There is often a misuse of the words work and toil. Some seem to be of the opinion that they are both one and the same thing, only differing in the context of usage. I beg to differ and will, through scriptures, explain why.

When God made man in the beginning,  He gave him authority and dominion over everything He( God )had created.
The word authority bestows on its holder a form of responsibility. When you have authority over something,  someone or people,  you are to a large extent responsible for them, and that responsibility comes with commitment and work.

In verse 15 of Genesis chapter 2, the man was given an assignment, which was to tend the garden and watch over it. This may be disappointing to some, but God did not create man to be idle.

Idleness is not from God. God placed man in such luxury and beauty, surrounded by good things, and still gave him a responsibility to work.

Further verses down  the same chapter,  you see the man involved/ partnering  with God as God formed the animals and the birds but brought them to Adam to name them.

God made the animals, but  Adam chose the names for each one of them, and this could have gone on for some time.

So,  Adam was responsible for naming all the animals and birds and tending and keeping the garden.  Adam was working.

If work then is from God, why are so many people suffering today in the name of work? We are talking about major health issues, stress, and all kinds of problems resulting from what people call work today. That can not be work, at least not how God intended, which brings us to the word toil.

In Genesis 3, the result of man’s sin was that the ground became cursed. Prior to the curse, the ground supernaturally produced springs which watered the whole earth, and a river flowed from eden outward to four different directions, nurishing all but that changed after the fall.  Look at the verses below:

“And to the man he said, “Since you listened to your wife and ate from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.  It will grow thorns and thistles for you, though you will eat of its grains. By the sweat of your brow will you have food to eat until you return to the ground from which you were made….
Genesis 3:17-19 NLT

This verse of scripture gives us a definition of the word toil, and they are as follows:

1)Struggle to scratch a living.

2)Experiencing thorns and thistles before the production of grains.

3)Sweating just to eat.

The word toil, according to dictionary definition, is to work extremely hard or incessantly, exhausting physical labour.

Everyone knows that starting a business,  a venture,  a company, a project, or anything of value takes time, energy,  effort, and so on. So, does that fall into the category of toil? Of course not!

Toiling is when the above description is a lifestyle. When the people involved experience nothing better than struggle after struggle to make ends meet, ‘struggling through the teeth’. 

I heard a story of someone who boarded a luxury cruise ship and for fear of extra expense which he couldn’t afford,  stayed in his room for 3 days snacking on the items which he had brought along to avoid paying for anything while on board. 

On the 4th day, during a routine stop ( which he had managed to avoid up till that time), one of the guests noticed him for the first time and asked why he hadn’t been coming out during meal times. The man in question casually said he didn’t want to accumulate extra expense, to which he was informed that his fare covered everything on board the ship, including food.

This man was in the midst of luxury for 3 days yet nearly died of starvation because he did not apply himself to understanding everything his package entailed. Very sadly, the majority of the human population are experiencing the same thing today.

We have within our grasp what it takes to walk away from a life of toiling and incessant labour into the kind of rest that only dependence on God and applying His principles can bring.

A life where work is not for the purpose of survival but the essence of fulfilling God’s mandate for us as humans.

Every blessing
Kingdom