Jesus was not paid, and he could say, “I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do” (John 17:4 NASB). People honor God by doing the work that God has given them to do. Work is a primary way we engage with God and experience his involvement in our daily life.

In part 1, part 2, and part 3 of this essay, I reflected on what makes for a balanced life in terms of the bodily needs for proper care in feeding the body, exercise, sleep, to avoid harmful substances, recreation, relationship with others, and engagement with God. In this fourth part, I continue with what makes for a balanced life through work.

Work

Eighth, we were made for work of many sorts, so a balanced life includes our participation in work of some sort. Perhaps this need of work is why retirement is troubling for some people, and vacations are not enjoyable. Some work is paid, but much that we are called to do is unpaid labor by which we honor God. Jesus was not paid, and he could say, “I glorified You on the earth, having accomplished the work which You have given Me to do” (John 17:4 NASB). People honor God by doing the work that God has given them to do. Work is a primary way we engage with God and experience his involvement in our daily life.

When we have no work to do, we wither. I was couch-bound for two weeks with the flu, and I felt useless, being unable to do any work, which made me feel worthless. Work is a large component of our purpose under God, so when we do not have work to do, we feel diminished and unbalanced. Since work was a feature of human life before they rebelled, we can expect that work will be an aspect of everlasting life in the new creation. God is a worker (John 5:17), so our work has great dignity no matter how mundane our tasks may seem as we wash dishes, fold laundry, grade student papers, scrub toilets, or care for pets.

If we can allow that work is whatever God has given us to do in life, then two important conclusions follow. If this is right, then perhaps we can avoid the overworking that commonly threatens to unbalance us by eclipsing the other ingredients we have been designed to need for well-being.

First, whether we are called to preach a sermon for the church or to cook breakfast for our children, both are work given by God, and both are valuable responses of honoring God. The sacred-secular distinction is misleading and harmful because it is an artificial value judgment about work that wrongly diminishes whatever we might define as unspiritual or unimportant work. Also, paid work is not more important than unpaid work that is typically mundane (such as home maintenance and cleaning). What matters is doing what God has given us to do. The work of a Christian missionary is not more worthy to God than the work of a Christian accountant looking at spreadsheets for a construction company.

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