Laboring for God

This MMM is taken from last year's Labor Day Ministry Minute.

Today is the day set aside to honor "Labor" in our nation. It is good and appropriate that we stop and thank God for those who have labored before us and to thank Him for the opportunity to labor for Him.

It can be difficult at times to thank God for the opportunity to work in the environment of a university. Today's universities are not always encouraging places to be for a Christian.

It can even be worse if we fall into the trap of separating the "spiritual" from the "secular" callings we have. Often it becomes easy to picture our "spiritual lives" as that which we do at home and at church, and our "secular lives" as that which we must trudge through to make a living.

But God has ordained all honorable labor as His gift to us, and a central arena of our lives to bring glory to Him. That makes the "secular" part just as "spiritual" as the "spiritual" part. In their book, "Your Work Matters to God," Sherman and Hendricks say, "[We often have a] view of work that distinguishes between work that matters to God (work that deals with the soul, with the eternal and sacred things, essentially the work of "ministry") and work that has little if any value to God (secular, everyday work)."

A.W. Tozer, in his classic, The Pursuit of God, describes it this way, "One of the greatest hindrances to the Christian's internal peace is the common habit of dividing our lives into two areas - the sacred and the secular. But this state of affairs is wholly unnecessary. ...The sacred-secular antithesis has no foundation in the New Testament."

The other extreme is mentioned by Os Guinness in his book, "The Call." Rather than dichotomizing the two aspects of labor, we can be guilty of seeing our God given call to a vocation as just having a job. We forget that there is a "caller" who asks us to do everything we do to His glory and honor. This Labor Day, may we be willing to live and work for God.

Christian Leadership Ministries wants to acknowledge the tremendous importance of Christians in the academy. We quote one of your colleagues on the back of our CLM brochure. She says, "Finally! Someone recognizes my calling as a Christian professor (or staff member) at a secular university." May you rejoice in the same knowledge.

Scripture: Colossians 3:17 - "And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father."

Action Point: Thanks God for where He has planted you to minister to others.

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