And at the risk of being mechanical in the use of bungling divisions we
may declare that Jesus entered into all the large divisions of toil. The
note of universality is seen here as it is seen elsewhere. We have been
told that the three forms of temptation that Jesus encountered on mountain
top and temple pinnacle exhaust all the types. It has been said, too, that
the thankfulness of Jesus is directed toward all the channels by which the
good of life can flow in upon us. This same characteristic of universality
appears in the work of Christ. As a carpenter he worked upon material
things. As a healer he worked upon the bodies of men. As a teacher he
worked upon the minds of men. As a preacher he worked upon the souls of
men. All the workers of the world can be brought into one of these
divisions, and so all true workers can enter into partnership with Jesus.
We call him the Carpenter, the Great Physician, the Greatest Teacher, the
World's Saviour! The manual toilers claim him. The doctors claim him. The
teachers claim him. The evangelists claim him. He is at home in the shop,
in the hospital, in the schoolroom, and in the temple. All the classes of
toilers can appeal to the sanction of his example.
Still we must again assert that these clumsy divisions were not emphasized
by Jesus himself. There has been an age-long debate, ofttimes degenerating
into a wrangle, as to the relative hardships of the different forms of
labor. Men who cling to their occupations will still declare that those
occupations have trials beyond all others. Into this debate Jesus did not
enter. He never set one form of toil against another by entering into any
comparisons or contrasts. As he experienced all the general forms of
labor, so did he honor all forms. In his view they were all good and all
cooperative. On the surface they may seem to be rivals, but in the center
they are actual partners in the divine program. Hence Jesus passed from
one realm of work to another with little sense of transition. Carpenter,
Healer, Teacher, Preacher, he was ever the servant of the Kingdom.
Faithfulness, honor, industry, efficiency, patience--in short, all the
virtues were possible in any good way of work. The life of Jesus unites
all our types of labor in a divine purpose and rebukes that quarrelsome
spirit which so often sets the manual laborers and the mental and moral
laborers in opposition. The hand cannot say to the head, "I have no need
of thee," nor can the head utter the like speech of egotism and
self-sufficiency. The workers are all one body, and every one members of
another.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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