Work can be exhausting. But it can be rewarding too. I’ve just finished writing a month-long series of bible-study notes on the book of Ecclesiastes. It’s for the wonderful Inspiring Women Everyday, published by CWR. The booklet will be published in April 2013 and will be called: ‘Chasing After the Wind – finding meaning in a meaningless world.’ Well without giving too much away in advance, I found after reading this often depressing book, that pretty much everything is meaningless if it is done with the wrong motive or is not a result of a life lived in line with God’s plans. ‘Meaningless, meaningless,’ cries the teacher of Ecclesiastes but in the next breath he declares:
‘(God) has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink and find satisfaction in all his toil – this is the gift of God.’ (Ecc 3:9 – 13).
Now that’s a pretty good attitude to adopt, I think. I don’t know how you are feeling about your work today. Perhaps you are just worn into the ground with the daily grind of it, or perhaps you are resentful that you do everything asked of you yet no one seems to appreciate it. On the other hand, perhaps you have no work and are are gradually losing your will to keep on trying to find some. I would encourage you today to recommit yourself to your work or your quest to find it and look for some meaning within it.
