But then came Ash Wednesday, which we did not observe because that was “Catholic” and we weren’t Catholic. Of course, I enjoyed Fat Tuesday because I liked to indulge my appetites, but not Ash Wednesday—not Lent for that matter—because all those ashy crosses on people’s foreheads and Friday fasts from meat and religious versions of New Years resolutions were just meaningless traditions—empty rituals—that had no place in my iconoclastic faith.

But lately I’ve been rethinking some of these “meaningless traditions.” Though admittedly more of a spiritual discipline than a church tradition, I’ve recently begun to think through the purpose and practice of fasting, which played no role in my faith for the first 24 years of my life.

So why fast?

It certainly seems counterintuitive to deliberately separate ourselves from enjoying the good things God has so richly provided—certainly counter in our modern, American context of plenty. Why not just always give thanks to God, and then—as the writer of Ecclesiastes so eloquently puts it—eat, drink, and be merry?

In thinking through all of this, I read a passage of scripture I’m sure I’ve read a thousand times, the account of the Last Supper as told by Luke. Unassumingly, I read these words of Jesus to his disciples:

“I have earnestly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; for I say to you, I shall never again eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.”

Then he passes the cup to his disciples and adds:

“Take this and share it among yourselves; for I say to you, I will not drink of the fruit of the vine from now on until the kingdom of God comes.”

If there is anyone in the cosmos who has every right to eat, drink, and be merry, it is Jesus, who overcame 33 years of life as a suffering servant, who died a torturous death on a cross, and who descended into Hell itself. Now He is seated at the right hand of the Heavenly Father in all His glory. It’s His turn to party.

Instead, He fasts. For us. For the coming of the Kingdom in all its fullness. Jesus is waiting to feast for the day when we’ll all be gathered around the table together at the Marriage Supper of the Lamb.

He fasts longing to be joined with us. We should fast longing to be joined with Him.

What I’ve realized while “living into” this discipline of fasting is how much I not only enjoy earthly blessings, but also how much I depend on them. At the end of a day of fasting with fatigue crushing in, I realize how dependent I am, how weak I am, and how much I need God. I hope this realization will grow into a deeper yearning to be with God that only He can satisfy, because though He is in the throne room of Heaven in all its splendor, He longs to be with me.

So Lent is upon us, and for thousands of years, Christians of all stripes have fasted together for a season in anticipation of the very weekend that justifies our whole religion. This is no mere meaningless tradition. I’ve come to realize that what makes a tradition meaningless is not anything intrinsic to the tradition itself, but rather our lack of understanding of the meaning of the tradition. I’m grateful that I am beginning to realize just how meaningful this Lenten tradition is, and I think I’m now ready to observe the very holiday that logically follows Fat Tuesday.

May this be a season to fast and to hunger for God who alone satisfies our deepest longings and desires.

Driving home from Pittsburgh yesterday afternoon—after one more year of “going up to Jerusalem” for the annual Jubilee and its thesis that “everything matters” –I was listening to “The Best of Bob Dylan” as I made my way from Pennsylvania to Maryland to Virginia. He is a genius.

And so I heard again the words of my life, from “Blowin’ in the Wind” to “The Times They Are a Changin’” to “Mr. Tambourine Man”…. and on and on over the years. Lyrics and images that have echoed through my consciousness for all of my life were my companions as I drove into the night, finally onto the Beltway of Washington with snowflakes falling on the highway.

Finally he came to “Gotta Serve Somebody,” and I found myself thinking of my work with The Washington Institute, always pressing one more time into the integral relationship of faith to vocation to culture, always arguing one more time that vocation is integral, not incidental, to the missio Dei.

Dylan got that, poetically and profoundly—and of course I wish a simply conversation was possible, as I would love to hear him reflect again on this insight, one of the truest truths of the universe as it is.

You may be an ambassador to England or France
You may like to gamble, you might like to dance
You may be the heavyweight champion of the world
You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls.

You may be a preacher with your spiritual pride
You may be a city councilman taking bribes on the side
You may be working in a barbershop, you may know how to cut hair
You may be somebody’s mistress, may be somebody’s heir.

You’re gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You’re gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you’re gonna have to serve somebody.

Because of years living in relation to Pittsburgh—some years as a resident and many years as a visitor –I have been drinking Turner Dairy’s milk for a long time. This family-owned company offers the city an array of products that are a foretaste of eschatological cuisine.

Yesterday I drove up Jefferson Road in the east hills of Pittsburgh, and wound my way into the headquarters of the dairy, eager to finally meet Walt Turner. For years I have heard of him through good friends whose judgment I trust, and finally we sat down to talk. A remarkably thoughtful man about all things that matter, he has a deeply-wrought vision for his vocation, connecting cows and a city.

From a principled concern for safety and health, exceeding local and national regulations for a quality product, to the intriguing reality that Walt knows the names and histories of everyone who works for him—stopping along the way of the tour he gave me to talk to scientists and engineers and bottlers and loaders and drivers and office-staff –to the fascinating family-wide, generational commitment to serving the city of Pittsburgh, the longer I listened the more deeply I loved this man.

We sat down at a table with magazines and newspapers telling the tale of the dairy. From the Post-Gazette’s “Best Place to Work” to its Gold Medals and First Places in national competitions, they have achieved an excellence that is rare. But it is the unusual heart of a man and his family that have stewarded a vision of business as common grace for the common good that makes sense of who they are and what they do– and makes their 1% Chocolate Milk not only tasty, but healthy too.

So as we talked we gloried in the gift of that comes from cows, imaginatively mixed together with cocoa by the Turner Dairy, making it the best chocolate milk in America. A conversation about a calling, about cows, about a city, and about the common good—a gift to me, and to all of us.

A week ago I gave a lecture to a large gathering of town-and-gown on the Cornell University campus in Ithaca, NY. A weekend given to the “between two worlds” dynamic that John Stott articulated in his life and writing, it was a gift to be part of their life for several days.

I took up the famous words, and warning, of the novelist and essayist Walker Percy in his story, “The Second Coming,” viz. that lurking around the corner of everyone’s heart is the possibility of “getting all A’s and still flunking life.”

While the question of the responsibility of knowledge goes deep in my life—the relationship of knowing to doing –its reality ripples through everyone’s life. In fact I would argue that it is the heart of everyone’s heart, sons of Adam and daughters of Eve that we are. Since the beginning of time we are people who stumble over what we know, and what we do with what we know. Or in the words of the Great Temptation, “What will you do with what you know?”– an epistemological temptation with a moral thrust.

I chose to begin the lecture with the very new news of the final court resolution of a heart-breaking tragedy here in Washington. Only a week earlier the horrible murder of a young woman by another young woman, both employees working at the Lululemon Store in an upscale shopping district of the city, had finally come to a sad end with a murder conviction. Awful as that was in every way, that the employees of the Apple Store next door, sharing an adjoining wall, heard the repeated cries, “Help me! Help me! Help me!” and chose to do nothing, only added to the horror.

How is it possible that we call people like that “geniuses” and “experts”? Those being, of course, the designations that Apple gives its store employees. Having been at the local mall several times in the last few days, needing work done on my MacBook Pro, and seeing a Lululemon store across the hall from the Apple store– a commercial proximity that is repeated all over the country, if not the world –keeps this question before me. What does it mean to “know”? And to be responsible for what we know?

Before the lecture was all over we stepped into a longer reflection on Michael Polanyi and Walker Percy, and the ways that both critically recast the meaning of the Enlightenment in light of what Percy called “the murderous, mechanized 2oth-century.” Or as Polanyi asked, after watching two world wars run through Europe, ruining a civilization, “How is it possible that we can be brilliant and bad at the same time?”

Hard questions, always. Learning to learn in a way that connects knowledge with responsibility is the only way forward, the only way to be fully human. It was not a small thing that Vaclav Havel argued that “the secret of man is the secret of his responsibility”– responsible, able to respond.

Bringing the evening to a close, I offered the wisdom of the French philosopher Simone Weil, and especially her vision of sacramental learning. As if to put a point on that insight, the last night of her too-short life she wrote these words in her journal, the final words on the final page, “The most important task of teaching is to teach what means to know.”

It is always possible to get all A’s and still flunk life– for everyone of us.

Twice in the last few days I have been drawn into serious conversations with serious people about situations that are both complex and unjust. One was the reason for a dinner on Capitol Hill this week, and Meg and I walked into a house where long friends were gathering to think with a new friend from Sri Lanka about deeply-established patterns of social and economic oppression on the tea plantations of his country. A story repeated thousands of times over the centuries in every culture, those who have show very little interest in those who do not have, apart from the benefit gained from their hard work to grow and harvest the tea. How is it possible to eat a wonderful meal, glorying in the goodness, and at the same time respond to something that is painfully not right?

And then I was invited to take part in another long conversation at a think tank in the city, this time focused on the generational injustice of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Serving on the board of the group sponsoring the gathering already means that I am committed to working on this, but this time there were many people from many places who together came to hear stories of what is and of what might be. Most want to choose a side in this one—either the Israeli or the Palestinian –but that only further escalates the problem. It is a land of two peoples, and neither one is going away. We heard of hope, and of despair, both wrought from the reality that what is is not the way it’s supposed to be.

There are few days or weeks that issues like this don’t come knocking at the door of my heart. Sometimes I step in more fully, joining in as a board member, and other times I offer something less, even if heartfelt. But always the cries of longing come close, and I know that I cannot just act as if nothing can be done, that nothing is worth being done.

A few years ago my good friend Gideon Strauss asked me to write on the vocation of politics for Comment, the magazine he then edited. Over a summer I thought about it, and finally offered him “Making Peace with Proximate Justice.” The essay has gone far and wide, surprisingly, and still I hear from people from all over the world who have found its vision of something—not everything but not nothing either –a way forward as they try to respond to the world that is theirs.

I know of no other way to live.

http://www.cardus.ca/comment/article/932/finding-our-way-to-great-work-even-in-politics-making-peace-with-proximate-justice

***

We were talking about the Civil War, and Liam was wondering about which side had the better generals. He wanted to know if Robert E. Lee was a good general. I agreed that he was, and quickly added that Ulysses S. Grant was a good general too.

To which Liam replied, “Yeah, but only Jesus was perfect.” To this I also agreed, and let him continue, which he did.

“But Jesus still needed the disciples. I mean, they were the ones that wrote down all that he said and everything otherwise we wouldn’t know about it.”

I saw my window and dove through it. “You’re absolutely right, Liam, Jesus needed his disciples and you know what? That’s still true. Jesus still needs his disciples. We’re the disciples of Jesus now, and now we’re the way that Jesus gets his work done in the world. Isn’t that amazing?” Liam looked and listened, I continued.

“Yep, when Jesus left the world, he left his disciples to keep on doing what he started. And that’s what we get to do too.”

He nodded his head, satisfied, and gratified that his observation had been affirmed, and wanted to talk more about Robert E. Lee and how could it be that good generals would be fighting for the wrong team.

I decided it was probably wise to leave the more abstract discussion about whether or not Jesus ‘needs’ anything to another night, and whether or not God is limited by his own design. (Thankfully, he’s not.)

***

That God’s people are given the high vocation and holy invitation and sacred trust to “be the presence of Jesus for the world” is this vision that drives NT Wright’s remarkable little book Reflecting the Glory. It was the first book I ever read by the once Bishop, now professor Wright, and it was this one that compelled me to read more of him and led to my being hooked by him. Its pages are full of what makes him so helpful–it’s biblical, scholarly, accessible, devotional, theological, all at the same time. It is sweeping and inspiring. It’s classic Wright. Almost 15 years after it was first published, it still speaks, and provides a wonderful introduction to his thought in the best way possible, through his careful exposition of Scripture. For all that, however, in this book it is not NT Wright who shines most brightly, but the Scriptures themselves and the glorious truths the work of Christ presents.

The book is 53 short, 2-3 page reflections on key passages in the Bible. Imagine the New Testament is a field strewn thick with jewels. Reflecting the Glory is as if Wright walks into the field, picks up 53 big jewels, and proceeds to shine a floodlight through each one, casting out brilliant colors for all to see. Here we get to bathe in the light of the heart of 2 Corinthians, Colossians 1.24, 1 Peter 2 and Romans 8, Revelation 4 and 5, the gospel of John, and especially John 13-17, and it all concludes in the finale of resurrection seen through the lens of 1 Corinthians 15.

If you want a devotional overview of what drives Wright’s vision, this is it. Even better, if you want clearer sight of the glory of the gospel’s many-splendored, implications, this book will do it. Throughout the work emerge and re-emerge the themes of the role of the Holy Spirit, suffering, the Church, transformation, glory, creation and new creation, Paul’s life and self-understanding, forgiveness of sin, resurrection, worship, work, and wonder, and of course Jesus himself, on every page.

And it holds together with this paragraph from the introduction:

The more we find out about Jesus, and particularly about his death and resurrection, the more we are then energized by the Spirit to reveal God’s love to the world. In John 20 Jesus breathes on the disciples and says to them, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you. Receive the Holy Spirit.” And suddenly we see the whole vista of what God did in Jesus, through his healing and his suffering, through his parables, his celebrations, and ultimately his agony. And, with that, we discover that the story of Jesus’ ministry is not only the story of what he did in history, but encompasses also the vocation that comes to us in the present: that we should be, in the power of the Spirit, the presence of Jesus for the whole world. This discovery brings the most remarkable joy and the most remarkable sorrow. This is our vocation: to take up our cross, and be Jesus for the whole world, living with the joy and the sorrow woven into the pattern of our days. (9-10)

There it is, Wright talking about the vocation under which all of our other vocations, including our daily work, find their rightful place. Whatever else it may be, for Christians what we do with the moments of our days and the work of our hands can be the way that Jesus continues to minister through the work of our hands in the moments of our days.

Indeed, Liam, Jesus needs his disciples; that’s the way he designed it, and it’s remarkable that we should be given so much dignity. To recognize it indeed brings both joy and sorrow, for it means greater purpose and opportunity than we could imagine, while at the same time guaranteeing more hardship than we might think we can bear. And we live with this call and this reality pretty much every day. Each day holds its share of laughter and tears, and in Christ, each have deep meaning. Just look at Paul’s life, which is what Wright helps us to do. Just hear Jesus’ words, which is what Wright helps us to do. And better, look at Jesus’ life, all of it. And there we see “the dying and the rising of Jesus, both as the final revelation of God, and as the blueprint for the vocation that is now given to God’s people through the Spirit.” (11)

***

So Lent is almost upon us, in just a few days, beginning February 22. Growing up Baptist, initially I had no reason even to notice it much, let alone do anything with it. But then I became Anglican, and the liturgical seasons of the church opened up to me, at least in external form. Initially, like most of us, I practiced Lent by giving something up, to somehow increase my focus on God.

But over the years, Lent has actually become my favorite church season, for it is the opportunity not only to take a new spiritual discipline or two, but more deeply to be reminded of how much I need Jesus, not only for forgiveness of sin, but for everything. It’s a season to focus hard on how much we need God.

Wright’s book however adds a different dimension to the Lenten season. While it is right to focus on how much we need God and give up certain things to mark our penitence and enhance our focus, to discipline ourselves spiritually, it is equally right and maybe a needed corrective to use this season to focus on how much God has invited us to in Christ, and let his vocation inform the understanding of our own through thoughtful and prayerful reflection.

Lent is not just for reminding us of our need for forgiveness, but also for reminding us of the height of our calling. We can in this season focus more conscientiously on what we’ve been saved from, and we can also, and should, let this season remind us what we’ve been saved for. We’ve been forgiven by Jesus so that we can be the presence of Jesus ‘til he comes again, and be with him on that day. This is where Wright’s book provides such a helpful and compelling explanation and reminder.

***

Lent lasts 40 days, or 46, depending on whether or not one counts its Sundays, which as the day of Christ’s resurrection, is never seen as a fast day but a feast day, even in the Lenten season. Either way, Wright’s book has more chapters than Lent has days. So what to do? Does it still work as a good book for Lent? Yes, absolutely, in one of two ways.

Either we can read a chapter a day, including Sundays, and double up on few of them and have the reading done by Easter. Or better and more likely, we can assume that reading it devotionally each day will stretch into the Easter season, and then not have to worry about missing a day or two, or more. However the book is read, to do it as a spiritual discipline of prayerful reflection on Scripture, with much time to savor each reading, is the best way. Frankly, a person could take six months on it and still not plumb its depths, again because it’s not about understanding Tom Wright, but about understanding God’s Word and God’s way and his way is inexhaustible and his Word unfathomable.

***

Wright concludes with thoughts on 1 Corinthians 15.58, in 15 year-old words reminiscent of words we often use today at The Washington Institute: Our work matters. These are good ones to take into Lent as we remember deeply what we’ve been saved from, and more deeply still ponder what we’ve been saved for, and get ready to celebrate Easter all the better for having made a good Lent.

“Therefore, my beloved brothers and sisters, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.”

What we do in the present matters. We are not simply oiling the wheels of a machine that will one day fall off the edge of a cliff. We must continue with our work of building for the kingdom of God…The great transformation is still to come. But when it does come, the holiness that we strive now to attain, the Christian work we struggle to achieve, the acts of justice and mercy that we try to accomplish, all our deeds of love and goodness, creativity, and beauty–all these will be enhanced, transformed in the new world God is going to make….Our calling today, throughout our life as God’s Easter people, is to remain steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord. And we know that what we do here and now, in the strength of the Easter Jesus, will not, will never be, in vain. (166)

So for all the sorrow, a joy-filled Lent to us all, and an Easter more joyful still!

-

Rev. Bill Haley is the Director of Formation at The Washington Institute and Associate rector at The Falls Church in Falls Church, Virginia.

(Pastor Tom Nelson delivered this sermon September 14, 2008 to his congregation at Christ Community Church in Leawood, Kansas as part of his “The Curse of the Cubicle” series)

Welcome to Christ Community where we take our faith seriously, but we have fun not taking ourselves too seriously! This morning we are continuing our message series on work, exploring together the rich biblical truths of vocation and calling.  It is our hope that each one of us might better connect our faith with our work, to better bridge the Sunday-to-Monday gap.

Before we begin this morning’s message, I would like to briefly review where we have been. We began last week by making a very important distinction between our primary calling and secondary callings. Our primary calling is what the bible speaks primarily about–that is our call to embrace Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior and become his yoked apprentice. The bible also speaks of our secondary callings, which include not only our stations of life such as singleness or marriage, but also our particular work.

Though our focus is on work in this series, it is important for each of us to firmly plant in our minds that the doctrine of Christian vocation permeates virtually every aspect of our Christian lives.  Gene Veith hits the bulls eye of truth when he writes, “The doctrine of vocation is not just a teaching about the value of work. It comprises a theology of the Christian life” (Gene Edward Veith Jr.). Last week we began our exploration of the doctrine of vocation by looking at God’s original design for work. We raised a bedrock question: Why do we work?

We Are Made In His Image

The bible informs us that we work because we are made in the image of the triune God who Himself is a worker! God is not a couch potato God nor did he make a couch potato world.

We Were Created To Contribute

In God’s original creation design each of us was designed to work…We were created to contribute to God’s ongoing creation…to join in with God, to advance His redemptive mission in the world. Our vocation is both an act of worship and an important stewardship. So what is work?  Our  work, whether we are paid for it or not, is our human contribution to God’s ongoing creation, an essential aspect of God’s Great Commandment to love our neighbor as our self.

I have a hunch this morning that many of you are thinking, “Tom, that sounds all well and good, but get real…you don’t know my situation in the ‘real’ world; my work is often a big pain! You don’t know the pressures I feel! You don’t know my boss!  You don’t know the moron I work with!” And you are right, in the sense that I don’t know all that you are facing in this competitive, fast paced, nanosecond world, but I would like to probe the Holy Scriptures and see if we can gain some greater understanding on why work is often such a pain as well as suggest some things that might be helpful for you along the way.  Before we begin, let’s bow for prayer!

Prayer

When it comes to the work you have called us to, we are at different places. Some of us are in a sweet spot; others are in a tough spot. The pressure to perform, the pace–we feel like a gerbil on a treadmill in a cage. Some work hard, often appreciated without a paycheck. Others are looking for employment. Others are self-employed. Some are one paycheck from financial disaster.  The stresses are real and the challenges are great. Lord you know each person and each situation. Through your Word bring encouragement, challenge, and needed direction for the journey. Amen

Is Work A Four Letter Word?  (Genesis 3:17-19)

Introduction

I am not a big-time yard jock, but I must admit that I like listening to Toby Tobin’s radio show. And I’ve always liked lawn work, that is until recently when something took the wind out of my sails. Frankly, it happened so very quickly I couldn’t stop it! The momentum of my revved-up lawnmower devoured the extended sprinkler head hidden in the tall grass. Black pieces of my sprinkler flew all over my back yard. At that agonizing moment: words suddenly snuck out of my mouth that, well, I don’t think I will repeat for you this morning; I’ll leave that to your imagination–not because I want to protect any false illusion of my personal piety, but more transparently because I would like to preserve my job! Needless to say, I was not a very happy camper when my sprinkler head disintegrated before my eyes and my tongue revealed to anyone within hearing distance, that I the “right”  reverend was neither right nor very reverent at the moment.  Work, sometimes it makes me want to curse!

Work: It Makes Me Want To Curse

Whether it is at home, in a classroom, on a factory floor, or in the office, work can be a big pain!

• Facing an urgent deadline and having a computer crash, is a big pain!
• Dealing with difficult customers or serving under a demanding boss is a big pain!
• Having to let an employee go or downsize a labor force is a big pain!
• Facing a family’s mountain of dirty laundry is a big pain!

Work, it makes us want to curse! But why?  Why is work so often such a pain? If you have a bible, turn with me to the book of Genesis!

Why Is Work So Often Such A Pain?

Though the bible does not give us all the answers to this question we might desire, it does gives us a helpful framework that paves the way for greater understanding.  On television commercials and in magazines ads, we have all seen many contrasting before and after pictures! Advertisers use them to sell products aimed at weight loss, cosmetic surgery or home improvement. Well guess what?  The biblical writers also paint “before and after” literary pictures in telling their story. In the first three chapters of the bible we are given a contrasting “before and after” picture of work!

Last week we looked at “the before” picture in Genesis 1 and 2. It is a delightful picture of Adam and Eve co-creating, co-working with God in the context of a joyful and intimate relationship with Him and each other. What we see in “the before” picture of Genesis 1 & 2 is that God didn’t design human work to be a frustrating pain, He designed it to be an exhilarating pleasure.

This morning as we come to Genesis chapter 3 we encounter “the after”  picture. The “after picture” portrays humankind’s tragic fall into sin and death! In humankind’s act of great folly, Adam and Eve rebel against God. Paradise is lost and sin wreaks a devastating effect on human work.

Paradise Lost: Sin’s Devastating Effect On Work!

The Genesis narrative tells us that while work is not a result of the curse, work itself was profoundly impacted by the curse.  If we grasp what the biblical writers tell us, then we realize that my work, your work, whatever it may be, is not at all what it ought to be. In this fallen and broken world, God’s original design for our work has been badly corrupted.  So what happened? Let’s take a look at Genesis 3, verses 17-19.

Genesis 3:17-19

Then to Adam He (God) said, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat from it’; Cursed is the ground because of you; In toil you will eat of it All the days of your life.

“Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you; And you will eat the plants of the field; By the sweat of your face You will eat bread, Till you return to the ground, Because from it you were taken; For you are dust, And to dust you shall return.”

Like he did earlier with the serpent, here in verse 17, the biblical writer employs the word “curse” to describe a new reality and its massive and devastating effect on work. In our cultural context, the word “curse” immediately brings to our minds images of a kind of mystical hocus-pocus (A kind of occultist witch-doctor voodoo sort of thing)–someone casting spells on others like the Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz.  Though I don’t want to minimize the very real presence and power of Satan, evil, demons and occultic practices in our world, the word “curse” here in this text is not primarily portraying this. What does this word “curse” mean here?  You will notice the far-reaching and long lasting changes described regarding work in verses 17, 18, and 19.  The very nature and context of human work has fundamentally changed.  As you read these verses, you can almost hear the intensity of hurricane force winds transforming the entire landscape of human existence, hear the groaning of creation and feel the weariness as work is placed under a heavy weight–a weight, humans were not originally designed to bear. Work is now toilsome and difficult. There will be thorns and thistles and the sweat of the brow! This vivid biblical imagery, of the curse paints the dire picture of the far-reaching and devastating consequences of rebellion against a good, just, and holy God.

In The Lion, The Witch And the Wardrobe, C.S. Lewis captures well this curse language in Genesis 3. If you have read this classic work or even seen the movie you know that Lewis’ mythical Narnia once displayed the vibrant and flourishing warmth of summer, but now it faces the chilling cold of winter. Lucy questions Mr. Tumnus about the White Witch whose curse has so dreadfully altered the land of Narnia. Mr. Tumnus responds, “Why, it is she that has got Narnia under her thumb. It’s she that makes it always winter. Always winter and never Christmas, think of that.”  Lucy blurts out, “How awful!”

Awful indeed! Evil, sin, and death entering the world had a ravaging effect on all of creation. It is like it is always winter and never Christmas. There is alienation from God, alienation from other human beings, and yes, alienation from work. In theologian Miroslav Volf’s words, “God’s curse after the Fall expresses the fact that alienation is inherent to the human experience of work” (Work in the Spirit, pg. 167).

In A Broken World, Work Is Not What It Ought To Be

The Apostle Paul knew well Genesis chapter 3 and he reminds us in Romans 8:23-34 that we along with cursed and fallen creation continue to groan deeply—a visceral groaning in the very depths of our being, one that permeates every aspect of our work with what I like to call a three “D” impact. Our work has become difficult, distorted and disillusioning.

1) Work is often painfully difficult!

Sin entering the world and corrupting God’s design has made work harder. The systems, technologies, economics, and structure reflect a fallen, broken world. We face difficult people in the workplace…and we are one of them. We face difficult competition…backstabbing political maneuvering in the workplace…people who play the power game to their career advantage. We face jobs that are less than desirable!

Illustration of Dirty Jobs TV show

One of the things that has surprised me is the increasing popularity of Discovery Channel’s Dirty Jobs. Dirty Jobs is hosted by Mike Rowe who has become a household name. Mike Rowe gets his hands dirty as he takes on icky, dirty jobs all the way from rattlesnake catchers to septic tank technicians.

On his popular website, Mike invites all who are stuck in a dead end job and are combing through the classifieds to consider a new calling. Here is one of the dirty jobs on his classified list: If you’re looking for a job, perhaps you should consider…

The Road Kill Collector:

“Must be able to work long hours braving oncoming traffic while picking up creatures of various size and breed and in various states of decay. Benefits include working outdoors. Strong stomach a plus!

Catfish Noodler:

“In search of people who can catch potentially 100 pound catfish with their hands only. Must not mind sticking limbs in holes in search of game and getting bitten as a result.”

I am not sure these job listings are very popular on monster.com. The truth that work is difficult, and some work is downright stinky and dirty has made Dirty Jobs a ratings success.  The curse of the Fall means work is often painfully difficult!

2) Work is often badly distorted!

Humankind’s fall into sin not only affected our relationships, but also our understanding of work itself. The lens through which you and I view and understand our world has been shattered and distorted, and this includes how we see our work.   Work can be distorted in three basic ways:

A) Work can be seen as no big deal:  This is the destructive danger of slothfulness!   The bible warns us of the peril of neglecting our work.  The book of Proverbs highlights the foolishness of a sluggard and calls us to diligence. So does the Apostle Paul when he says, “he who is unwilling to work, neither let him eat.” To be unwilling to work—to contribute—is a fundamental violation of our creation design.

B) Work can be seen as too big of a deal:  This is the destructive danger of “workaholism”–Where our identity is centered in and our entire life revolves around what we do. In this common form of idolatry, we worship our work and live our lives as if God does not exist. This can be driven by our pursuit of the American dream, of material comforts, of financial security or of propping up a certain image. It can be driven by greed and rebellion against God. Excessive devotion to work crowds out both our relationship with God and others. In his parable of the rich fool, Jesus warned about the peril of a life lived without God, one that worshipped self, work and personal comfort. Workaholism is a very big and destructive distortion that wreaks havoc to individuals’ health, to marriages, to families and to the church. The sin of a hurried, harried and preoccupied, marginless life is rampant not only in broader society, but also the church. When our work gets out of whack, we can be assured our life is out whack too!

C) Some work can be seen as more important than other work:  This is the destructive danger of a work dualism. Dualism simply means we wrongly divide something that should not be divided. Or we wrongly distinguish one thing from another thing, or we value one thing at the expense of another thing. In their insightful book, Your Work Matters To God, Bill Hendricks and Doug Sherman describe this distorted picture of work as a two story work world. The upper story is seen as a “higher calling,” one devoted to the church or religious or sacred work, and then there is a lower calling, a lower story which is secular work.  This unbiblical work dualism distortion is so dangerous because it is subtle and sounds so spiritual. But it is faulty to the core. Work dualism can be seen in various Christian traditions. For example, we see this in the use of language such as “full-time Christian work” by which is often meant the vocational calling of pastors, missionaries or parachurch workers.

This distortion of work dualism can also be seen in monastic impulses calling followers of Jesus to withdraw from the normal day to day world to pursue a highly spiritual and highly mystical contemplative life, where we leave common day-to-day life to find God in some deeper way or experience his presence in some more concentrated way. In perpetuating this distortion we reinforce a false two-story work world, one that elevates certain vocations over others and reinforces the unbiblical idea of a withdrawing from the world rather than an engaging of it.

***

As apprentices of Jesus we have all been called into full-time Christian work. That doesn’t mean we are all called to be a pastor, parachurch worker, or a missionary. My calling as a pastor, though I am paid to do what I am called to do, is no more or less full-time Christian work than any of your callings here this morning. Your mission field is right where God has called you to work, or study, or where you volunteer!  Dorothy Sayers, highlights the rich doctrine of vocation and shatters any work dualism when she states, “The only Christian work is good work well done.”

Emphasizing the rich rediscovery of the doctrine of vocation by the Protestant Reformers of the 16^th century, Edward Gene Veith speaks with crystal clarity. Veith states, “The priesthood of all believers, (Namely that all true Christians have equal access to God and value before God) did not make everyone into church workers; rather it turned every kind of work into a sacred calling” (Edward Gene Veith, God at Work, pg. 19). In our growing understanding of work, we must become increasingly aware and avoid the distortion of slothfulness, the distortion of workaholism and the distortion of religious dualism! Because of humankind’s fall, work has become difficult, distorted and also disillusioning.

3) Work is often very disillusioning!

The writer of Ecclesiastes transparently addresses the disillusionment that is part of this fallen world and our daily experience in it. The author’s mad pursuit of power, pleasure, and material comforts leads him to the disillusioning conclusion that it’s all for naught. Satisfaction and fulfillment elude him in his pursuits, particularly his work.  It is as if he had before him the lyrics of the Rolling Stones classic, “I can’t get no satisfaction, but I try and I try and I try…”

If you haven’t read through the book of Ecclesiastes recently, I would encourage you to do so. It speaks to our fallen human experience in powerful ways, particularly with work. Though written thousands of years ago, it is one of the best books I have ever read on work. If you have your bible open, flip over to Ecclesiastes. Let me highlight a couple of texts to prime the pump of your curiosity.

Ecclesiastes 2:17-18

So I hated life, for the work which had been done under the sun was grievous to me; because everything is futility and striving after wind.  Thus I hated all the fruit of my labor for which I had labored under the sun, for I must leave it to the man who will come after me.

Ecclesiastes 2:22-23

For what does a man get in all his labor and in his striving with which he labors under the sun? Because all his days his task is painful and grievous; even at night his mind does not rest. This too is vanity.

Here in these verses the biblical writer captures the disillusionment that often comes with our work. Though our work is often difficult and disillusioning the writer of Ecclesiastes also recognizes our work as a very good thing, a gift from God.

Ecclesiastes 3:12-13

I know that there is nothing better for them than to rejoice and to do good in one’s lifetime; moreover, that every man who eats and drinks sees good in all his labor–it is the gift of God.

The writer of Ecclesiastes reminds us that work in this broken and fallen world is a mixed bag. It is both a curse and a gift. It brings us frustration and exhilaration. Yet work calls us not to an eeyore kind of pessimism, but to a tigger kind of hopeful realism.

In your conversation starter this morning, you have a very thoughtful extract of Theologian Miroslav Volf’s seminal thoughts which I highly encourage you to read. Volf summarizes the before and after picture of work well when he writes, “Together Genesis 2:15 and Genesis 3:17ff. affirm that the inescapable reality of human sin makes work unavoidably an ambiguous reality: it is both a noble expression of human creation in the image of God and a painful testimony to human estrangement from God”  (Work in the Spirit, pg. 168).

Reflection on Bridging The Sunday To Monday Gap

 Cultivating A Hopeful Realism About Work

1) Remain Hopeful In The Midst Of Work’s Inevitable Difficulties!

This morning you may be facing the frustration of unemployment, or underemployment or you may be facing some very real difficulties in your work. In this series I have asked you to e-mail me and let me know what challenges you are facing, and I have been encouraged by your responses.

I received an e-mail from a member of our congregation describing his vocation in business in the highly competitive global corporate world. He writes:

“It’s…like a daily Private Ryan hit-the-beach environment. The landing gear goes down and the bullets are flying. People next to you are dropping or getting hit while you scramble up the beach to accomplish your individual mission…without getting hit! Bullets come from everywhere: customers, your own company, competition and your own troops. The goals are extraordinarily difficult to complete…Morale suffers under the carnage.”

His email ends with a hopeful note:

“Business calls it leadership. As yoke mates we call it Worship…actual breathing, reflecting, imaging Him whenever possible. Even when it’s foggy, cloudy or pitch black.”

I also received an e-mail from a member of our congregation who is presently a stay at home mom.  She writes:

“A stay at home mom doesn’t get a lot of accolades or affirmation. No paycheck. No glowing review from their boss. I have been working through these thoughts and feelings and several weeks ago decided I wasn’t going to spend any more time feeling like a victim….I have had a new outlook on life over these past few weeks and I feel so much better…I have never thought of being a mother as an act of worship. I can look at it in a whole new way now!…I can now see the contributions I make to my household as what I was uniquely created  to do for this season of life.”

Our work can be difficult, it can be a pain at times, but we do not have to live in an eeyore fog of melancholy and discouragement.  If we grasp the truth of God’s word about our work, we can remain hopefully buoyant even in difficult job circumstances.

James 1:2-3 (The Message)

“Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides.”

(does that sound like your work place or what?)

“You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don’t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way.”

Like the institution of marriage or the local church, the work God calls us to is one of God’s main conduits to bring us to increasing maturity in Christ. It was Martin Luther’s conclusion that “God’s complete work is set in motion through vocation” (Gustaf Wingren, Luther on Vocation, pg. 33). Cultivate an attitude of gratitude that you do have a job and an income that often comes from it to provide for your needs, to provide for your family, and to generously share with others.

2) See Your Work As An Opportunity For Personal Growth and Influence!

As I look back at my life and my vocational work, I realize that some of the times of my greatest personal and leadership growth have been in the most difficult days. When my work has been the most demanding, when my inadequacy has been most inescapable, as I have had to trust God for wisdom and strength, my growth as a human being has been the most significant!

In Romans chapter 5, after the Apostle Paul articulates the transformational truth of the Gospel of Jesus–that we find new creation life by faith alone in Christ alone–he lays out God’s path for our transformation. It is not a path of ease, but it is one of enduring hope. In verses 3-5, Paul declares:

“And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope;  and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.”

We must fix deeply in our hearts and minds that our work, though often difficult, is one of God’s main means for our spiritual growth and transformation! Work is where perseverance, proven character, and hope often are deeply forged. Our work is also where we are called to be salt and light, to live salty lives of influence. When we understand the rich truths of vocation, we realize that Christ wants us fully engaged in our vocation. Healthy spiritual growth is not about withdrawing from the world, but engaging in it in our work, for he has made us for the street.

3) Build A Healthy Rhythm Of Both Hard Work And Sabbath Rest!

We live in a time where human work has dramatically changed. In a high tech, 24/7, nanosecond, global world, each one of us needs to establish healthy boundaries and a regular life rhythm of engagement (work) and withdrawal (rest). This will require us to build margin in our lives, our schedules, and our finances. For many this might very well mean simplifying your life. The frenetic pace and the ambitious pursuit of the American Dream and increasing material affluence often brings with it a very high cost.  Our work world needs to be shaped wisely or it will wrongly shape us. Building a healthy rhythm of both hard work and regular rest raises the importance of close knit spiritual community with others who help us as well as our own personal vibrant prayer life. Trying to fulfill our vocations, to do true Christian work–work that is well done–requires both times of disciplined prayer and ongoing prayerful conversation with God throughout the day. Trying to do our vocation without prayer virtually shuts God out of our work. Many of us approach our work–what we do the majority of the week–as practical atheists, and sadly that includes full-time vocational Christian workers and pastors.

God’s Word clearly reminds us that in this very broken world with broken people, Work will never be all it was intended to be. Though sin entered the world, the good news is so did the Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, who came to this sin-stained earth and died on a cruel Roman cross, the redeemer of not only human souls, but also a fallen world. Have you embraced Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior? Do you know Christ?  Someone has rightly said, “If you miss Christ you miss it all.” Without knowing Christ not only is life unfulfilling, work is also unfulfilling.

***

Recently I was sitting on my back deck as the sun set:  the lingering shadows of light, the crisp cool fall air, the carpet of green, and the aroma of flowers. I sat there just wanting to soak it in. As I savored this moment of God’s beautiful creation, as breathtaking as it was, I found myself wondering what this must have been like before it was corrupted by sin entering the world. None of us have ever seen the pristine breathtaking beauty of creation as it was originally designed to be. None of us have ever experienced our creative work as it was designed to be. We can only imagine what life was like before sin and death entered this world.

But there is good news! The “before and after” picture of Genesis 3 is not the last picture! As the Good News story ends, a great new picture emerges–a picture of a new creation! Of a brand new heavens and a new earth!

Shortly before Jesus made his way to the cross, he spoke not of the “before” picture of Genesis 1-2, or the “after” picture of Genesis 3, but of the last picture. And He left his disciples with these hopeful words, “In my Father’s house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.”  (John 14:2)

Conclusion

In his beautiful poem, “When Earth’s Last Picture Is Painted,” Rudyard Kipling penned these words:

“When earth’s last picture is painted,
And the tubes are twisted and dried,
When the oldest colors have faded,
And the youngest critic has died,

We shall rest, and faith, we shall need it,
Lie down for an aeon or two,
Till the Master of all good workmen
Shall put us to work anew…

…And no one will work for the money,
No one will work for the fame.
But each for the joy of the working,
And each, in his separate star,
Will draw the thing as he sees it.
For the God of things as they are!

Our work is not what it ought to be, but one day it will be!  Let’s pray!

Closing Prayer

Our work is not what it was designed to be, but one day we will experience work as it ought to be in the New Heavens and New Earth that are being prepared for us!  Because of Christ, Paradise Lost will one day be Paradise Re-gained.

Benediction

A close friend and colleague of William Wilberforce was Henry Thornton.  A devout Christian, Henry’s vocational calling was in banking. One of the lasting legacies Henry Thornton left behind were the prayers he wrote for his family’s time of prayer. Henry Thornton’s prayers have been a delightful companion to my soul. For our benediction this morning, I bless you and dismiss you with his words:

“Almighty God, by whose will we were created, and by whose providence we have been sustained, grant to us your blessing this day! You have given to each of us our work in life; Lord enable us to diligently perform our respective duties.  May we not waste our time in unprofitableness and idleness, nor be unfaithful to any trust committed to us. By Your grace strengthen each of us for the performance of duties before us.”

And may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.

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Tom Nelson is the senior pastor at Christ Community Church in Leawood, Kansas and is author of Work Matters.

OK, I made those last two up in a lame attempt to bring a chuckle. This happened years ago, as I started my communications career, so some of the details are a bit fuzzy. But the story is true and the vocational lessons learned guide me to this day.

Alone back then in an unheated, dimly lit, glorified tree house they had the audacity to call a press box, I bent over my yellow legal pad, charting each play of the game with a dull pencil and increasingly numb hand. I craved a hot cup of coffee in the worst way but the only thing on the menu that night was “humble pie.”

“Let’s see,” I asked myself, peering through the pelting rain. “Was that last run by number 32 a 3-yard gain or a 4-yard gain? Let’s be generous and give him 4 yards.”

How did it come to this?

Two years earlier I was covering the Green Bay Packers, not Green Run High School. Writing for a national news service, I was among the select few in a heated, glass-enclosed press box above legendary Lambeau Field, a press box stocked with piping hot coffee, the best stadium bratwursts in America and professional statisticians keeping me well-informed as the game went along. With much prayer and more than a little faith, I quit that fun job to get a master’s degree in journalism that would help me transition, I thought, from a sportswriter to a hard-hitting news reporter who would afflict the comfortable, comfort the afflicted, expose evildoers, right wrongs and win a Pulitzer Prize (or two), humbly giving credit to God, of course, in my glorious acceptance speech that would be videotaped for aspiring young journalists to listen to and learn from for years to come.

Things didn’t unfold as I envisioned. After graduate school, with my wife six months pregnant with our first child, I applied to all the major newspapers I could think of in the Midwest and on the East Coast. The only job I could land was covering high school sports for the Beacon, a Virginia Beach tabloid inserted into The Virginian-Pilot a few times a week before it lined the bottom of many bird feeders. I seemed to be descending, not ascending, the career ladder, and felt confused, frustrated and, during particularly humbling moments like this, ornery. It was my first—and certainly not my last—encounter with “downward mobility.”

***

Over the years, I have learned a thing or two about this downward mobility, a counter-cultural lifestyle we as Christians are called to embrace, even in our jobs. Do a search for “humility” or “servant” in your Bible and you will see what I mean. You will eventually find yourself in Philippians 2.

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death–even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

So how can we live out this calling of intentional downward mobility on our jobs? Here are three suggestions this Lenten season.

ASK GOD FOR HUMILITY: I try to pray regularly for humility. One of my favorite verses is 1 Peter 5:6, which says, “Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.” Take it from me, this is a lesson you will have to learn as a Christ follower, and it is far better to humble yourself than to have God humble you. That “due time” of lifting up (some translations say He will “exalt” you) rarely seems to be my chosen time, but His, with a notable exception. Sometimes I like to think of it as “dew” time, the early morning time of blessed, precious, intentional silence when I seek and receive His presence while the dew is still on the grass. Have you ever asked God for humility?

STOP PROMOTING YOURSELF: In this era of promoting your personal “brand” on Linkedin, on your blog (you do have a blog, don’t you?), to your boss, to your co-workers, to your customers and constituencies. This is somewhat radical, especially in a place like Washington where the perception of power is power, and power is the name of the game. There was a time when quiet, loyal hard work over years of service was more valued and rewarded by employers. Giving others on your team credit for a successful project while downplaying your role may seem suicidal, and perhaps it is. It’s certainly sacrificial, which makes it perfect for Lent. Try fasting from self-promotion for a few weeks. Let me know what happens (email address below).

SEEK SECRET SERVICE: I’m not talking about donning a dark suit and sunglasses to protect the president but finding small ways to serve others in your work. Make the morning coffee without letting anyone know who did it. Quietly volunteer for menial tasks. Better yet, just do them. Do excellent work, beyond the call of duty, to serve your customers. Take that struggling colleague to coffee or lunch to encourage him or her, and don’t tell another soul. The Lord sees and is pleased. Oswald Chambers, reflecting on Philippians 2:17 (see February 5 entry of his classic devotional, “My Utmost for His Highest”) put it this way: “Are you ready to be not so much as a drop in a bucket – to be so hopelessly insignificant that you are never thought of again in connection with the life you served? Are you willing to spend and be spent: not seeking to be ministered unto, but to minister? Some saints cannot do menial work and remain saints because it is beneath their dignity.”

***

After that miserable football game ended it was my job to interview and get quotes from the high school coaches and athletes for the article I would write.

Have you ever smelled a locker room full of grunting, belching, muddied, sweating, testosterone-charged adolescent boys after playing a football game in the rain? I sought and found the team’s quarterback getting dressed at his locker.

Award-winning journalist with a master’s degree: “On your game-winning touchdown pass, what did you see and how did the play develop?”

Inarticulate adolescent: “I looked up. Saw he was open. So I threw it.”

Award-winning journalist with a master’s degree, realizing that last quote stinks so he better come up with another question to try to get something useable out of this kid: “How did you feel when you realized he caught the pass and the game was essentially over?”

Inarticulate adolescent: “Cold.”

I wondered if Woodward and Bernstein experienced something like this. Sometime after that miserable game, exactly when I can’t recall, it dawned on me that my on-the-job attitude wasn’t exactly reflective of Philippians 2. I repented, asking God for humility, asking Him for new eyes to see who I can serve covering high school sports for The Beacon.

I soon began to notice articles I wrote cut out and proudly tacked on to bulletin boards outside the office of high school coaches. I became aware that when I mentioned some inarticulate adolescent’s name in the community newspaper a happy mother or grandmother called friends and family and put that article into a scrapbook which would one day be read and cherished by that inarticulate kid’s children and grandchildren. I saw how people who couldn’t get to the game, perhaps due to weather, truly relied on my reports for information.

This was community journalism. Covering the Green Bay Packers for a national news service, I never heard from readers and it’s unlikely many people cherished my articles as family keepsakes.

My grumbling turned into gratitude, my misery into joy. This was my calling for this season of my life, a blessed season of downward mobility.

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Mark O’Keefe is a communications consultant for nonprofits and businesses. Contact him at okeefemark@verizon.net and find him on Linkedin.

One of the reasons that I have chosen to live within the literary vision of Wendell Berry is that he writes about this kind of common life. In every course I teach I require my students to read him and learn, looking over-his-shoulder and through-his-heart as he unfolds a vision of vocation that is formed by the truest truths of the universe, and yet in language the whole world can understand.

After years of schooling and getting the job he had long longed for, Berry decided that his deeper identity was as someone from Kentucky, and that he should return home–a decision that has shaped his life and literature for the rest of his life. Buying into the family farm, he taught writing for awhile at the university, but over time settled into the rhythm that has become his life: husband, father, farmer, writer, neighbor, friend, day after day after day.

It is not a surprise then that his stories are about people a lot like him. Imagining a small town on the banks of the Kentucky River, he has created a universe out of Port William, with its farmers and shopkeepers, fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, generationally twined together over a hundred years.

That Distant Land tells these tales as short stories, giving windows into the lives of people Berry’s readers come to know and love. The Old Jacks, the Miss Minnies, the Mat Feltners, the Burley Coulters, the Mary Penns, and the Wheeler Catletts, each one painted with a skillful brush, with complexity and nuance, richness and depth.

Take Wheeler, for example. The subject of several stories, we meet him as a young boy on his way to becoming a young man in the story, “Blood Is Thicker Than Liquor.” As a child he loved his Uncle Peach, his mother’s brother; they would play and laugh, full of pleasure together. But as Wheeler became an adolescent he began to see that Uncle Peach was an alcoholic, and was drunk more often than not. Rather than happy to be in relationship, Wheeler wanted nothing to do with him.

Seeing how his mother troubled herself with Uncle Peach and mourned over him, Wheeler said, bullying her in her own defense as a seventeen-year-old-boy is apt to do, “To hell with him! Why don’t you let him get on by himself the best way he can? What’s he done for you?”

Dorie answered his first question, ignoring the second: “Because blood is thicker than water.”

And Wheeler said, mocking her, “Blood is thicker than liquor.”

“Yes,” she said. “Thicker than liquor too.”

Wheeler goes off to the university, then to law school, and returns home to begin his life as an attorney and a new husband. Mother and son have an important conversation along the way, he now a young man, learning to see the world with both responsibility and love. “’Blood is thicker than liquor,’ Wheeler said to her, no longer mocking, but gently stating the fact as he knew she saw it. ‘Yes,” she said, and smiled. “It is.’”

A hotel clerk in Louisville calls Wheeler one day, asking if someone can come into the city and get Uncle Peach who has gotten drunk, horribly messing up the room. Instinctively, Wheeler says he will come and help his uncle. And he goes off to love his mother’s brother, more because she does than that he does.

He finds Uncle Peach disheveled, and the room torn apart. Cleaning him up, he gives him coffee, and brings him home. But before the train ride is over, Uncle Peach vomits again, horribly and loudly retching in the crowded train car. Wheeler does his best to clean them both up, and upon arriving at the station gets them into the buggy, and takes them back to Uncle Peach’s home, enduring more vomit along the way.

Finally, after this had happened perhaps a dozen times, Wheeler, who had remained angry, said, “I hope you puke your damned guts out.”

And Uncle Peach, who lay, quaking and white, against the seatback, said, “Oh, Lord, honey, you can’t mean that.”

As if his anger had finally stripped all else away, suddenly Wheeler saw Uncle Peach as perhaps Dorie has always seen him—a poor, hurt, weak mortal, twice hurt because he knew himself to be hurt and weak and mortal. And then Wheeler knew what he did need from Uncle Peach. He needed him to be comforted. That was all. He put his arm around Uncle Peach, then, and patted him as if he were a child. “No,” he said. “I don’t mean it.”

The story finishes with surprising grace, and has become a metaphor for life, wherever I find it. When they arrive home, Wheeler decides to stay with Uncle Peach, rather than go home to his new bride. And so after putting the older man to bed, Wheeler climbs in too. As the hours pass, he feels the terrors of Uncle Peach’s mostly sleepless night—but eventually, “Wheeler went to sleep, his hand remaining on Uncle Peach’s shoulder where it had come to rest.”

In this short story Berry offers a window into life for Everyman, for Everywoman. There is no one who does not have, literally or figuratively, an Uncle Peach to love—a person, a place, a community, a culture. In the innocence of youth, Uncle Peach was loveable, but as Wheeler got older, knowing more of the world and of his uncle, the more difficult it was to love him. That Wheeler’s mother loved her brother instructed her son, and he was willing to step into her loves, for love’s sake. But it was not until he began to see Uncle Peach as “poor, hurt, mortal,” that he got into bed with Uncle Peach, and put his hand on his shoulder through the night.

Can we know the world, and still love it? Mostly we decide that we cannot, for lots of good reasons—just like Wheeler. Uncle Peach did not deserve to be loved, and there was no indication that he was ever going to change. Simply said, he was a mess, and whatever he touched became a mess. But in the midst of the mess, Dorie loved her brother, and taught her son to love him too. Knowing what they knew, complicated and complex as it was, they chose to love.

To do that, with honesty and integrity, is the most difficult task in the world. But there are people who make that choice. Not out of grandeur or great ambition, but in the spirit of Berry’s vision, viz. in the relationships and responsibilities of common life, they see themselves as implicated in the way the world is and ought to be. They see themselves as having vocations that call them into life, into the world—into a way of knowing that implicates them, for love’s sake.

(Wendell Berry has recently been named the 2012 Jefferson Lecturer in the Humanities, a great honor for a great man. For more information, click here)

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Dr. Steven Garber is the Director of the Washington Institute and author ofThe Fabric of Faithfulness.

Yesterday I was given a tour of the Cornell University campus, and we stopped at the Johnson Art Museum, designed by I.M. Pei. As we walked through, I saw a sculpture, the Walking Man of Alberto Giacometti, and thought of years ago when I wrote about it in my master’s thesis. Hoping to understand many things that mattered to me then, I titled it, “What Is It To Be Human? Understanding the Relationship of Philosophical Anthropology and Psychotherapy.” Those years of study still shape my life in the world.

In the thesis, Giacometti took his place alongside Bob Dylan, especially his song “Thin Man.” My argument was that in the 20th-century human beings were feeling increasingly alienated, not having a place in history and the cosmos that oriented them/us about who we are and why we are—and that these artists felt that in their work, sculpting and singing about the “thinness” of the human condition. Pretty interesting, huh?

And so here I am, most of my life later, lecturing within the Cornell community for a weekend, still thinking about the conditions of human flourishing, of what it means to be a human being. The direction has changed some; no longer am I looking at the implications for psychotherapy. Rather I am fixed on the question of vocation, of who we are and how we live—situated within commitments we make about what we believe and what we think it all means for history. That nexus is the heart of all I do, viz. faith, vocation and culture. That what we believe about the deepest things of life, shapes the way we live life, and that has consequence for life—for everyone everywhere.

Here is what the museum says about the Walking Man.

“After WWII, Giacometti turned from his earlier Cubist and Surrealist work and became especially interested in creating figures that would always appear to the viewer as if from a great distance, no matter how close one stood. He achieved this by paring the figure down to its essential components, and by making the figure as lean as possible. But Giacometti’s fragile men and women are also inseparable from the post-war attitudes that were crystallized in the writings of Jean-Paul Sartre. An ardent admirer of Giacometti, Sartre believed that it was naive to hope for any higher purpose in life since man, though free, was alone and responsible only to himself for his actions. Giacometti’s emaciated, post-Holocaust figures, with their eroded, crumbling surfaces, suggest the antithesis of heroism or nobility, associations traditionally linked to European sculpture.”

Walker Percy was right one more time. The Enlightenment, audaciously self-named, created the conditions where we are lost in the cosmos. Not much of a sense of vocation is possible, of being called to a life that matters, in that very alienated world. Lonely and alone we are, without a God and without a reason to live.