We were in the woods every winter cutting down trees when I was a young lad in the 1940s and 1950s on the 238-acre farm outside of Seneca in the heart of Crawford County. After morning chores and breakfast, Dolly and Prince were hitched to a sleigh wagon, two runner blades in the front and two in the back, loaded with axes, cant hooks, hammer mall, wedges, crosscut saw, and away we go would to the woods, Dad, my two brothers, Phillip and Bob, and me. That’s a two-man crosscut saw I’m talking about, no chainsaw on the Scheckel farm.

Dad showed us how to make a notch on the side of the tree we wanted the tree to fall. We would pick a spot that was as clear of other trees as we could make it. We didn’t want a tree “hung up” in another tree. That could be dangerous. When the tree started to fall, Phillip, Bob, and I would yell “timber” to warn anybody that was nearby. Of course, there wasn’t anyone except the four of us and Browser, the dog, and we made sure he was out of the way. We did not have hardhats or any protective steel-toed shoes. We boys took great delight if the tree fell where we chose. A big tree would yield a log or two, fence posts, and firewood.

As soon as the tree was down, two of us attacked the top of the tree with axes, cutting off the ends and stacking the brush. Two others would use the crosscut saw to cut logs and fence posts. Long limbs about 10 to 12 feet were stacked up or loaded up on the wagon. These would be taken to the farmstead to await the “buzz” saw and cut up to burn in the basement furnace.

We’d take a breather now and then, deep in the woods and sit on tree stumps and drink water from quart jars that we brought along. Sometimes we packed a few sandwiches.

Dad would tell a few stories of his past. A man was working in the woods with him when he was a boy. They were felling trees and a dead limb hit him on the head. The man got a bad bruise but kept right on working. At noon, they went home to eat dinner. The man laid down on the couch to rest awhile and died. Dad thought that a blood clot had gone to his brain.

Dad talked about the importance of paying your debts, honesty, and frugality. More than a few times, he would pontificate, “Boys, work is a blessing.”  We would think, “Yah, bullshit.” But of course, Dad was right. We boys just didn’t see it at the time.

There’s that wonderful scene in Season 3 Episode 8 of the original 1978-1990 All Creatures Great and Small television program airing on February 16, 1980. The Yorkshire vet, James Herriott, and his partner, Siegfreid Farnon, are attending Dolly, an ageing horse belonging to an elderly milkman, Herbie Hinchcliffe.

Herbie and Dolly have been delivering bottled milk to the Darrowby townsfolks for decades. Dolly has come up lame and can barely stand or walk. The vets deliver the sad news to Mr. Hinchcliffe, who can’t afford another horse and must now suspend his milk route. Both milkman and horse are out of work. Siegfried turns to James and loudly exclaims, “James, we are the lucky ones, apace, apace, work, work, oh, she wears a beautiful face.”

The value of human labor goes back to Biblical times. In Genesis 3:19,  God said to Adam, “Ye shall earn thy bread by the sweat of thy brow.”

Paul’s second letter to the Thessalonians says that when we do authentic work of whatever kind, we participate in God’s ongoing creation and providence. We should see our daily labor, however humble, as part of God’s plan to bring us joy. Paul knew about hard physical labor. Paul was a tentmaker, not easy work, and lots of drudgery.

Work affirms our dignity and self-worth. It is a social activity that draws us together in a common enterprise. Work produces something of value for others to consume. In a real sense, work is a form of prayer.