Throughout itshistory, the American economy has transitioned from agrarian to industrial to information-driven.

Given ournewfound status, manual labor is increasingly cast down in the popular imagination, replaced by white-collar jobs, bachelor’s degrees, and ladder-climbing. Whether due to new avenues and opportunities or a more general distaste for the slow and mundane, work with the hands is either ignored or discouraged, both asvocational prospect andconsumeristic priority.

Amid this sea of new efficiencies, the art of craftsmanship is at a particular disadvantage. Whereas things used to be made with a certain individual artistry (out of necessity, no doubt), so much has e industrialized and systematized. That shift has led to unprecedented blessings, to be sure, whether in time, money, energy, andconvenience, and for those fruitswe should be grateful and rejoice.

But even in an economy such as this, there remains a need, a market, a knack for the slow and steady. There remains room not just for the magnificence of a well engineered microchip, but for a masterfully carved table andan artfully tailored suit. Creative es in all kinds, and God has aplan toboth meetour immediate needs and fillour bodies, souls, and spirits with beauty and wonder.

In a new video series called Raw Craft, famed travel geek Anthony Bourdain seeks to highlight the folks who are thriving on this frontier — the best of the best, who continue to create value in trades or methods that many consider dead or disposable. “The great cathedrals of France were designed by artists,” Bourdain says in one episode, “but they were built by craftsmen.”

Bourdain sits down with everyone from brewers to tailors, blacksmiths to instrument builders, but the episode on an age-old printer and bookmaker draws out all the rightthemes rather well:

Toward the end of the episode, Bourdain expresses the surprising awe ofsimply holding, touching, and smelling one of their finely made books, noting what he describes as a “metaphysical aspect” to the process and product. “There’s a heft to this,” he says, “You know somehow in a tactile way this is a well-made thing.”

In doing so, he unknowingly points to something profound about our God-given nature and destiny, not to mention the fruits of our labor. We are co-creators made in the image of a creative God, and the es and byproducts of that divine relationshipare often no less mysterious. There is something to behold and appreciate about ourcreations in and of themselves, and there’s a place in God’s economy for activities or processesthat we might otherwise deem “useless”or inefficient.

AsLester DeKoster and Gerard Berghoef observe,when we put hands to matter, we partake in somethingmore profound than we often realize:

The forms of work are countless, but the typical one is work with the hands. The Bible has reference to the sower, to the making of tents and of things out of clay, to tilling the fields and tending the vine. Handwork makes visible the plan in the mind, just as the deed makes visible the love in the heart. While the classic Greek mind tended to scorn work with the hands, the Bible suggests that something about it structures the soul.

Even amid our shifting civilizational priorities, and despite the temptations of consumerism, we now have the time, tools, and resources for the carefulness that craftsmanship requires. Oddly enough, and partly thanks to prosperity and efficiency, we now have new freedom and resources to pursue the goodness and beauty ofcraftsmanship— no longerout of a quest forself-sustenance, but for the service of all humankind.

More broadly, as society continues to blindly elevate this industry or occupation over that, and as our culture continues to assign status and value according to earthboundviews of human worth and destiny, the church has the opportunity to lead the way forward in recognizing the glory of craftsmanship. We can affirm whatBourdain already senses tobe true, pointing to the transcendent value behind it and the God-glorifyingtruth that liesahead.