Work Is Good, but Service Is Better

Work Is Good, but Service Is Better | Luke 10: 38-42

Work is a profound grace; it is good, life-affirming, and transformative. Yet, within it lies a quiet danger when we become consumed by endless activity. Exhaustion inevitably follows, breeding murmuring, complaint, and grievance. In turn, grievance curdles into resentment, and resentment isolates us, turning others into adversaries. This hostility can easily harden into a form of destruction—whether physical or through the chilling weight of critical words. Tiredness / burnout > anger > hatred > murder. Consequently, what was once a grace transforms into a heavy curse.

As Karl Marx noted regarding alienation, a worker can become profoundly detached from the fruit of their labour. When toil loses its meaning, how do we reclaim a genuine sense of satisfaction and fulfilment?

The answer lies in a fundamental realignment: we are not primarily called merely to work; we are called to serve. True service is simply work infused with love and passion. Often, we busy ourselves with endless tasks while losing our foundational love. When labour becomes forced toil rather than a joyful offering, we forfeit our calling as co-creators.

It is not Just Work, but Work that Emerges out of One’s Holiness

The people who carry our coffin to be buried must feel happy and privileged. In act 5: 15, the people found it a blessing to have even the shadow of Peter fall on them. This happens not because we have done a lot of work, but the realisation that our doing and our not doing has sprung up from our holiness.

We have the famous story of jesus visiting Martha and Mary (Luke 10: 38-42). When someone comes home we are supposed to be hospitable to serve them. Look at what Martha was doing “Lord do you not are that my sister has left me to do all the work alone?” She was working and she was complaining about it too. “Be hospitable to one another without complaining” (1 Peter 4:9). When we work and grumble, all anointing that we have received leaks out. It becomes work and pure toil; and our work does not become service.

True service restores the sacred dimension to our daily endeavours, bridging the gap between our actions and our deepest purpose. It transforms routine obligations into mindful acts of grace, reminding us that every effort, when touched by love, has the power to elevate both the giver and the world.

From the retreat talks by Fr John Kusumalayan, OP.

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