Jesus was a carpenter and he worked with a saw and a hammer
And his hands could form a table true enough to stand forever
And he might have spun his life out in the coolness of the morning
But he put aside his tools and he walked the burning highways
To build a house from folks like you and me
Singer-songwriter Johnny Cash composed these lyrics to describe a man with a less distinguished career than his own, a man with the lowly profession of a carpenter. We should be all the more amazed to recall that the man with this modest job was Almighty God.
Before his public ministry, Jesus was not known for his elegance of speech or his miracles. On the contrary, his fellow Nazoreans were surprised by his words and deeds: “Where did this man get this wisdom and these mighty works? Is not this the carpenter’s son” (Matt 13:54–55)? He certainly had a reputation, but only as a simple laborer. God the divine artisan abased himself to our human condition, but he didn’t stop there. The Son of God “went down” to Nazareth to be the son of a carpenter (Luke 2:51). “We should be astonished by [these words]: was that then the whole work of Jesus Christ, the Son of God? His entire duty was to obey two of his creatures. With regard to what did he obey them? In the lowest of activities, in the practice of a mechanical art” (Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet).
Yet, we who follow this humble carpenter are all too quick to complain when the work assigned to us is beneath our dignity, unworthy of our talents—as if these were our own in the first place (1 Cor 4:7).
Standing up to our pride, Christ’s handiwork endures to this day. Jesus was a good carpenter, building things to last. He built his dwelling place within our souls (John 14:23; Eph 2:22) and a place for us to abide in his Father’s house (John 14:2). He constructed a table whose purpose continues in the heavenly banquet and the Sacrifice of the Mass (Luke 22:30; 1 Cor 10:16).
Among all the things his loving hands made, his greatest work was also fashioned with wood: the Cross. The hardness of the nails became softened with sweetness, placed in the hands of this humble carpenter. The simple, zebra-striped grain of the wood was painted elegantly with the blood of the Lamb. As Christ had been recognized in Nazareth for his carpentry, he was recognized in an entirely new way for this lowly, cruciform craft: “Truly this man was the Son of God” (Mark 15:39)!
When we undergo suffering, do we think this abasement is beneath us? Do we, lowly creatures, spurn what the Most High God took upon himself as a labor of love?
Rather than shun the humiliation, we should give thanks for being made instruments and tools of this divine carpenter. As the Church works to baptize all nations, souls are continuously built into a temple of God. At the table of our Father’s house, the Eucharist is celebrated from the rising of the sun to its setting. In our sufferings, we supply for what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ (Col 1:24). May we continue to give praise and glory to God by our humble cooperation in the work of this carpenter’s calloused and nail-torn hands.
Come again now Jesus be a carpenter among us
There are chapels in our discontent, cathedrals in our sorrows
And we dwell in golden mansions with the sand for our foundations
And the raging water’s rising and the thunder’s all around us
Won’t You come and build a house on rock again
Jesus was a carpenter and He worked with a saw and a hammer
And His hands could form a table true enough to stand forever
✠
Photo by Alexander Andrews on Unsplash
