Don’t Regret the Sweat

We’ve become people who are ashamed to sweat.

But it’s not just because we think sweat stinks. There’s also an unfounded stigma of low social status attached to the man who owes his existence to hard physical labor.

Unfortunately, this impression has gained a lot of plausibility over the years.

Not only that, many young boys have been groomed to seek a “good” job—one demanding a liberal arts college education and a well-deserved expectation to somehow try to increase personal wealth exponentially sitting behind an employer’s desk for eight hours a day.

But God’s wisdom remains unfathomable.

And I’m convinced that a desire to work hard and sweat make up a critical part of the intrinsic male appetite. However, the appeal of easy money has successfully enticed many of us to abandon the masculine character and physical vitality necessary to thrive in a fallen world.

Because life in the Garden before man’s disobedience was hardly an exercise in idleness. After creating Adam, God placed him there to take care of it. [Gen. 2:15]

He had to work in order to do that.

And nothing in the texts of the creation account suggests that sweating didn’t exist before the man disobeyed. God merely stated that Adam’s “sweat” would henceforth be the result of a more difficult form of sustenance—farming.

“Cursed is the ground because of you.  In toil you shall eat of it all the days of your life.  Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you, and you shall eat the plants of the field.  By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread till you return to the ground, because from it you were taken.  For you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”  [Gen. 3:17b-19]

Of course, “sweating” can sometimes be understood in the context of doing any number of things I don’t want to do.

Yet, in spite of how the world works, I believe God’s intention has always been for a man to be bound to some form of challenging, physical labor, whether it involves agriculture or not.

After all, His curse was upon the ground, not upon Adam.

And it’s no secret that the sweat from physical labor is itself actually a blessing, for without it, a man cannot remain cool. The health benefits are also self-evident.

Few will admit it, but when men work and sweat, there’s a sense of accomplishment among them.