A New Kind of Work

It’s not a question of something bad and something good.  It’s a question of a good and a better. 

Food—“perishable” food or food “that remains unto life eternal.”  Even though food may be “perishable,” it’s still something good, something we need to survive.  But there’s a “better food”—food that lasts.  Jesus slowly enters into a discussion with the crowd following him, a discussion that will lead to his astonishing revelation about the nature of this “better food.” 

We know how to work for perishable food.  Forty hours a week or more, we know how to earn all that we need to survive.  Jesus suggests that there is another kind of work with another kind of food:  work for “food that remains unto life eternal,” he says.  It’s not a question of survival, but of really living.

How to work for this new food?  Will this new work be forty more hours?  Will it wear us out?  Something more—to do?

Then comes the strange revelation:  “This is the work of God:  have faith in the One whom he sent.”  Believing in Jesus:  that’s the “work” that gives us the “food” that brings life.  A truly refreshing work with instant pay!

A better food with less work.  Sounds like a good deal to me!