HAPPY LABOR DAY?

What makes a happy Labor day, anyway?

Do you give Labor Day gifts?

Was there a great military battle we won, worthy of celebration?

Maybe it has some Religious or Christian significance.

No, no and no.

"Labor Day differs in every essential way from the other holidays of the year in any country," said Samuel Gompers, founder and longtime president of the American Federation of Labor. "

All other holidays are in a more or less degree connected with conflicts and battles of man's prowess over man, of strife and discord for greed and power, of glories achieved by one nation over another. Or else they are in observance of some religious event.

Labor Day...is devoted to no man, living or dead, to no sect, race, or nation."

Labor Day is a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity, and well-being of our country.

The first Labor Day holiday was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882, in New York City, in accordance with the plans of the Central Labor Union. The Central Labor Union held its second Labor Day holiday just a year later, on September 5, 1883.

On June 28th, 1894, Congress passed an act making the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday in the District of Columbia and the territories.

Did you know, though, that by a resolution of the American Federation of Labor convention of 1909, the Sunday preceding Labor Day was adopted as Labor Sunday and is supposed to be dedicated to the spiritual and educational aspects of the labor movement?

In the end, Labor Day is a secular holiday (which, since holiday is a contraction of Holy Day, may be an oxymoron), and is directly tied to neither patriotism nor faith.

That being said, one principle of Scripture is that we give our very best as slaves (read: employees) remembering that our work is unto the Lord, and not to men.

So, HAPPY LABOR DAY! And may all the picnics you attend be filling, may the speeches you endure be short, and if you are off today, be safe, get some rest and tomorrow...get to work!

Above all, remain in Christ.

That will make it a happy Labor Day, indeed.