There’s a helpful piece here on the Gospel Coalition website in a new ‘Thorns and Thistles’ column, by Missy Wallace, looking at the question, ‘What if my work isn’t my passion?’
It pushes back a bit on the well-worn adage, ‘Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life’, with the main takeaway being that ‘both social science and also God’s Word refute passion as a major job-search criterion’.
Wallace offers the following four principles to bear in mind:
1. ‘“Finding your passion” assumes passion is a fixed and/or inherent quality, whereas social science research suggests it’s more of a developing and changing quality.
2. Passions, when channeled into work, often don’t translate to giftings.
3. Science reveals that turning a passion into paid work can cause it to lose its inherent pleasure.
4. Scripture reveals that even though God created us to take dominion and create productive flourishing, all work includes toil, regardless of its alignment with our interest and giftings.
She concludes:
‘I’m thankful we live in a world where discussion about vocational fulfillment and satisfaction is even possible, as the privilege of choosing work is a first-world opportunity that reflects a movement from scarcity to abundance. While God may enable us to work for him in our “sweet spot,” we must acknowledge and steward the gift of that choice, remembering that our only true fulfillment is in him.’
Read the whole piece here.
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