You are not “Making a Living.” God is Giving You Life > 목회자칼럼

• 목록

We use this expression “making a living” to refer to our work. 

That’s fine as far as language goes, but it can easily lead to the sense that it’s up to us to provide for ourselves. 

Christians can fall into that just as much as anybody else. 

God provides for the sparrows. Now in one sense sparrows don’t have to work. 

They’re not engaged in conscious economic activity, 

putting on their little sparrow suits and driving in little sparrow cars to work, 

flying around negotiating the price of random bits of food on the ground. 

You might say they work in their flitting about gathering food. 

Nonetheless, there is a sense in which God just provides for them, 

whereas we have to take a more active role. 

Jesus certainly recognizes that – he’s not telling people not to work. 

But I do think he’s saying that ultimately all things are a gift from God, 

including your ability to work.

It’s not really a paradox, it’s just the way life is. We have to affirm that fact that 

God is ultimately providing everything we have. We work hard, make prudential decisions, 

and are responsible in our duties.  In that sense we could say we’re making a living. 

But we need to take it as God’s gift to us and not of something we’re laying hold of independently.

The primal sin way back in the garden is the illusion of radical autonomy – the 

idea that I can separate myself from God, make my own judgements, 

work in my own strength. It’s just me, me, me. That’s a complete delusion. 

Everything we have is a gift from God. 

Your job is equally provision from him, not something you achieve for yourself. 

It’s a gift – a gift that you pour yourself into it with all the strength that you have.