Why Do You Labor?

In the early years of her ministry, a young woman abandoned her desires for home and family to travel from place to place sharing the Gospel. She found the open-air meetings and the one-on-one personal work demanding but productive. In time, however, her ministry changed to one of caring for children who had nowhere else to go.

She soon found herself thrust into a seemingly endless routine of sewing, cleaning, cooking, and changing diapers. The drudgery of her duties caused her to wonder whether it could be right to turn from so much that might be of profit to become just a nursemaid.

Have you ever felt that way? Admittedly, the mundane chores required to establish families, rear children, or invest in others' needs can create doubts about the value of how our time is being spent. They can make us long to "get out of the rut" and get on with the real "spiritual work." But there's more to the story.

In later years the young woman's perspective changed: "If by doing some work which the undiscerning consider 'not spiritual work' I can best help others, and I inwardly rebel, thinking it is the spiritual for which I crave, when in truth it is the interesting and exciting, then I know nothing of Calvary love."

Amy Charmichael's reward in heaven will be great, not because of the interesting and exciting things she might have done, but because of her faithfulness to the duty -- and benefits -- of her calling.


WHY DO YOU LABOR?

Please tell me, my friend, why do you labor,
Caught up in duties so mundane and trite?
Surely you're one who could have done better,
Held jobs more worthy and noble and bright.

You could have had honors and loftiest praise
And worldly success and all that attend,
Had you but taken the time to pursue them,
Had not commitment to home reigned you in.

I'll tell you, my friend, why I have labored,
Why your suggestion has not been my quest.
Worldly success you speak of so highly
May gain you the good but cost you the best.

I labor because of those in my family
Who by my actions will learn how to live.
God only grants a brief time to labor;
My family deserves the best I can give.

Though in the rays of dawn I first started,
Day is now waning as shadows fall dark.
While light remains this vision compels me:
Eternal treasure in home and in hearth.

(Copyright 1999 James McAlister)


Copyright 1999 James McAlister

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