, they would please God and He
would pour out his blessings on them…if they failed to live according to the
Law, they would displease God and would find themselves punished. The problem was, my friends, that no matter
how hard the people worked, they could never completely fulfill the Law, in
some way, shape, or form, they would sin, and then they would have to work more
by bringing sacrifices to atone for their sins.
Then, on top of those 613 Laws, as time went on the religious leaders
began interpreting God’s Law and the words of the judges and prophets and began
adding rules of their own that God’s people were expected to live by—so the
people would have to try harder and work harder in order to try and please God…yet
they could never work hard enough.
Enter Jesus…
Have you ever had one of those
times when you have been slaving over a task for hours and hours, sweat pouring
from you, and never seeming to get anywhere, only to have someone come in, and
within a matter of moments, without breaking a sweat, they have it completed? While not citing a specific example, that
would entail just about any work that I ever attempted to accomplish on a car,
and have my dad (or just about anyone else) walk up, and it was done.
The people had been working hard,
never truly making any progress…and the religious leaders let them know
it. However, then Jesus came in. Too often we are quick to say Jesus came in
and all that Old Testament Law stuff does not mean anything anymore. Jesus, though, points out the opposite, “Do
not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets; I have not come
to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I
tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a
letter, will pass form the law until all is accomplished.”[ii] Jesus says, the law holds, the work is still
there, I have not come to get rid of it.
I have come to fulfill it. I am
here to show you how it should be completed…I am here to help you; and He
did. Jesus showed the people what it was
like to live a life completely given over to God…a life that sought to please
God rather than gratify our own desires.
Jesus even went as far as criticizing those religious leaders who had
added on to God’s Law by saying that they had done nothing to help the
people: “Then Jesus said to the crowds
and to his disciples, ‘The scribes and the Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat;
therefore, do whatever they teach you and follow it; but do not do as they do,
for they do not practice what they teach.
They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the shoulders
of others; but they themselves are unwilling to lift a finger to move them.’”[iii]
Jesus had already promised that
things are different with Him. He called
the people to him, promising them relief:
“’Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and
I will give you rest.”[iv] Jesus says to the people, “y’all have been
working too hard, bring it to me, and I will give you rest.”
How did Jesus give rest? By finishing the work that God’s people were
unable to complete. “So they took Jesus;
and carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of
the Skull, which in Hebrew is called Golgotha.
There they crucified him…After this, when Jesus knew that all was now
finished he said…’I am thirsty.’…When Jesus had received the wine, he said, ‘It
is finished.’ Then he bowed his head and
gave up his spirit.” [v]
Jesus completed the work…and this
is where Paul picks up in our reading today.
Paul recognizes that we were all dead because of our trespasses and
sin…and all we could do was look out for ourselves…and last week we talked
about how Christ freed us from that sin.
Paul now tells us because Christ finished the work that “God, who is
rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were
dead…made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved…By grace
you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the
gift of God—not the result of works….”
The work of our salvation…the
making God pleased with us…has been done and has been completed. The work of keeping God’s heat off our backs,
or actually Hell’s furnace off our feat is done…and we did not have anything to
do with it. Christ did all the work…and “it
is finished.”
Knowing this is the case…knowing
that nothing we can do can bring us God’s favor…because the truth of the matter
is that there is nothing that we can do to make God love us more (just as there
is nothing that we can do to make Him love us less), why is it that we are
still working so hard? Why are we still
working so hard at trying to make God love us, trying to make God happy with
us?
It happens all the time. We don’t want God to hate us…we want Him to
love us, we think if we just do enough good and good things, God won’t send us
to Hell, He’ll let us enter Heaven. We
make sure that we are signed up for anything and everything. If there is a work day at the church, we are
there! If there is a Bible Study, we are
there! If someone calls us to serve on a
committee, we would never refuse; we’ll even chair the committee if asked. Are there mission projects to be part of,
sign us up. Does the pastor need his
car washed? We’ve got bucket and
soap. Well, actually I haven’t seen that
one, except when Davey was trying to earn some money, not God’s favor. The list goes on. We know the sins we have committed, and we
figure that there must be some way we can make up for them, so we strive and
work hard to make up for what we have done, or left undone. We don’t want God upset…we want Him to love
us, so we work hard at trying to do the right thing…and we get so tired…and we
will get tired, because we will never be able to do enough. And part of that is because when we are doing
good simply to try and save our own souls, it compounds our sin…because 1) we
are acting in our own self-interest, not in God’s interest, and 2) we are
failing to trust in Christ for our salvation and are trying to save ourselves.
We have to remember, Christ
finished the work…He brought us salvation.
He completed the work and nothing we can do can exceed that work or
replace it. It’s done…It’s finished.
And now I feel like I am treading
on dangerous ground (I would have said thin ice, but it is way too hot to think
we would even have thin ice). This
cannot come across as a blanket invitation to just do nothing but sit there or
lie there. It doesn’t mean that when a
Bible Study comes up, we choose not to sign up because Christ has done it
all. It can’t cause us to refuse to sign
up for a mission trip or project, citing Christ has having completed the work. We can’t use Christ finishing the work as a
reason to decline any request to serve in the Church.
Paul made that clear to the
Ephesians and to us…works do not save us…however, because we are saved, we
work. “For we are what he has made us,
created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our
way of life. Jesus completed the work
required for our salvation so that we might be able to freely serve God. God designed us to grow, to love, to
serve…and when we do things without the pressure of having to earn God’s
favor—when we sign up for all the Bible Studies we can because our hearts
desire to learn more about God and His love for us…when we make an effort to
take part in as many mission trips as possible because we want to share God’s
love with others…when we say yes to requests to serve in the church because we
want to be part of building God’s kingdom and letting others know of the
salvation that Christ has completed for us…when it is done out of the heart…it
is no longer labor…it becomes a natural part of who we are…it becomes our way
of life.
In the Name of the Father and of
the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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