Joy

Each year during the Christmas season I try to find one thing to meditate on. It is easy to be distracted by the commercialism, or to forget altogether that it is Christmastime (it’s a little hard to get into the Christmas spirit when it is hot and humid!). This year in an attempt to remember the reason for this holiday, I decided that we would light the advent candles each Sunday night. For a few minutes each week, it reminds us why we celebrate Christmas. It draws us back to the center. Back to Christ. Growing up, my family lit the advent candles each night during the Christmas season and I hope we can keep this tradition as we start our own family. It was through the advent readings God gave me that one thing to dwell on this Christmas season. Joy.

I came across this definition of Christian joy by John Piper. “Christian joy is a good feeling in the soul, produced by the Holy Spirit, as he causes us to see the beauty of Christ in the word and in the world.” At first, it was just a definition to use in teaching the teens class at church. But as I pondered it, I realized what a wonderful and practical definition of joy it is. Despite being my middle name, I have always struggled to grasp and to truly practice the Christian concept of joy. It is easy to get bogged down by everything that is going on in my life and around me and react accordingly.

There are two things that really catch me in this definition. The first is that joy is produced by the Holy Spirit. It seems like an obvious and simple truth. We learn this at an early age in the church as it is a fruit of the Spirit. But it is one thing to know a truth and another to practice it. I often strive to produce my own joy in life. I have a mindset that it is my responsibility to hold onto joy whatever is happening, and if I am not, then I am failing as a Christian. But if joy is a fruit of the Spirit, if it is produced by the Holy Spirit, then it is not my striving that produces joy. Rather, it is me being filled with the Spirit and in turn producing the fruit of joy. My job therefore goes from striving to have joy to striving to be filled with the Spirit, and those are very different things. One centers on doing, the other on being. Certainly, there is a response required on our part, but that is different from producing that emotion or feeling ourselves.

The second aspect of this definition I love is the last part. The Holy Spirit causes us to see the beauty of Christ in the word and in the world. Wow. This feeling is not absent of what is going on around us. As Christians, I think sometimes that is how we see joy. We have joy in sufferings because somehow we can rise above what is going on around and within us. But here I see that joy comes IN those experiences in the world, not despite them.  The challenge is to have open eyes, to let the Holy Spirit show me beauty in the brokenness. Maybe it is a beautiful sunrise while stuck in traffic. The smile and laugh of a child in the midst of a difficult life. A kind word from a friend or stranger. These point us back to Christ and help us to have joy.  

One example of seeing the beauty of Christ in the word comes from one of the passages on joy. In Matthew 11:1-19, John the Baptist asks Jesus through a messenger, are you the one we have been waiting for? Imagine waiting all this time for someone and finally He arrives. What response is there but joy! The advent and Christmas season helps us remember this. We wait in expectation for the One to come who will bring our salvation. And He is here, what joy that brings!

My goal this year is to focus on being filled with joy. Not in the usual way of trying to be happy despite circumstances, but through a focus on being filled with the Spirit and seeing the beauty of Christ around me. What goals do you have for the new year?