So it is God who “establishes the work of our hands” so that our labor bears fruit. We need not worry whether our work made a difference—He will make sure that it does, no matter its length on this earth. After all, once we accept that our eternal life has already begun, what matters it that the number of days we spent on this side of eternity are few or many? Like Moses and the Anonymous author of Psalm 119, what gives us comfort in our suffering is that our efforts to do good, no matter how humble or puny their effect in our eyes, can continue to “produce a crop 100, 60, or 30 times what was sown”(Matthew 13:8), long after our time on this earth has ended. The beauty that “Anonymous” was the author of Psalm 119 is now revealed: we can all claim these words are our own expression of finding comfort in our suffering:
My comfort in my suffering is this:
Your promise preserves my life. Psalm 119:50
