Religion: A Pastor Ponders

Loving Labor

by Pastor William Jenkins

September 2, 2005

Labor Day is the only holiday on which we celebrate something by ignoring it. On Thanksgiving we eat turkey and give thanks for our various blessing.

On Christmas we celebrate Christ’s birth, exchange gifts and make quite a production of Christmas. On Memorial Day we memorialize our fallen soldiers who gave all for our freedom. On Mother’s Day and Father’s Day we honor our parents. On Labor Day we take the posture of Jerome Jerome who confessed, “Work fascinates me. I could sit and watch it for hours.”

Have you noticed how most of the work that is done to keep the world going is done anonymously?

I woke up this morning and my digital clock was blinking on and off. The power had gone out in the night; but somebody, somewhere had turned it back on before I woke up to start the day.

Once there was a break in the water line that supplied our house. I knew because the water in the tap was a brownish color, indicating dirt had gotten into the line. A few hours late the water was clear and clean.

Somebody, somewhere repaired the line. I do not know who these people were who took care of the problems, but I sure am thankful for their labor. To them it may be just a job, but to me it is much more.

There was a man in one of the churches I served named Paul Henderson. For over 20 years Paul was the Communion Steward at that church. Month after month, year after year, people came to partake of the Holy Sacrament and never gave a thought about who had lovingly prepared it. They really didn’t need to think about it because Paul was behind the scenes doing his little bit for everyone. Which reminds me, have you noticed that there are some jobs nobody notices unless they are not done?

The whole world knows who the Apostle Paul was. Quite often Paul will mention the name of some obscure person or provide a list of names as in II Timothy 4.

In our reading we hurry past these names, much as we ignore the credits at the end of a movie. In I Corinthians 16:8 Paul writes: “I will stay in Ephesus till Pentecost…” Where will he stay while in Ephesus? The Holiday Inn? Whose home will he be a guest in? Who is providing hospitality to this apostle as he writes his letters and preaches the Good News in Ephesus? We can’t say for sure, but I vote for that person whose name we barely notice in the first verse of the first chapter, “Sosthenes”
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There are a lot of unknown people doing a lot of good work to keep this world going. Thank you.

League City United Methodist Church is located at 1411 Main Street (FM 518), one block east of Interstate 45. For information, call the church offices at 281-332-1557 or visit the website at

HYPERLINK - http://www.lcumc.org