Sermon

John 21:1-14

Do You Enjoy Your Work?

By The Rev. Dr. James D. Kegel

GOD BE PRAISED FOR HIS GLAD TIDINGS!

There are seventeen toll booths on the San-Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge. Last Thanksgiving we drove over it again and paid the toll to cross. I heard a story about the bridge from Dr Donald Hagen, surgeon general of the United States Navy and a Lutheran. He told of a time when he was crossing the bay bridge and came up to the toll booth to pay his money. As he slowed down, he heard loud music from inside the booth and when he stopped to give his money he saw that the toll-taker was a young man dancing wildly inside his little booth.

“What’s going on in there?” he asked.

“A party,” came the answer.

“A party?”

“Yes, I’m having a party and why shouldn’t I? Look at the other toll booths, what do you see?”

“Nothing.”

“They are sixteen vertical coffins. The people who go to work in them put away their mind from 8:30 to 4:30. They are dead on the job. Me, I’m having a party. I want to be a professional dancer someday and the way I look at it is this job lets me practice for what I want to do in life. I love this job. I enjoy every single minute of work. I am not dead like all the rest. I am having a party.”

He paid his toll and drove off – but then Dr. Hagen made his point: We should all so love our work that we enjoy the hours of our life spent on the job. Even the dullest job – such as taking that dollar toll over and over again, can be an opportunity. We can all take advantage of whatever circumstances we find ourselves in.

Now I do not know how many of you enjoy going to work. I dare say very few of us think of our jobs as a party. The alarm clock goes off and another day of work begins. For many people, in all sorts of occupations, real life is that time apart from the job. We are a nation of clock watchers waiting for that five o’clock bell or whistle to get back to life, to family, friends, fun. I read recently about low morale in colleges and universities, and again about the raise for teachers as a real morale boost.   Doctors, lawyers, teachers, even pastors, report low morale, job-dissatisfaction and the diseases that come from stress. Thirty years ago clergy were remarkably more healthy than the average American. Not so today. By all indicators, clergy are less healthy. Stress takes its toll. Many, many people become like the sixteen toll-takers who put away their minds, are dead on the job.

Life is work. Work is our life. I have noticed many people who just cannot wait until they retire and then seem so lost without their jobs. I remember in a former congregation inviting and older man to our senior fellowship. He said he couldn’t come because he was still working and didn’t spend his time just milling around. That was an unfair comment but I understood what he meant. His life had meaning and purpose. I remember one of my graduate school mentors, Dr. Carl Braaten, saying that he could not believe how wonderful his life was to get paid for doing what he wanted to do, which was to be a theologian. I’ve heard this from other people. Work can be toil and labor, but also a source of meaning, energy and joy.

Martin Luther once wrote,

“A cobbler, a smith, a peasant, whatever one may be,
has the labor of their craft…
yet all are bishops and priests.
A poor servant girl may say,
‘I cook the meals. I make the beds. I dust the rooms.
Who has bidden me to do this?
My master and my mistress have bidden me.
Who has given them the right to command me?
God has given it to them.
So it is true that I am serving God in heaven
as well as them.
How happy can I feel now!
It is as if I were in heaven,
doing my work for God’.”

Work is ordained by God; blessed by God. It can be a source of joy as we understand all human labor as God’s will for us – and as we make the best of our opportunities.

When I was reading over the Gospel lesson for today, it struck me: without the presence of the Lord, the disciples could not catch any fish. They were like mindless toll-takers in their stand-up coffins. The disciples cast their nets into the sea without energy, without enthusiasm and without results. They were just going through the motions of fishing and were not catching any fish. Their work was drudge and toil, unappreciated and unfruitful. A man came to them saying, “Children, have you any fish?” They answered him, “No.” He said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” So they cast it and now were not able to haul it in, for the quantity of fish. The risen Christ appeared to the disciples in their work, blessed them and the results were bountiful. He gave meaning to their labor and the fruit of their labors. God’s presence can do the same for us. We can understand our daily work as part of God’s plan, we can recognize God’s presence with us, we can claim God’s power to give us the understanding to make the most of whatever job we have.

When you work, you are doing the Lord’s work. I do not mean church work. During the Middles Ages, Christians got into the habit of thinking that church work was somehow better and more blessed than ordinary labor. Many people left their everyday jobs and went into monasteries believing they were following a higher calling. The Protestant Reformers wanted to halt such thinking. There is nothing holier about being a pastor or bishop or parish worker than being a bricklayer, storeowner or teacher. All honest work is created by God and pleasing to God. Some are called by God to publicly preach and teach – these people should go into pastoral ministry. Others are called to be musicians and painters, lawyers, salespeople, mechanics, farmers, cooks. All people are called to glorify God in their work and work with God. Luther even used what had been a special, religious word, vocation, to speak of God’s call to work which comes to each person.

St. Jerome once wrote, “Baptism is the ordination of the laity.” We are all ordained to be ministers of God in whatever calling we happen to be. Some are called to fish and others to fish for people. Paul Tournier, the Swiss psychologist and theologian, reminds us,

“The valuable thing is to see our job, as well as all other activities,
as an adventure directed by God.
In religious circles,
people have gotten into the habit of restricting the idea of vocation
to the call to the ministry of the church,
or at most to a medical or teaching career…
For the fulfilling of His purposes,
God needs more than priests, bishops, pastors and missionaries.
God needs mechanics and chemists, gardeners and street sweepers,
philosophers and judges.”

Proverbs tells us, “In all toil there is profit,” and John Calvin says,

“There can be no work however vile or sordid
that does not glisten before God
and is not right precious,
provided in it we serve our vocation…
Everyone ought to deem the estate in which they find themselves
assigned by God.”

I would add to the sixteenth century language of Calvin, what I found recently in a Chinese fortune cookie: a lump of coal becomes a diamond by sticking to its job.

We can use our work to glorify God. We can respond to the risen Christ knowing that Jesus is with us in whatever we do, and whatever we do can redound to His glory. Simon Peter came to realize that the Lord was with him. Peter tucked in his shirt and jumped out of the boat to meet the Lord. His faith was active, up and doing. John loved the Lord and waited to tell the others. He was of a different sort. Whatever type of person we may be, whatever work we do, we can do the Lord’s work. We can witness to the Lord not just by telling others about Christ – we do that when the time if right for it, but also by showing our joy and enthusiasm in what we do. We do not have to be the working dead leaving our minds behind from eight to five. We can make our job a party, a time for learning and enjoying and thanking and praising.

When the alarm rings, we can tell ourselves, “This is the day that the Lord hath made, I will be glad and rejoice in it.” Amen.

Copyright 2004 James Kegel.  Used by permission.