Good Morning Friends,
“I went past the field of the sluggard, past
the vineyard of the man who lacks judgment; thorns had come up everywhere, the
ground was covered with weeds, and the stone wall was in ruins. I applied my
heart to what I observed and learned a lesson from what I saw: A little sleep,
a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest -- and poverty will
come on you like a bandit and scarcity like an armed man.” (Proverbs 24:30-34)
The world wasn’t meant to be a place of hard
work, plagued by difficulty in supporting ourselves and our families. God created
the world as a place of abundance. But that changed when Adam and Eve sinned. God
punished Adam by cursing the ground and saying, “through painful toil you will
eat of it all the days of your life.” (Genesis 3:17) There would be no more
life of ease for Adam, nor for his descendants. From Adam, all mankind has
inherited hard work as our lot.
There is now built into our world a general
principle by which it works: life will not be easy and providing for yourself
and your family will require diligence and hard work. The flip side comes with
that principle, if a person chooses to be lazy, poverty will be the sure
result.
It’s not that work is bad. In fact, when our
work is productive it brings great satisfaction. Even heaven will include work.
Revelation says of heaven, “his servants will serve him.” (Revelation 22:3)
We’ll enjoy the work of heaven, it won’t be work just to survive, but perfectly
productive work for God.
The toilsome work is the burden of putting
food on the table, keeping the house in good repair, replacing clothes as they
wear out. It is the routine of what we must do over and over that grows weary.
Yet that is our lot in life, the result of Adam’s sin and our sin that confirms
Adam’s choice.
His, by Grace,
Steve
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