Even in Times Like These – Joy

Back in December, I was trying to write a sermon on joy. However, in the back of my mind were the tornados that ripped through Kentucky. I also couldn’t help but think about the choir director from a church I used to serve who confessed to the murder of his wife and two grown children… Senseless… That week, it was very hard to feel joyful. And it raised the question: How can we talk about joy amid suffering?

However, the truth is, Christians have always spoken about joy even during times of intense sorrow or loss. We do this because our understanding of joy is that it does not come from escaping from suffering or hardship – but that it comes in the midst of it.

Barbara Brown Taylor describes the experience of joy as “almost irreverent.” She writes, “Joy has never had very much to do with what is going on in the world at the time. This is what makes it different from happiness, or pleasure, or fun. All those depend on positive conditions… The only condition for joy is the presence of God… which means that it can erupt in a depressed economy, in the middle of a war, or in an intensive care waiting room…”

About a year ago, I received an email from my friend Charley Landreth who had a stroke sometime back and lost much of his ability to speak. We hadn’t seen each other in a while and he wrote this: I am happy, feel fine, and receive excellent care. I still have difficulty speaking… However, (and he put this all in caps) I am filled with Joy!

Those of you who know Charley, know it’s true…

Paul wrote from prison: Rejoice in the Lord always! Again, I say rejoice! On his way to the cross, Jesus said, “I have told you all of this so that my joy would be in you and that your joy would be complete.

Maybe in part, joy is a choice. My prayer for you today is that you would keep an open heart. Pay attention to the blessings around you, gifts even in amid the darkness. Remember God is with you, and that God is inviting you to rejoice.

Let us pray: We remember, O God, that there other invitations out there – invitations that can take away our joy. There is the invitation to be constantly productive, the invitation to be constantly entertained… There is the invitation to cynicism, to bitterness, the invitation to give into our fears or to allow our grief or pain more time than it deserves. We don’t want to answer those invitations, just yours. Despite our outward circumstance, we turn to you again this day asking you to fill us with joy. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.