Finding Joy in God in our Productivity

Enjoying the LORD is usually easy when I have the space to study His word, and think upon Him. But when it’s time to work, and I take a glance at my tasks list and calendar full of tasks I haven’t accomplished and deadlines I haven’t met, it is so hard to delight in Him.

But that doesn’t mean I’ve never enjoyed working—I certainly have. But I am quite embarrassed to admit that I don’t acknowledge Him as the Source of it as often as I ought to.

Is work a curse or a blessing?

So many times we think that to toil and to work means suffering, when the fact is that even before the fall of man, this was part of God’s design and purpose for us (Genesis 2:15). We were created to work and delight in doing so!

This question on Ask Pastor John resonated a lot with me: how could we say that we delight in God, when we find satisfaction in our productivity, that isn’t necessarily about God?

A personal fight for joy in God

This question has troubled me quite often. As a new Christian years ago, but a long time music hobbyist, I was so determined to honor God above everything, and lay aside all competing idols in my life. I found that music was taking up more of my enjoyment than I felt it should, and couldn’t figure out how to honor God while using my gifts in a creative field that far too easily gets glorified.

I ended up doing what any sensible young and zealous Christian would do: I gave up music! I sold and gave away my equipment, and quit writing and recording secular music to make room for God in my life. It was a difficult decision, but it was also in many ways freeing at the time.

As it turns out, a little while later, God allowed me to write music again, and I vowed to make music that honors only Him. I’ve received lots of questions from people asking if I would ever make secular music, especially since that will more likely earn me a lot more money. But, confident of my calling from God, I’ve kept my music dedicated to Him to this day, and I watched Him multiply what I had to offer as I did.

Not too long after that, it was time for me to take the step from doing music as a hobby, into a full-time calling. Music has suddenly become my job. So you can only imagine how the original joy and delight began to fade.

Strangely, there were times when it felt illegal for me to have fun and enjoy, because it seemed contrary to the hustle culture that glorified sleepless nights, and serious hard work, all for gaining profit.

And so begins, yet again, the struggle of understanding how I could carry out my mission for the Lord joyfully, rather than begrudgingly. How could I call myself a Christian creative, when it was beginning to feel like a chore to find ways to glorify God?

Finding freedom and joy in work

Sometimes I forget that although I’ve grown much in my walk with God, there are still mountains of growth I will undergo. One of those lessons is unlearning my guilt over enjoying other things that are not directly God.

This verse from Ecclesiastes 2:24 has recently opened my eyes: “There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God.”

Isn’t it wonderful to think that the blessings of eating and drinking, and finding enjoyment in our toiling—in our writing, planning, thinking, moving, analyzing, producing—all come from the hand of the Lord? In all honesty, I was prone to dismiss this word of wisdom, thinking it too simplistic and close to idolatrous.

God is the means and the end

But then I see a verse such as this: “As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. (1 Timothy 6:17)”

God, through the apostle Peter, makes it clear that He—God Himself— provides us richly with everything to enjoy! The condition is that we do not set our hopes on these things per se, for the uncertainty of riches is an unworthy anchor. But instead, we put our hope on God from whom these riches, blessings, and enjoyment, come.

Thinking upon that truth, now I have freedom to find joy in Christ Himself, even in the process of work, writing, creating, thinking, and planning. The reason is because the Source of my capacity to do these things is Christ Himself! God is not merely glorified in the output of my labor, but in the labor itself being done by faith.

So that means, God is glorified as I write this message to share with you, and you are certainly free to believe that He is glorified in your reading and understanding this wonderful truth, this very moment!

A lifetime endeavour

I’m sure that this fight for freedom and joy in work will continue until the day I die. I’m personally inspired by people like John Piper, well in his seventies, still grinding night and day, in search of the glories of God in Scripture, and faithfully serving His discoveries on a platter for the body of Christ to feast on. I pray that every Christian would have such a heart for God.

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