Working Among the Thorns
Work remains good, but sin distorts our work and us.
Big ideaThe fall brings toil, conflict, injustice, anxiety, and frustration into work. The gospel lets us face those thorns honestly without surrendering hope.
Participants can name a distortion of work without shame or simplistic blame and distinguish faithful endurance from tolerating harm.
Say or askWe traced the ripple of one task to the people it affects. Did anyone make a small change—or see a cost or benefit they had missed?
SayScripture calls work good and also speaks with remarkable honesty about how grievous it can become. Tonight is not about pretending every hard situation is acceptable. It is about locating our frustration within God’s story and asking what faithfulness can look like among the thorns.
Ecclesiastes 2:17–23
Ask one person to read slowly. Notice the emotional, relational, and physical effects of work described in the passage.
Before you press playListen for what ‘under the sun’ means and for the inward turn that sin introduces into work.
Connect the idea
Pastor Bill contrasts work organized around self—earning, making, spending, saving for ourselves—with work done ‘under the Son.’ The gospel begins to turn us outward again toward God and neighbor.
Make space for the circle.
Without naming an employer or person, which word best describes the thorns you have encountered in work: frustration, futility, conflict, anxiety, unfairness, exhaustion, or something else?
How do Genesis 3 and Ecclesiastes protect us from two opposite errors: calling work itself evil, and pretending faithful work will always feel fulfilling?
Where can self-protection, recognition, control, or advancement quietly become the organizing purpose of work?
What might bringing the gospel into one thorny situation look like—not merely talking about Jesus, but acting from grace, truth, repentance, courage, and love?
Name one thorn and one faithful response
Privately name one distortion that affects your work. Choose one response within your responsibility: repent, ask for help, tell the truth, establish a boundary, encourage someone, repair something, or pray before acting.
Invite people to write it down. Participation is encouraged, not policed.
How we’ll return to thisSession 4 opens by reconnecting with this practice.
Allow a moment of silence. Pray for people facing weariness, injustice, unemployment, conflict, or uncertainty, without requiring anyone to identify themselves.
Amen
Facilitate carefully
- Never imply that abuse, discrimination, harassment, dangerous conditions, or illegal conduct should simply be endured. Help is a faithful response.
- Avoid locating every problem in an individual attitude. Sin operates through people, practices, incentives, organizations, and systems.