working spiritually

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.

Colossians 3:23-24

These words were originally written to encourage slaves who had converted to Christianity. They may have toiled under Christian masters. They may have had unbelieving masters. Paul instructs them in either situation to consider that earthly slavery is not their true condition. He urges them to take a higher view of their lives, and in so doing, calls us to consider the same.

Paul’s advice to slaves is to “work heartily”. The phrase can be literally translated as “work from your soul”, or in better vernacular to “work spiritually”. Their work was not mere physical labor or menial management. Instead, slaves were to do spiritual work, with a focus of offering their labor to Christ, not men. Slaves were to look for the “well done” of Jesus and not people. They were to be rewarded by serving Christ as their Master and not to get hung up on pleasing human masters.

It is popular to attempt to translate Paul’s advice to slaves into modern principles of employment for Christian employees in the marketplace. I find that offensive for a couple reasons. First, it trivializes the dehumanization that is institutional slavery, and though Roman slavery was not as brutal as American racial slavery, it was still awful. Secondly, it minimizes the reality of vocational calling and unique giftednese if I think of myself as a “slave” to my job. Instead, I choose to just embrace Paul’s advice to slaves as good insight into every believer’s motivation. We should do all for Christ’s kingdom anyway. Paul considered himself a slave of Christ (Titus 1:1). Christians call Jesus Lord and Master, a slave’s address to a superior authority. Mentally, we should serve because we have no other occupation or choice in the matter. We are slaves of Jesus. We too must serve “the Lord Christ”.

And so I labor in the kingdom, which I will do however I am called to do so, until God takes me home. I will adopt a motivation to work “with soul”, in a spiritual way, with God-focused motivations. My goal is not human recognition, the employee of the year reward, MVP status, or applause from others as I take the stage. Rather, I have one “well done” in mind as I toil behind the scenes, with humility, content to let others be served and to serve my Savior. I will only hope to possibly hear “well done” when one day I will bow before my only Master and Lord: Jesus!