As Christians, we need to let our redemptive imaginations go a bit and recognize that our work is a way of blessing people, even if we don’t see it, because we trust that God is a God who cares for those in need. And, one of the ways he cares for those in need is by using the vocations of his people to bring blessing.

The fact that we celebrate the American worker by not working tells us something about our relationship with work — it is very complicated. Even Labor Day itself has an interesting background. When President Grover Cleveland signed the law that made Labor Day an official national holiday in 1894, he did so against a backdrop of social unrest in this country — much of it because of unjust work practices. Many laborers were working twelve-hour days, seven days a week, in unsanitary factories and unsafe places. It was not long ago that children as young as five or six years old were put to work in factories and mines in the United States. And so, against that backdrop, which led to riots and strikes, there was good legislation passed in Washington — good work done on behalf of people, treating them like the image bearers of God they are — so that they might be treated with dignity and respect in the workplace.

Fortunately, times have changed… somewhat. In professional situations, some still work seven days a week, twelve hours a day, but because they choose to. In other situations, particularly low wage environments, economic necessities require long work hours. Yet, even when things have improved in terms of work environment, our relationship with work remains complicated because (as a general rule) even if we love our work, daily work is hard. People are annoying. Co-workers are indifferent. Bosses and supervisors are selfish. Organizations and institutions are greedy. Our clients are demanding, and they do not call us simply to thank us for doing a great job today. Even if we love our jobs, we never love all of them. That’s just part of our complicated relationship with work.

And, truth be told, some of us really do not like our jobs. Some are just paying our dues until the next thing comes along. Some are just trying to pay the bills. For some, the job right now is studying in order to one day be employable. Any of us who have gone through school knows that that’s kind of an up-and-down affair, depending on the class and the subject and the teacher and the classmates in the school. For some, our job is looking for a job, something that is no fun. Work, of all these types, can be frustrating, disheartening, and discouraging.

For others, our job is now figuring out what our work will be now that we no longer have a job, because we are retired. The days involve thinking, “Now what do I do with myself for the decades ahead? People used to answer to me. People listened to what I said. I had influence on an organization. And now I’m just trying to find my place.”

Most of us are somewhere in between all of these, just blandly doing the thing in front of us. Despite all of those frustrations and all of those hindrances and barriers to joy, tomorrow morning, guess what? We’ll be back at it, showing up, in front of the screen, in precalculus class, dialing in, making a 45-minute commute, looking for a job again, trying to figure out what to do with ourselves.

Why? We have to pay the bills. We have to do something. We have to put one foot in front of the other.

There is nothing wrong with a sense of duty and responsibility. Yet, there remains something deeper inside of us when it comes to work. Even if we mainly work because we have to, we want something more out of our work, something that is a vocation, not simply a job. Deep down, all of us want our work to matter. We want our lives to matter, and we will never be able to get away from that, because it is how God made us. God made us in his image, put us to work, and gave us a day of rest — so that in his hands, our lives would matter. And since approximately 80% of our lives are work, that 80% of our lives matters as well.

So how do we know that our work matters, that we are not simply wasting our days? One option is ultimately subjective: to look at what the world would tell, to look at our record, to show others our resume, to list the really important things we have done.

But sometimes, we doubt ourselves. We ask, “Does what I have accomplished actually matter? Does it matter that I have built a good reputation in the sight of others? Does it matter that I have achieved a high-ranking position in my organization?” In the end, most come to realize with age, that what we have accomplished, the reputation we have built, and our rank are all poor measures of our actual value. And, as the author of Ecclesiastes suggests in chapter 12, if age alone does not bring such wisdom, ultimately death makes it unquestionable. Ultimately, our resume will not get it done. Doubt will always gnaw at us. So how do we know that our work matters?

In Matthew 13, Jesus tells a parable, one that reminds us of our value. Jesus tells us that God loves to do his work in the world by taking ordinary people and making an extraordinary difference.

He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.”

He told them another parable. “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, till it was all leavened.” (Matthew 13:31-33)

What does this parable tell us about ordinary people?

First, it reminds us that the kingdom seems small. Notice that the object lesson here has to do with two very small things. In fact, Jesus goes out of his way to note that the mustard seed was the smallest of all the seeds. The beginning of the parable contains a remarkable juxtaposition. Jesus begins, as he does in many of the parables in Matthew 13, with the words, “The kingdom of heaven is like….” An original Jewish audience would (just as a modern audience) hear “kingdom of heaven” and think of something immense, grand, large, and endless. The disciples’ minds might go to Daniel 7: Daniel’s vision of the throne of God and the Ancient of Days and the Son of Man; a vision that declares God’s kingdom as an everlasting dominion, a kingdom that shall not be destroyed.

But instead, Jesus says, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed.” It would not have been surprising if there were ripples of laughter through the crowd when Jesus spoke those words, almost the humorous dissonance of a Monty Python skit. People would have had to squint to even see if Jesus was really holding a mustard seed, or if he was just pretending to hold a mustard seed, because it is the smallest thing he could have picked, yet Jesus said, “This is what the kingdom of heaven is like.” It starts small. You can barely see it. It does not get a lot of recognition or applause.

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