Joy in the Third Third of Life

A Lunch I’ll Never Forget

Sixteen years ago, I found myself enjoying lunch with someone I never in my wildest dreams would have imagined I’d share a meal with. I was serving at a leadership forum in Florida sponsored by Laity Lodge, where I worked at the time. We were hosting a special guest speaker, who joined us for lunch before his presentation. So, five of us were able to spend ninety minutes with him as we ate together.

Talking with our guest, I was struck by the fact that he was the most joyful person I had ever met. His joy was genuine and effusive. It wasn’t the result of an easy or comfortable life, that’s for sure. In fact, our guest had experienced more challenges and heartaches than most people on earth. Yet, during our lunch, he laughed heartily, telling humorous stories, usually ones featuring his own foibles. Soon, my Laity Lodge colleagues and I were sharing in his laughter. Who was this unusually joyful lunch partner? None other than Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

As you can imagine, that was a lunch I’ll never forget.

The Book of Joy

Now, jumping ahead 16 years to 2025, memories of lunch with Archbishop Tutu have come back stronger than ever. They are related to research I’ve been doing on joy in the third third of life. My research led me to a book written by Douglas Abrams, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World. This book features a fascinating conversation between the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Tutu. The subject of their conversation? Joy.

Now, since I had once experienced the Archbishop as the most joyful person I had ever known, I was eager to read The Book of Joy. My eagerness was rewarded, not only by insightful wisdom about joy, but also by the descriptions of the utterly joyful, almost childlike interactions between Archbishop Tutu and the Dalai Lama. They were not only globally influential leaders, but also good friends who loved to laugh together.

Of course, these conversation partners differed in many ways. Archbishop Tutu was a Christian from South Africa. (He died in 2021.) The Dalai Lama, a Tibetan Buddhist who is now 90 years old, still lives in exile in India. One was a deeply committed theist, the other a lifelong atheist. Yet, despite their differences, when it came to their understanding and experience of joy, both the Archbishop and the Dalai Lama had much in common.

For example, both of them thought of joy as something more than happiness. The Dalai Lama said, “Joy is something different from happiness” (p. 35). Archbishop Tutu elaborated,

It’s wonderful to discover that what we want is not actually happiness. It is not actually what I would speak of. I would speak of joy. Joy subsumes happiness. Joy is the far greater thing. Think of a mother who is going to give birth. Almost all of us want to escape pain. And mothers know that they are going to have pain, the great pain of giving birth. But they accept it. And even after the most painful labor, once the baby is out, you can’t measure the mother’s joy. It is one of those incredible things that joy can come so quickly from suffering” (p. 32).

The Complexity of Joy

Intuitively, we agree with these two sages. Joy and happiness, though related in some way, are not the same thing. Yet, if you start digging into writings on joy, as I have done recently, you’ll discover a wide variety of views on the true nature of joy. My Fuller colleagues, Pamela Ebstyne King and Frederic Defoy, in an article called “Joy as a Virtue: The Means and Ends of Joy,” observe, “Currently within the psychological literature, diverse conceptualizations of joy exist. They range from involving levity and delight to having substantive and sacred meaning” (p. 309). King and Defoy add, “Most often joy is treated as a basic emotion, a discrete emotional response, or an enduring disposition—none of which capture the complexity of biblical joy that has prominent relational, moral, and spiritual elements” (p. 309).

Indeed, there is complexity when it comes to joy in Scripture. Often, joy is linked with the emotion of gladness (Psalm 45:15, 51:8, 67:4). Even before he was born, John the Baptist “leaped for joy” in the womb of his mother, Elizabeth (Luke 1:41-44). The prophet Zephaniah paints a striking picture of God who “will rejoice over you with gladness . . . [and] exult over you with loud singing” (Zeph 3:17). Jesus reveals that we are branches and he is the vine, encouraging us to abide in him and the love of his Father (John 15:1-10). He offers this exhortation: “so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete” (John 15:11).

The notion of complete joy suggests that joy is more than a common or momentary emotion. The Apostle Paul concurs, explaining that “the kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (Rom 14:17). In his letter to the Galatians, Paul adds that joy is one aspect of “the fruit of the Spirit” (Gal 5:22). It is something God, through the Spirit, grows in us, something deep, pervasive, and lasting.

Scripture consistently emphasizes the fact that joy comes through our experience of and relationship with God. This truth bursts forth from Psalm 16:8-11:

I keep the LORD always before me;
because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
Therefore my heart is glad, and my soul rejoices;
my body also rests secure.
For you do not give me up to Sheol,
or let your faithful one see the Pit.
You show me the path of life.
In your presence there is fullness of joy;
in your right hand are pleasures forevermore.

In God’s presence, we experience not just temporary feelings of joy, but rather the “fullness of joy,” the “pleasures” of which last “forevermore.”

In God’s presence, we experience not just temporary feelings of joy, but rather the “fullness of joy,” the “pleasures” of which last “forevermore.”

Joy in the Third Third of Life

If joy comes through our relationship with God, and if the pleasures of joy are “forevermore,” then we can expect to experience joy in the third third of life. Yet, we may wonder how we can know joy in a season of life with many losses, losses that often bring suffering and grief. Can we be joyful when our bodies and minds begin to wear out? When we can’t do some of the things we once loved to do? When people close to us need exceptional care? When friends and family members die? When we know that our own death is rapidly approaching?

In Scripture, joy isn’t something we experience only when life is good. In the letter of James, for example, it says, “My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of any kind, consider it nothing but joy, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance; and let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:2-4). For James, we can rejoice in difficult times because they will help us grow to maturity. Peter, in his first letter, notes that his readers are rejoicing in their salvation even though they “have had to suffer various trials” (1 Pet 1:3-6). As they suffer, they “rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy” (1 Pet 1:8). They can rejoice in this way because they are “sharing Christ’s sufferings” in anticipation of the time when they will “be glad and shout for joy when his glory is revealed” (1 Pet 4:13).

The New Testament bears witness to the fact that Christians can rejoice in hard times. To the Thessalonians, Paul writes, “And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for in spite of persecution you received the word with joy inspired by the Holy Spirit” (1 Thes 1:6). Even more striking is Paul’s description of what the churches in Macedonia, including Thessalonica, did for others:

We want you to know, brothers and sisters, about the grace of God that has been granted to the churches of Macedonia; for during a severe ordeal of affliction, their abundant joy and their extreme poverty have overflowed in a wealth of generosity on their part (2 Cor 8:1-2).

Though these believers faced extreme affliction and poverty, their overflowing joy inspired overflowing generosity.

Academic research also testifies to the possibility of third third joy. A study sponsored by AARP and National Geographic found that “happiness grows with age, with a striking spike among those age 70-plus.” Laura Carstensen, director of the Stanford Center on Longevity, gave a TED talk called “Older people are happier.” A fascinating study of joy among older people comes from Norway, where researchers sought to understand ways in which people in nursing homes experience joy. “Joy of life in nursing homes” found five factors that helped folks in nursing homes experience joy: “(i) positive relations, (ii) a sense of belonging, (iii) sources of meaning, (iv) moments of feeling well, and (v) acceptance.” So, it is certainly possible for those of us in the third third of life to experience joy, even in difficult life situations.

So, it is certainly possible for those of us in the third third of life to experience joy, even in difficult life situations.

Of course, I began this article with a stellar example of a joyful older person who had experienced plenty of pain in life. Desmond Tutu suffered during decades of oppression as a Black man in South Africa. Because of his advocacy for racial justice, he experienced government harassment, widespread criticism, and numerous death threats. Moreover, he suffered from a variety of health issues, including polio, tuberculosis, and prostate cancer. In fact, recurrence of prostate cancer almost kept Archbishop Tutu from traveling to meet with the Dalai Lama for their five-day conversation about joy. Nevertheless, that conversation happened. And if you read about it in The Book of Joy, you’ll find ample evidence that Desmond Tutu’s joy wasn’t diminished in the least by the limitations of his 80-year-old body.

Let me conclude this article with the Archbishop’s own words about joy and sorrow:

Discovering more joy does not, I’m sorry to say, save us from the inevitability of hardship and heartbreak. In fact, we may cry more easily, but we will laugh more easily, too. Perhaps we are just more alive. Yet as we discover more joy, we can face suffering in a way that ennobles rather than embitters. We have hardship without becoming hard. We have heartbreak without being broken (p. 12).

May the example of Desmond Tutu and the teaching of Scripture inspire us to “discover more joy” in the third third of life.