“The Sacred Blessing of Work,” Liahona, Aug. 2025, United States and Canada Section.
The Sacred Blessing of Work
Work develops character, allows us to serve others, and can help us become more like Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ.
Illustrations by Christopher Wormell
When our children were young, our family motto was “We work before we play.” We told them we could do all the playing they wanted, but the work—chores, homework, music practice—had to be finished first. They would often roll their eyes when we offered that reminder.
But as they grew, they expressed gratitude for that principle, and now since becoming parents, they continue to do so. When our grandson was two years old, we went to Tacoma, Washington, to tend him while his parents went out of town. One day I was having so much fun with our grandson that I suggested we go outside and play after lunch. He said, “Grandma, we work before we play.”
In the Church, we often talk about work: missionary work, temple work, family history work, building temples, building the kingdom of God, the work of salvation, the Creation, the Restoration, and eternal progress. All of these require work. God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, exemplify perfectly the principle of hard work.
God said, “For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man” (Moses 1:39). The prophet Isaiah wrote, “But now, O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand” (Isaiah 64:8). Think of it! Everything we are and all we enjoy as sons and daughters of God are the result of His holy work! The Savior worked out our salvation by paying for our sins through His atoning sacrifice in the Garden of Gethsemane and on the cross at Calvary. “And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground” (Luke 22:44).
“By Work We Sustain and Enrich Life”
Our Heavenly Father invites us to become more like Him. One way we can do this is to give our best and honest effort in education, employment, homemaking, and developing our talents. Good, honest, sweat-producing labor is refining. It can develop character and strengthen bodies and minds. The Lord told Adam and Eve, “Cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life” (Genesis 3:17). President Joseph Fielding Smith (1876–1972) taught, “It is contrary to the law of God for the heavens to be opened and messengers to come to do anything for man that man can do for himself.”
And Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles testified:
“A consecrated life is a life of labor. Beginning early in His life, Jesus was about His Father’s business (see Luke 2:48–49). God Himself is glorified by His work of bringing to pass the immortality and eternal life of His children (see Moses 1:39). We naturally desire to participate with Him in His work, and in so doing, we ought to recognize that all honest work is the work of God. …
“God has designed this mortal existence to require nearly constant exertion. … By work we sustain and enrich life. It enables us to survive the disappointments and tragedies of the mortal experience. Hard-earned achievement brings a sense of self-worth. Work builds and refines character, creates beauty, and is the instrument of our service to one another and to God. A consecrated life is filled with work, sometimes repetitive, sometimes menial, sometimes unappreciated but always work that improves, orders, sustains, lifts, ministers, aspires.”
Filling the Lord’s Storehouse
Many of us wonder how we can help those who are suffering more than we perceive ourselves to suffer. When we respect and participate in the sacred blessing of work, we are able to help others. Elder Robert D. Hales (1932–2017) of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles said, “The purpose of both temporal and spiritual self-reliance is to get ourselves on higher ground so that we can lift others in need.” And in the Book of Mormon, King Benjamin says, “When ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God” (Mosiah 2:17).
As welfare and self-reliance specialists in the Church’s Wasatch Front Service Mission, my husband and I are blessed to work to help local leaders and members. Elder Hales explained that “the welfare plan is an integral part of the plan of salvation” and that “the scriptures provide the spiritual framework for the welfare plan.”
When we work hard in our fields of labor, live within our means, save for an unforeseen difficulty, and pay tithes and generous fast offerings, we collectively become the Lord’s storehouse. “And all this for the benefit of the church of the living God, that every man may improve upon his talent, that every man may gain other talents, yea, even an hundred fold, to be cast into the Lord’s storehouse, to become the common property of the whole church” (Doctrine and Covenants 82:18).
The Savior is the perfect example of hard work and self-reliance. In the great Intercessory Prayer, He prayed, “I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do” (John 17:4). Our Redeemer worked out our salvation alone. And His work today is hastening. He said, “Behold, I will hasten my work in its time” (Doctrine and Covenants 88:73). He gives us the opportunity to work with Him and to have a purpose in the labor we do and that which we are able to share with others because of our hard work.
The Lord Honors Our Agency
In the mid-1980s, my husband and I were newly married and getting ready to move away to law school. We were worried about having enough money to make the move. We had always been self-reliant and did not want to ask our families for help, and the amount we needed was large. We had been praying about what to do. Out of the blue, I was commissioned to do a large art project for the college we attended. It would pay exactly what we needed. This experience was a direct blessing of paying tithing. But it was also something more. The Lord blessed me with the opportunity to work for that money. He gave me a way to earn it myself, and He honored my agency. I could have turned down the offer. I had a full-time job and a major Church calling, but I made the time and completed the project. We paid our own way to move.
I testify that the Lord wants and expects us to work and to be self-reliant. It is His way. Work and self-reliance are true principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now that my husband and I have served seven years in the Wasatch Front Service Mission, more than ever I have tremendous respect for our Heavenly Father. He wants to help His children, but He knows it would not be good for us if He were to do for us what we can do for ourselves.
Our son is a new hematology-oncology doctor. He has had the blessing of obtaining all his medical school education and training through a scholarship from the United States Army Medical Department (AMEDD). It has provided 100 percent of his tuition, housing costs, and expenses and even a small monthly stipend during medical school. When he was working hard to qualify for that scholarship and fearing the possibility of having to take out six-figure loans if he did not, I remember a conversation we had. I will never forget what he shared. My son told me that he knew it would all work out somehow because he was committed to paying tithes and fast offerings while he was in medical school.
He wanted to know he was doing everything he could to qualify for the Lord’s help with the large task he was setting out to accomplish. His work ethic has since been tested to its limit, but he is a good example to me of never being weary in well doing (see Doctrine and Covenants 64:33). Even with his busy hospital schedule, he has happily accepted heavy Church assignments, and he and his wife and little family have been blessed.
I testify that the Lord will bless us with the power and strength we need to work hard and be self-reliant, if that is what we desire. Our Father in Heaven honors our agency, and when we show Him we want to be like Him, He shows how to do it, and He helps us to be successful. We honor God and His Son, Jesus Christ, when we follow Their example of honest and worthwhile labor.
The author lives in Utah.