Grind

"Do not overwork to be rich;

Because of your own understanding, cease!

Will you set your eyes on that which is not?

For riches certainly make themselves wings;

They fly away like an eagle toward heaven." - Proverbs 23:4-5

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You know the mantra:

Grind. Grind. Grind. Grind. Grind.

Push. Push. Push. Push. Push.

Work. Work. Work. Work. Work.

Hustle. Hustle. Hustle. Hustle. Hustle.

Self-improvement coaches with their millions of followers and even more millions of dollars, who preach their messages of unending grind, working harder than everyone else and proving to yourself just how passionate and serious you are about your pursuits.

But God presents a different perspective. Remember that He commanded - commanded - His covenant people to rest one day out of the week. He also informed them that while things like diligence, persistence, intentionality and consistency were important for the honoring of God through their work, the intensity of their efforts would still not be the primary factor in determining their success:

“You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is He who gives you power to get wealth, that He may confirm His covenant that He swore to your fathers, as it is this day.” - Deuteronomy 8:18

“The Lord sends poverty and wealth; He humbles and He exalts.” - I Samuel 2:7

Additionally, God was clear that wealth and monetary success are in no way an absolute blessing or proof positive of His approval. Striving to be rich for its own sake or as a way to convince yourself that God is pleased with you is a fool’s errand:

“He who loves silver will not be satisfied with silver; Nor he who loves abundance, with increase. This also is vanity. When goods increase, They increase who eat them; So what profit have the owners except to see them with their eyes? “There is a severe evil which I have seen under the sun: Riches kept for their owner to his hurt.” - Ecclesiastes 5:10-11, 13

It is the wisdom of the world to think that money and wealth prove much of anything at all. The truth of the matter is that we cannot know what God has in mind by how He exercises His sovereignty. There are those who work very hard and never become rich. Conversely, there are some who seem to acquire great wealth with mediocre talent and far less investment than those they surpass.

The self-improvement gurus who declare that their own personal formulas of hard work and determination are the keys to success are denying the role God played in their lives in placing them where they are. Correlation does not equal causation. Just because the grind was an integral part of the process does not mean that the grind was the ultimate reason they succeeded.

None of this is to say that working hard is optional for the Christian. But the goal of hard work is to leverage the gifts God has given you in order to honor Him with them. We were made to work (Genesis 2:15). It is part of our purpose for existence. But the goal should not be to get rich for its own sake. The man who makes wealth an end goal or the validation of his own world view and thought process has bought into a deception. His riches can sprout wings and fly away even more quickly than they arrived and no amount of hard work or persistence will be able to get them to come back.

Because their source is never in the hands of hard working, intelligent or talented men, but in the hands of the God that gives all of these things according not to intensity of effort or depth of passion, but to His own inscrutable will.

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“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” - James 1:17

“What do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?” - I Corinthians 4:7

“Give me neither poverty nor riches—
Feed me with the food allotted to me;
Lest I be full and deny You,
And say, “Who is the Lord?”
Or lest I be poor and steal,
And profane the name of my God.” - Proverbs 30:8-9