What’s Work Got to Do with Joy?

By Chris Armstrong, reprinted from Humanism as a Way of Life; part one of a series.

The idea of taking joy in our ordinary, daily work may seem alien to many of us. Work is simply hard, isn’t it? Cursed from the beginning? An unpleasant necessity to keep body and soul together? So, the questions I’m going to reflect on here may seem weird, and perhaps even insulting to most working folk:

Can we expect to attain vocational joy?
If so, can we inhabit that joy?
Can we even spread that joy?

Even many of us who have some perhaps religiously grounded concept of “vocation” or “calling”—generally considered something positive—are experiencing a work life sadly unlike the ideal of vocation we may dream of. And we’re left with the question:

How can we attain a sense of joyous calling?

Of course a mere cognitive reframing of our work may seem pitifully inadequate in the face of the frustrations, thorns, and thistles we experience daily. Surely we need more than some adjustment of our affective set related to work: what about rest, restoration, a redemptive reckoning on broken aspects of our imperfect institutions? At minimum, for many of us lament seems more appropriate than some quixotic search for joy.

And yet, many still yearn for joy in our vocations – so what are we to do with that?

Is Joy in Work Attainable?

First, we’ll ask whether we can trust that vocational joy is attainable.

I’ll spend more time with this question than those about inhabiting and spreading vocational joy, because I think this question of trusting in joy may require the most evidence and careful thought.

As we wrestle with work-related anxieties and loss of purpose, many Christians turn to the scriptures and our faith traditions for vocational renewal and wholeness.

According to David Miller in his history of the American faith and work movement, this search was a primary driver of that movement. And those who pursued this quest managed over the years to uncover some truly good things to help them in their vocational disappointments and challenges – even to point them toward joy.

Scripture

Old Testament

Let’s start by turning to the faith and work movement’s primary source—the Bible. We find workaday joy affirmed in a surprising number of places in Scripture. Perhaps none of these is more surprising than a biblical book reputed to be one of the most depressing texts in the canon.

Yes, Ecclesiastes has a reputation as a despairing and cynical portrait of life on earth. “Vanity . . . all is vanity!” famously wrote the author, traditionally identified as Qoheleth—“the preacher.”

We miss the positive message of this wisdom book because we fail to see that in those passages about the futility of life’s occupations, Qoheleth is talking about the worldview of those who do not know and honor God (those living what we might call a “secular” life “under the sun.”) But Qoheleth shows us a happier reality for those to whom God is present and acknowledged.

Consider chapter 5, verse 18:

“When God . . . enables [anyone] to . . . be happy in [their] work—this is a gift of God . . . because God keeps [them] occupied with gladness of heart.”

This message is repeated again and again in Ecclesiastes, no fewer than nine times in all.

There are, in other words, reasons given in the Hebrew Bible that we can expect, and that God wants to give us, a certain satisfaction and even joy in our work – even when that work is difficult and challenging in many respects. Most of us have experienced this at least fleetingly—though we may be finding such experiences elusive right now.

So many of us may still ask, Sure Qoheleth, but . . . Why should we expect joy in our work? Surely work is just hard, and always has been, and expecting joy in it is unrealistic.

Now, you may say (quite correctly), that vocation is not “all about” the joy of the worker; it’s substantially about serving others. And that’s true. So we should add a footnote here: joy, when it occurs, seems better described as the . . . by-product of our vocations than their goal.

But again, what’s the scriptural evidence that we should expect joy at all in our work?

The Ecclesiastes message of joy in work is by no means unique in the Old Testament.

Alongside a dominant theme of hope, joy also shines through—often tied to agricultural experiences of shalom. That meant crops and herds thriving through people’s work, and banquets of celebration assembled with the fruit of that labor.

Before Genesis 3’s curse on work, Genesis 2 assigns to Adam and Eve the good work of cultivating and keeping the garden God gave to sustain them, showing us that shalom in and through our work is God’s original and best plan for us.

Of course work in today’s information economy differs from agricultural work. But God’s plan and promise to sustain our flourishing—often through our work—remains the same.

New Testament

The same plan continues in the New Testament, which promises a joy most often linked to the presence of the Lord.

In its texts, shalom is again tied to work. For example, while the parable of the talents certainly points beyond itself, at the literal level it speaks of a productive servant whose master declares “well done!” and puts him “in charge of many things”—that is, assigns him more work—and then finally tells him:

“Come and share your master’s happiness!”

The Apostle Paul speaks of joy so often that some scholars rank the theme as second only to agape (love) in his writings. Even in the face of trials, persecution, and suffering, joy is promised.

And as Jesus does, Paul connects joy with our earthly activities. He does so in the context of an ordered Christian community, in which we are to contribute to the well-being of others, according to the division of labor into the many kinds of vocations on which our shalom still depends today.

This is reflected in I Corinthians’ language of a variety of giftings, and of one body with many members. One place we find Paul connecting joy and vocation explicitly is a passage we hear everywhere in today’s faith and work movement, Colossians 3: