Malachi 4:1-2a; 2 Thessalonians 3:7-12; Luke 21:5-19.

It seems that in one of the first Christian communities, that of Thessalonica, there were believers
who drew mistaken conclusions from these discourses of Christ. They thought that it was useless
to weary themselves, to work or do anything since everything was about to come to an end.
They thought it better to take each day as it came and not commit themselves to long-term
projects and only to do the minimum to get by.
St. Paul responds to them in the second reading: "We hear that some are conducting themselves
among you in a disorderly way, by not keeping busy but minding the business of others. Such
people we instruct and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to work quietly and to eat their own food."
At the beginning of the passage, St. Paul recalls the rule that he had given to the Christians in
Thessalonica: "If anyone will not work, let him not eat."

This was a novelty for the men of that time. The culture to which they belonged looked down
upon manual labor; it was regarded as degrading and as something to be left to slaves and the
uneducated. But the Bible has a different vision. From the very first page it presents God as
working for six days and resting on the seventh day. And all of this happens in the Bible before
sin is spoken of. Work, therefore, is part of man's original nature and is not something that
results from guilt and punishment. Manual labor is just as dignified as intellectual and spiritual
labor. Jesus himself dedicates 17 years to the former -- supposing he began to work around 13 --
and only a few years to the latter.

A layman has written: "What sense and what value does our ordinary work as laypeople have
before God? It is true that we laypeople also do a lot of charity work, engage in the apostolate,
and volunteer work; but we must give most of our time and energies to ordinary jobs. If this sort
of work has no value for heaven, we will have very little for eternity. No one we have asked
about this has been able to give us satisfactory answers. They say: "Offer it all to God!" but is
this enough?

My reply: No, the value of our work is not only conferred on it by the "good intention" we put
into it or the morning offering we make to God; it also has a value in itself, as a participation in
God's creative and redemptive work and as service to our brothers. We read in one of the
Vatican II documents, in "Gaudium et Spes," that it is by "his labor [that] a man ordinarily
supports himself and his family, is joined to his fellow men and serves them, and can exercise
genuine charity and be a partner in the work of bringing divine creation to perfection. Indeed,
we hold that through labor offered to God man is associated with the redemptive work of Jesus
Christ" (No. 67).

The work that one does is not as important as that for which he does it. This re-establishes a
certain parity, beneath distinctions -- which are sometimes unjust and scandalous -- in position
and pay. A person who has done the most humble jobs in life can be of greater "value" than
those people who hold positions of great prestige.

It was said that work is a participation in the creative action of God and in the redemptive action
of Christ and that it is a source of personal and social growth, but we know that it is also
weariness, sweat and pain. It can ennoble but it can also empty and wear down. The secret is to
put one's heart into what one's hands do. It is not so much the amount or type of work done that
tires us out, as much as it is the lack of enthusiasm and motivation. To the earthly motivations
for work, faith adds eternal motivations: "Our works," the Book of Revelation says, "will follow
us" (14:13).