Description
Previously in this journal (vol 22.4 and 23.1), Peter Heslam introduced and developed the theme of ‘Being Productive: Working from Rest’. He made three biblically grounded arguments. First, that instead of treating rest primarily as recovery from work, we should see it as resourcing for work. Second, that instead of regarding rest merely as an earthly necessity, we should also regard it as our ultimate and eternal destiny. Third, instead of perceiving productivity solely as an outcome of work, we should also perceive it as an outcome of rest. In this third and final instalment, he suggests that, although many scholars of religion stress that the Protestant origins of today’s global economy lie in Protestantism’s ‘work ethic’, it is important to acknowledge that Protestantism also had a ‘rest ethic’. We need to live out such an ethic today, he concludes, at a time when our culture is dangerously work-obsessed but our churches are almost silent about the practical and theological importance of rest.
