Work is Worship

Yesterday I was racing through the bedlam of an Indian market with my friend Punit and a few of his cousins. In the midst of the crazy tumult of traffic, Punit pointed out a delivery truck that had pink writing in Hindi on its bumper. He explained that all such trucks carried this inscription meaning "Work is Worship". It was a way of thinking that these workers had adopted because they worked long hours for very little pay. So they chose to see something sacred in their daily grind - an attempt to rise above their circumstances by offering their work as worship.

As Christians, worship is something that we often seem to relegate to a two hour weekly timeslot at a church building. We can have trouble connecting our everyday tasks and jobs to something as sacred as worship to God. Intellectually I can understand the concept that worship is a lifestyle and encompasses all that I do in my life. But putting it into practice isn't as easy. Because we live in a very compartmentalized society it can be difficult to avoid artificial divisions between secular and sacred actviity. If the sacred does somehow break in to my daily routine it is still limited to moments when I see or feel God moving in my day. But this is not a limit that God places on worship.

In Psalm 96:11-12 it says, "Let the heavens rejoice and the earth be glad. Let the sea resound and all that is in it. Let the fields be jubilant and everything in them. Let all the trees of the forest sing for joy." Now, understandably this is poetry and something of a metaphor, but I also think that there is a truth here. All of creation is called to worship its Maker. Yet how do fields and forests worship God? I believe they worship by being a field, by being a tree.- by being what they were created to be.

However, fields and trees do not choose who they worship but we must. As someone recently put it to me, "We are not so much born to worship as we are born worshipping. We are always worshipping but we have to choose whom to worship." From birth we are faced with the continual choice: Will we worship self, sin or any other false gods? Or will we surrender our lives to our Creator, thus fulfilling what we were created for and making our lives an act of worship to God? When we live in this surrender, resting in who God has created us to be, worship flows effortlessly from our being. Then all the areas of our life become worship - from church to work to our home life - everything. And we can take the workers' motto even a step further saying, "Work is worship. Life is worship! To God be all of my worship."

Ben Gumienny is always looking for ways to improve the mediums and methods of communication so that more people can be reached. Currently he is on a trip in India attending two weddings along with his wife.