If You Don't Work You Don't Eat
We all know about “sound bites,” those quotes that everyone knows about but really don’t know the rest of the story. This quote is one of those incidents, “…if any would not work, neither should he eat..” The rest of the story is what is overlooked, that the person not working is disorderly. How many times do we hear of people being disorderly, then being arrested and put in jail for awhile? Not only are they disorderly, but they refuse to work, they refuse to participate according to civil expectations. Not only do they refuse to work, and are disorderly, but they are busybodies! A busybody is someone who is always prying into and meddling in the affairs of others. A disorderly person who rummages through other people’s personal drawers is someone most people would not have in their home for any longer than a few days. Really, for this person not to be fed anything in your house is a common sense practice because they are going to be evicted from living with you! These disorderly busybodies who don’t work are trying to wear you down and destroy your well-doing, and so we are exhorted to “…be not weary in well-doing.”
The writers of the scriptures are full of the Spirit that can only come from the Cross of Christ. We know that in the eyes of the Spirit, food is the Bread of Life to nourish us with the Holy Spirit. From the Cross, it is common sense that if we are not working towards reconciliation with God then we are not going to be fed with the Fruit of the Spirit. Of course, if we are not working in the Will of God, which is the work of redemption of souls, then we do not eat from God’s table. It is from Satan, the anti-Christ, that people are disorderly to what Christ has done for us on the Cross. Through disorderliness, Satan wants to disrupt reconciliation to God, to destroy the fruit of the Holy Spirit, and to kill our desire in well-doing. The anti-Christ is one of the biggest busybody a person will ever know when it comes to what you are doing for God according to the Cross of Christ. Satan is something like George Orwell’s Big Brother who has to know your every move to control your actions and thoughts. Those living in the darkness of the sin nature will do nothing to turn on the light and will not work towards the remission of sin to give birth to the Holy Spirit. Satan wants to wear you down and make you tired and to be fed up with the life we have through the Cross of Christ. God, through the Holy Spirit, exhorts us, “…be not weary in well doing.”
Set yourself apart from the disorderly busybodies who refuse to work according to the employment that flows from the Cross of Christ.
“For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat. For we hear that there are some which walk among you disorderly, working not at all, but are busybodies. Now them that are such we command and exhort by our Lord Jesus Christ, that with quietness they work, and eat their own bread. But ye, brethren, be not weary in well doing.” 2 Thessalonians 3:10-13