Yesterday I was pondering the mighty men of David described in 1 Chronicles 11 & 12. These men were warriors, men of war. That was their specialty. They were not known as butchers or bakers or candlestick makers or farmers or politicians or speakers or anything else. They were known as warriors.
And I was thinking about the similarities between warriors and workers in the harvest field. Here are some of my observations:
1. Both need courage. Warriors face the fear of death every time they go into battle. Workers face the fear of wasting their lives. Does their labor really matter? They don’t often experience the immediate sense of victory a warrior gets when a foe is defeated.
Sometimes a person is quickly reaped into the kingdom of God from the harvest field, but often much work is invested planting, sowing, watering, and cultivating before reaping.
2. Both are experts. Warriors are experts at war. If they weren’t, they would already be dead because of their mistakes.
Workers are experts at farming for souls. If they weren’t, they would have already given up or never started, because the work is too hard.
3. Both “take a stand”. 1 Chronicles 11:14 says that Eleazar (one of the mighty men) and David “took a stand.” They quit running, stopped, and took a stand against the Philistines. If they died, they died, but they were going to stop in the middle of a barley field and defend it against all comers.
Workers have to “take a stand” as well. They have to enter the harvest field and stay until the work is done. If they don’t do it, some people will not get harvested. No one else is going to do it. The harvest is still plentiful and the workers are still few.
4. Both do “a lot”. The mighty men in 1 Chronicles were known to kill a lot. 300 men was a common number for a mighty man to have dispatched in order to become famous. You did not become a famous warrior by killing a man or two. Unless he was a giant!
Workers have to do a lot of work. You don’t work in the field on day and call yourself a laborer. That person is known as a “tourist.” They came out to the farm and rode on the tractor or the combine for a day or a half-day to see what it was like. They are more of a “spectator” than a laborer. Even if they steered the combine or got dirty helping to unload the harvest.
Over the years, I have seen many spiritual tourists and spectators. Laboring in the harvest sounds fun or glamorous. But its not. Its rewarding, but it can also be as difficult as going to war.
What observations have you made about the similarities between workers and warriors?
Tags: laboring / working, working
