WORK

I am thankful today for sunshine and for a day off work to catch up on reading and lectures for school. Systematic Theology 101 is challenging my mental capacity and blowing my scholastic fuses. (But, Wow!, is the content encouraging!)

I participated in a discussion about WORK recently. When someone asked, "Who actually likes to go to work?," I sheepishly raised my hand. No one else in the room did. (What can I say? I love my job - the work I do, the people I work for and with, the patients we serve. Sure, getting up at 3:30 some mornings is not particularly fun, and I am tired at the end of the day, but, seriously, I love my job.)

Then another question was posed: "If you didn't have to go to work every day, would you?"

Let's speculate...

If I won the lottery or if some long-lost relative bequeathed me a vast inheritance, would I still get up at 3:30 in the morning to go care for anxious patients?

Hmmmmmm...maybe I'd skip the 3:30 wake-up part. But, you know what? I would still want to be active in meaningful, relational, productive work.

"If I won the lottery..." - the whole assumption here seems to be that if my financial needs were met, that if I didn't have to worry about how I was going put gas in the car or afford my medications or pay to replace the washing machine, then my world - and my outlook - would be completely different. I would be safe, secure, free from anxiety. I wouldn't have to work. Instead, I could just relax and enjoy a stress-free life. Rest. Breathe. Visit my kids. Take a holiday.

But you know what?

I ALREADY AM SAFE AND SECURE. TODAY. RIGHT NOW.

I belong to the God who created all things (see Genesis 1-2), who sustains and oversees every tiny detail of my life, and who promises to bring all things to glorious completion (see Revelation).

Question and Answer 1 in the Heidelberg Catechism sum up my situation beautifully:

Q: What is you only comfort in life and in death?
A: That I am not my own, but belong - body and soul, in life and in death - to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with his precious blood, and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil. He also watches over me in such a way that not a hair can fall from my head without the will of my Father in heaven; in fact, all things must work together for my salvation. Because I belong to him, Christ, by his Holy Spirit, assures me of eternal life and make me wholeheartedly willing and ready from now on to live for him.

Friends, I don't need to win the lottery.

I ALREADY HAVE!!!

And now, I need to get back to work. I have a LOT of reading to do before an online meeting tonight.

(And to my awesome coworkers at UCSC: I'll see you bright and early tomorrow morning!)