Your work is a warfare, an appointed time wherein you must stand upon the field allotted you. The days of this labor have been measured out by the same hand that weighed the mountains in scales, and therefore you are neither to despise the task nor to faint under its burden. Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for if your daily employment is done as unto Him, it is no drudgery but a sacred charge. Do all your work at your best. Do a day’s work in a day and have no balance of debt to carry over to tomorrow’s account. Let your glory be fresh in you, and seek that anointing of fresh oil which comes from the Spirit of God alone.
Yet the excellence you crave cannot rise from your own striving merely. Observations of method and machinery are of small account unless the Divine Omnipotence goes forth upon the effort. The Holy Spirit must work mightily in your midst, or all your diligence will be but the beating of the air. As you walk the streets, as you sit at your table, as you bend over your appointed task, cry out in your heart, “Lord, put down all that hinders by Your Spirit, and accomplish the day’s labor with power from on high.” The results which follow our labors are trivial and insignificant compared with what they would be if the Spirit of God were more mightily at work.
Bear patiently with the vexations that attend your striving, and do not charge God foolishly when the hours prove weary or success seems distant. In all this see that you sin not. The triumph of a gracious spirit is to keep right with God under every pressure. When you are tempted to resent the tedium or to envy those who seem at ease, remember that it is the fashion of the world to be selfish, but it is a work of grace to break self down until you live to Christ and not to self any longer. Do your work therefore with both hands earnestly, and with a heart full of sympathy for those who toil alongside you, weeping with them in their sorrows and rejoicing in their joys. Such charity of the heart puts a sweetness into every honest employment.
Above all, approach this day’s labor in full assurance that the Lord is just and that His ordering of your place is right. Though you do not feel that the trouble attending it is sent for some particular sin, yet never doubt the righteousness of God in appointing you this very station. The Gospel is your lever, but full assurance must be the arm to work it with, yes, and the fulcrum, too, upon which the lever must rest. Know yourself to be saved, and then go forth to the business of the hour with a calm and confident heart. Your work is not your own, but His who bought you; and He who sustained Job in his sore losses will uphold you in the little frictions and wearinesses of your daily round. Look for that lifting up which comes to those who trust Him, for the Lord reigns and all things work together for good.
Therefore pray without ceasing for the descent of the Holy Spirit upon every thought, word, and deed of this day. Pray for your friends and for all who cross your path, for when Job prayed for his offending friends the Lord turned his own captivity. So may it be with you: as you intercede for others, your own spirit shall be liberated from fretfulness, and your work shall wear the brightness of a heavenly service.