Young men in this generation are particularly susceptible to sloth. The opportunities to be entertained are endless; gaming consoles and smartphones feed our dopamine systems like an IV drip. Fake enemies, fake battles, fake sex, fake risks, fake camaraderie, and fake victories beckon at every turn.

“You can be anything you want, but you cannot be a loser.”

Harsh? Perhaps. My dad told me this when I was in high school and contemplating my future. What was a loser for him? It wasn’t someone with the least points at the end of the game. It was someone who didn’t work hard, who moped around, who didn’t sweat (metaphorically or otherwise). It was about effort.

I wasn’t surprised when he said this. He was a basketball coach, and I was a mediocre basketball player. The time I sensed he was most proud of me was when I won the “Hustle Award” at a basketball summer camp. It wasn’t my fault I was slow and five foot nine, but it was my fault if others were working harder than me.

If he wanted to be more biblical, he might have said, “You can be anything you want, but you cannot be a sluggard.” In Scripture, hard work is a good thing and sloth refers to the avoidance or resentment of labor. Young men who want to be godly must learn to identify and resist the trap of laziness.

Attitudes Toward Work

Generally, people are either tempted to over work or to under work. Consider when Israel left Egypt after 400 years of slavery; they had trouble keeping the Sabbath. After explicitly being told to observe the Sabbath, “on the seventh day some of the people went out to gather” (Ex. 16:27). They’re reflexive workaholics after working 365 days a year for as long as they can remember.

In an age of abundance, our instinct is generally the opposite. The need to work hard isn’t what it once was. Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows private-sector employees averaged 34.5 hours per week in 2023–24, down from 61 hours per week in the mid-19th century (Robert Whaples, 1990). The wealthier a culture, the less pressure there is to work long-and-hard as survival can be safely assumed.

The Sabbath command cuts us in a different direction: Six days you shall work—not five, or four, or three half days.

Too often, we long to escape work. But while work is cursed by sin, it is a feature, not a bug, in God’s design. Work is why Adam was put in the garden. The first problem we see before the fall is that “there was no man to work the ground” (Gen. 2:5). Man is the answer to the “no workers” problem.

Word from Proverbs

For people in this age of under-working, Proverbs has an important message: Don’t be a sluggard. The inability or unwillingness to work hard is corrosive, lethal, and tempting. Work isn’t a morally neutral zone—laziness and its effects are always waiting to sneak in and make a mess of things. Consider Proverbs 6:6–11:

Go to the ant, O sluggard;
consider her ways, and be wise.
Without having any chief,
officer, or ruler,
she prepares her bread in summer
and gathers her food in harvest.
How long will you lie there, O sluggard?
When will you arise from your sleep?
A little sleep, a little slumber,
a little folding of the hands to rest,
and poverty will come upon you like a robber,
and want like an armed man.

The ant doesn’t need her mother, father, or boss to convince her to work hard; she’s intrinsically motivated. Preparing, gathering, and laboring, the ant marches on through the summer because winter is coming. The folly of sloth is exposed throughout the book of Proverbs:

• “Like vinegar to the teeth and smoke to the eyes, so is the sluggard to those who send him.” (10:26)
• “The hand of the diligent will rule, while the slothful will be put to forced labor.” (12:24)

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