First in our Calling

⁹What does the worker gain in his toil? ¹⁰I have seen the busyness God gives to humans to preoccupy them. ¹¹He has made everything suitable in its time. He also has put the past in their hearts, yet no one can grasp what God does from the beginning to the end.

²²I have wiped your transgressions out like a cloud and your sins like mist. Return to me, for I have redeemed you!” ²³Sing for joy, heavens, for Yahweh has done it! Shout, depths of the earth! Break forth, mountains, in rejoicing, forest and every tree in it, for Yahweh has redeemed Jacob, and he will show his glory in Israel! ²⁴Thus says Yahweh, your redeemer, and he who formed you in the womb: “I am Yahweh, who made everything, who stretched out the heavens alone, who spread out the earth—who was with me?—

²³Whatever you do, accomplish it from the soul, as to the Lord, and not to people, ²⁴because you know that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. Serve the Lord Christ. ²⁵For the one who does wrong will receive back whatever wrong he has done, and there is no partiality.

⁸Now the one who plants and the one who waters are one, but each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor. ⁹For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building. ¹⁰According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building upon it. But each one must direct his attention to how he is building upon it.

⁹Enjoy life with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life which he gives you under the sun, because this is your lot in life and in the toil with which you toil under the sun. ¹⁰Whatever your hand finds to do—do it with all your might; for in Sheol—where you are going—no one works, plans, knows, or thinks about anything. ¹¹I looked again and saw under the sun that the race does not belong to the swift, the battle does not belong to the mighty, food does not belong to the wise, wealth does not belong to the intelligent, and success does not belong to the skillful, for time and chance befalls all of them.

¹⁰For God is not unjust, so as to forget your work and the love which you demonstrated for his name by having served the saints, and continuing to serve them. ¹¹And we desire each one of you to demonstrate the same diligence for the full assurance of your hope until the end, ¹²in order that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who inherit the promises through faith and patience.