. . . to their last.

Wikipedia:  "A last is a mechanical form shaped like a human foot. It is used by shoemakers and cordwainers in the manufacture and repair of shoes."

Following the way of everybody those days, my father was excited to buy his first electric (corded, no battery-powered) hedge trimmer in the 1970s.  One of his first attempts at technologically enhanced yard work went awry when he swung in the wrong direction and cut into the cord.  Sitting on the step of the porch, this now nonfunctional wizard in his hands, he repeated one of his favorite sayings, "Every workman to his last." 

"Does that mean we work to the end?" I asked.  "No," he said.  "A last is what shoemakers use to make shoes.  This means that it's sometimes better in life to concentrate on what you do well and trust others with skills and talents different from yours for some things.  Try things, but trust your purpose."  Every worker to their last.

As I've remembered that as an adult I've learned more about lasts.  It seems that a last is less like a tool and more like a mold.  It's a wooden frame shaped like a foot that allows a shoe to be created from leather or mended. 

There's something about faith in that, and about the New Creation, which is also the Great Repair of the Cosmos, we proclaim in Christ. 

Two levels to this, I think.

One:  Why do we try so hard to make things right, to save ourselves, to create a livable world, and find such mixed results for our efforts.  Is it a job that's given better to the Creator?  Perhaps so.  Perhaps healing what's diseased, aligning what's out of joint, finding what's lost, mending what's broken, saving what's been wildly overspent is better given to the One born for that.  Perhaps the role given us is simply to receive—and to respond to, to act on, to wear the work that has already been completed by God.  Every worker to their last, after all. 

But consider this at another level—every metaphor to their last.  As we begin Advent, let's think of Christmas as Creation's last—the story upon which all other stories are built.  Here the One who made all things, who loves all things, who frees all things, and who takes the broken chord of our separation and mends it with re-creating love, comes among us in the most humble of ways.  Here God is not separate from the dramas of the world, but comes into them with a small sweet voice of promise.  Here God in a manger is our divine last, inspiring all who come to see him with confidence, with strength, with gratitude, and with a future. 

Every creature to their last.