The Taste Of Joy!
Sermon
A Long Time Coming
Cycle A First Lesson Sermons for Advent, Christmas, and Epiphany
When traveling to Israel, Jerusalem is the place! But if you arrive on the weekend, it might not seem so. You see, Friday is the Muslim holy day and everything Arab is closed. Saturday is the Jewish holy day. So everything Jewish is shut tight. Then Sunday is the Christian day of rest and things Christian are closed. So, if you arrive in Jerusalem on a weekend, you'll find it a very quiet place for three days.
There are those who love it, though -- the men on the tour -- for Jerusalem on the weekend means three entire days without shopping. But things can get boring if one finds history, architecture, geography, and long walks dull. After all, it is the people who make Israel exciting -- crowded streets, a babble of languages, music and laughter, milling crowds in the marketplace, and the smell of exotic foods cooking in the numerous roadside stands.
The first few times I went to Israel I ended up in Jerusalem on weekends. And I came to view people there as taking their religion far too seriously. Black robes. Somber faces. Fasting. The Wailing Wall. Music in a minor key. Closed doors. Yet I've been to Israel enough times now to know where to go to find the fun on weekends. Saturday night after sunset the Sabbath ends. And if you look, you can find a wedding somewhere with its accompanying feast and dancing in the streets. Or Saturday morning at the Wailing Wall there is joy afoot as Jewish boys, twelve year olds, become sons of the Covenant at their bar mitzvahs. And if that's not enough for you, at the YMCA on the weekends there is the "Sobra," a festival of Jewish folk dancing and costumes.
The first time I discovered such dancing, feasting, singing, and joy, I must admit, I was caught completely off guard. For I had not realized Jews were such a joyous people.
Voltaire wrote, "God is like a comedian playing to a crowd that is afraid to laugh." Ten years ago my approach to the Old Testament was like that. It was such a forbidding book of prophetic doom, death, and justice all under the watchful eye of a stern, holy God. People were afraid to laugh.
And the New Testament wasn't all that different. Christians were such a serious, gloomy, dull people talking all the time about sin, coming judgment, the cross, and repentance. They spoke of a God with a frowning countenance, a great tribulation and beasts, anti-Christs, and Armageddons. And when one goes into today's church one finds more of the same, Christians desperately concerned about famine somewhere, injustice, nuclear war, ecology, abortion, and pornography.
But suddenly, in Jerusalem, I discovered Christians and Jews dancing in the streets, feasting, and making merry with all their hearts! So I came home and reread the scriptures to see if I was missing something. And to my surprise, I discovered a large measure of joy written right in the Bible. An Old Testament prophet announced, "The joy of the Lord is my strength." A Christmas angel announced, "Good news of a great joy" (Timothy 6:17). And a poor, single missionary from jail wrote to the Philippians, saying, "Rejoice in the Lord always."
Both the Old Testament Hebrew and the New Testament Greek use a number of different words for joy. When David killed the giant in battle, he returned home to a hero's welcome. The women met him "singing and dancing with joyful songs and with tambourines and lutes" (1 Samuel 18:6). The word here for joy is simchah and it literally means "bright and shining." If you have seen the eyes of a bride before a wedding, or a child's eyes on Christmas Eve, then you've seen this sort of bright and shining joy.
Another word for joy is masos, as found in Psalm 48:2. It means leaping and jumping for joy, not unlike a football team that's just won the championship. When Peter and John healed the cripple at the temple gate, the man went "running and leaping and praising God."
Psalm 126:6 uses rinnah for joy. This type of joy translates as exuberance and shouting. We hear some good news and our hearts respond through our mouths with a "Hallelujah!" or a resounding "Amen!" or "Praise the Lord!"
There is also Psalm 13:5 and the joy word gil which means "to move around in circles." Watch what happens when you unchain a dog and set him free to roam, or watch a snow skier on the slopes during his first morning run.
Old Testament joy is boisterous, leaping, bright shining eyes, noisy exclamations, or even the antics of running clownishly around in circles. And the Bible says God not only approves of such, he actually encourages it.
Three times a year God required Jews to venture to Jerusalem to worship in the temple. Psalm 33:1 and 3 tell how "it is fitting for the upright to praise him." "Sing to him a new song, play skillfully, and shout for joy!"
When David brought the ark to Jerusalem, he stripped himself to a loin cloth and went before the parade dancing. With bright shiny eyes, leaping and circling, and shouts of acclamation, he praised God.
The New Testament word for joy is chara. It is very close to charis or grace. The idea is that if one is saved by grace (charis) then he should experience chara or joy.
Look at the portrait of Jesus painted in the New Testament. Sure it has its somber tones -- denouncing Pharisaism, weeping over Jerusalem, wincing at unbelief, and dying on a cross. But there is also the color of joy -- wine at a wedding feast in Cana, taking time out to be with children. Luke 10:21 even tells us that during a time of intense conflict Christ was moved to sing a hymn of praise and he became "full of joy through the Holy Spirit."
What was the early church like? A persecuted minority, poor, and meeting in secret, Acts 2:46 still says they "ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people." Paul used the word joy sixteen times in his short Philippian letter written from prison.
It is against this background of rich biblical heritage that the church today must answer why we are so joylessly boring, so overly serious, and so somber. Instead of a community of joy we've become a community of sourpusses. We speak of fasting but never feasting. The sound of tambourines is replaced by complaining. And we justify ourselves by pointing to the specter of nuclear warfare, widespread famine, and the sins of a wayward generation. "Who can be joyful in such a world?" we ask.
I once traveled to south Texas to try to make myself useful at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes camp on the border. And never have I been to such a dull place! The towns are one-horse towns in which the horse has already died. And it's so flat that people pass by a fifty-foot rise in the desert and call it a mountain. And hot! Why, in April it was 97 degrees with humidity so high a breeze felt like a dog breathing on you.
The landscape was all tumbleweeds, mesquite trees, cacti, and 200 miles to anywhere. And I've never been to a place where so many things bite and sting: scorpions, rattlesnakes, and more spiders than you can shake a shoe at! And mosquitoes! Why, they're the state bird of Texas!
Barney and Sherry Sarver have been ministering in south Texas for over ten years. I spent five days ministering alongside them and found it fascinating. Barry explained to me how mesquite trees burn hot and long and thus help make the best barbecue. He got me up at 1:00 a.m. to show me a meteor shower. He fed me a chili pepper so hot I still sweat just thinking about it. He pointed out roadrunners and armadillos, Texas blue bonnets, and cactus flowers.
There was an electrical storm so bad I wanted to find a bomb shelter in which to wait it out. And Barney explained to me the differences between ball lightning, chain lightning, and heat lightning. He could look into the desert and see dozens of different plant species, look into the faces of children and say if they were Incas, Mestizos, Spanish, or Anglos.
And I realized something with him. It is possible in Jesus Christ to have joy in a hot, humid, flat, rural desert infested with the occult even after ten years of labor.
Most of us today confuse joy with happiness. Happiness comes from the same root as "happening." Thus, happiness is circumstantial. It depends on your happenings happening like you want them to happen. So to be happy we must spend all our times trying to arrange our circumstances so things will happen like we need them to so we can be happy. Are my stocks maturing? Are my children on the fast track for success? Did I have a good vacation? Is my car tuned? Does the new house meet my expectations? Is my weight just right? Is the business booming?
Two things here: One is that by the time I so arrange my happenings that they happen so I can be happy I am simply too tired to enjoy them. And, two, there are always at least one or two happenings that have the poor taste to get out of line and ruin my day. The children act up. The stock market crashes. I get a dent in my new car.
I preached at a singles' conference and a 29-year-old woman approached me to talk. She was lovely to look at, educated, wealthy, a Christian, enjoying the company of many friends, but totally unhappy because she had no husband. Just one thing was out of line, and she was unhappy.
Joy, on the other hand, is not circumstantial. It is based on God's presence and a moment by moment celebration of the gospel. Paul wrote of joy in Romans 5:2, 3, and 11. "And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. More than that, but we also rejoice in our sufferings ... we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."
The Past
Three things here Paul says are fuel for joy. First, "We rejoice in God through Jesus Christ through whom we have now received reconciliation." This means there are things in our past that are cause for joy. God has redeemed us. The Greek for "received" is a bookkeeping term. For example, let's say I'm hopelessly in debt. $463,249.12 to be exact. I've lost my job, depleted my savings, the bank has foreclosed on my house, and my cars have been repossessed. Tomorrow I'll be on the street.
But then I receive a phone call. A rich friend calls to say, "I hear you're in real trouble. I can help. And I want to. I'll be right over with my checkbook. Don't worry. Leave it to me!" That is how it was with me and my sins. I was morally bankrupt, getting in deeper all the time. And Judgment Day was coming. Then Jesus came. "I can help," he said. "Put your sins on me," he soothed. "I can offer you my rich grace."
Hence, I can rejoice in my past reconciliation. With bright shining eyes, shouts of exaltation, and the antics of a clown, I can joyously celebrate being debt free in Jesus Christ!
The Future
Paul also points to the future as fuel for joy. He says, "And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God!" The word for "hope" here means "overwhelming confidence." And our world is losing hers. In fact, few in our world handle the future very well. Doomsayers, survivalists, hoarders, alcoholics, party animals have all taken on the attitude, "Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we fry, die, choke" or whatever particular blend of disaster they foresee.
I like watching the reruns of Hawaii Five-O. It's about a world of crooks, plots, guns, groans, lawlessness, and impossible odds. Yet no matter how bad things get, I know how it will end. McGarrett will triumph and say, "Book 'em, Danno!" And that's how the Bible says history will end. Christ will triumph. Good will win over evil.
The world sees only a hopeless end. In Christ, however, we have an endless hope, an overwhelming confidence.
So where is my fuel for joy? It's in a sense of what God's bookkeeping grace has done to my past. It's in what God will do in the future. And now Paul says joy is also to be found right here today, even in my present sufferings.
The Present
Most of our lives are like the beds we sleep on. The headboard is straight up. The footboard is firm. But the mattress sags in the middle. And our faith is like this. The headboard is our future and we are confident of going to heaven. The footboard is our past, and we do rejoice knowing our sins are forgiven. But our todays are sagging like a worn-out mattress!
Not Paul's! He speaks of his todays, saying, "Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings." The Greek word for "sufferings" means pressure or stress. And for Paul, it was chronic illness, poor eyesight, singleness, rejection, disappointment, trouble with the law, the stress of responsibility, trying to write, and living on a tight budget. And can you believe it? Paul made the bold assertion that we each rejoice in such present sufferings?!
Now Paul tells us why. He says that "suffering produces" endurance, character, and hope. At Colonial Williamsburg I visited a blacksmith shop. The smith heated his forge white hot and thrust in an awkward-looking piece of metal. When it glowed red, he removed it to his anvil and hammered it into shape. This process he repeated several times until he'd fully refined it, hardened it, and shaped it into something useful.
When I came to Jesus Christ, I too was an awkward Christian -- weak, shallow, unreliable, superficial. And God put me under the stress of suffering. Loneliness, rejection, poverty, tests, mental anguish, accountability, failure, enemies -- I've known them all. Oh, the pain of being purged and broken and shaped! Oh, the agony of God's hammering, shaping, and strengthening. But I conclude as Paul does. Rejoice! Because suffering produces endurance, character, and hope. And thus, suffering is not something to be avoided but something to be embraced. It means you are growing up.
I'm convinced so much of the unhappiness and depression of our world today is theological at root. When German theologian Helmut Thielicke visited the United States, he commented, "The American people have an inadequate view of suffering." Our happenings do not happen like we want them to happen, so we pine away in misery. But beyond our circumstances is joy in knowing that God can grow us up even in a time of suffering.
Conclusion
I was jogging with a friend and we ran past a lilac bush. Spasms of fragrance swept into my nostrils and I stopped to enjoy it. My friend turned around and jogged back asking, "Is something wrong?"
"Smell that!" I exclaimed.
"Smell what?" he asked, mystified.
"Concentrate! Smell!" I urged again.
"Oh, that," he said dully.
You see, it is possible to get so busy making a living we forget to make a life. When we concentrate on arranging our happenings so that they happen the way we want them to happen, we can walk and run right past lilac bushes in full bloom and never even enjoy. But in Jesus Christ, the fruit of the Spirit is joy! And we've got time.
There are those who love it, though -- the men on the tour -- for Jerusalem on the weekend means three entire days without shopping. But things can get boring if one finds history, architecture, geography, and long walks dull. After all, it is the people who make Israel exciting -- crowded streets, a babble of languages, music and laughter, milling crowds in the marketplace, and the smell of exotic foods cooking in the numerous roadside stands.
The first few times I went to Israel I ended up in Jerusalem on weekends. And I came to view people there as taking their religion far too seriously. Black robes. Somber faces. Fasting. The Wailing Wall. Music in a minor key. Closed doors. Yet I've been to Israel enough times now to know where to go to find the fun on weekends. Saturday night after sunset the Sabbath ends. And if you look, you can find a wedding somewhere with its accompanying feast and dancing in the streets. Or Saturday morning at the Wailing Wall there is joy afoot as Jewish boys, twelve year olds, become sons of the Covenant at their bar mitzvahs. And if that's not enough for you, at the YMCA on the weekends there is the "Sobra," a festival of Jewish folk dancing and costumes.
The first time I discovered such dancing, feasting, singing, and joy, I must admit, I was caught completely off guard. For I had not realized Jews were such a joyous people.
Voltaire wrote, "God is like a comedian playing to a crowd that is afraid to laugh." Ten years ago my approach to the Old Testament was like that. It was such a forbidding book of prophetic doom, death, and justice all under the watchful eye of a stern, holy God. People were afraid to laugh.
And the New Testament wasn't all that different. Christians were such a serious, gloomy, dull people talking all the time about sin, coming judgment, the cross, and repentance. They spoke of a God with a frowning countenance, a great tribulation and beasts, anti-Christs, and Armageddons. And when one goes into today's church one finds more of the same, Christians desperately concerned about famine somewhere, injustice, nuclear war, ecology, abortion, and pornography.
But suddenly, in Jerusalem, I discovered Christians and Jews dancing in the streets, feasting, and making merry with all their hearts! So I came home and reread the scriptures to see if I was missing something. And to my surprise, I discovered a large measure of joy written right in the Bible. An Old Testament prophet announced, "The joy of the Lord is my strength." A Christmas angel announced, "Good news of a great joy" (Timothy 6:17). And a poor, single missionary from jail wrote to the Philippians, saying, "Rejoice in the Lord always."
Both the Old Testament Hebrew and the New Testament Greek use a number of different words for joy. When David killed the giant in battle, he returned home to a hero's welcome. The women met him "singing and dancing with joyful songs and with tambourines and lutes" (1 Samuel 18:6). The word here for joy is simchah and it literally means "bright and shining." If you have seen the eyes of a bride before a wedding, or a child's eyes on Christmas Eve, then you've seen this sort of bright and shining joy.
Another word for joy is masos, as found in Psalm 48:2. It means leaping and jumping for joy, not unlike a football team that's just won the championship. When Peter and John healed the cripple at the temple gate, the man went "running and leaping and praising God."
Psalm 126:6 uses rinnah for joy. This type of joy translates as exuberance and shouting. We hear some good news and our hearts respond through our mouths with a "Hallelujah!" or a resounding "Amen!" or "Praise the Lord!"
There is also Psalm 13:5 and the joy word gil which means "to move around in circles." Watch what happens when you unchain a dog and set him free to roam, or watch a snow skier on the slopes during his first morning run.
Old Testament joy is boisterous, leaping, bright shining eyes, noisy exclamations, or even the antics of running clownishly around in circles. And the Bible says God not only approves of such, he actually encourages it.
Three times a year God required Jews to venture to Jerusalem to worship in the temple. Psalm 33:1 and 3 tell how "it is fitting for the upright to praise him." "Sing to him a new song, play skillfully, and shout for joy!"
When David brought the ark to Jerusalem, he stripped himself to a loin cloth and went before the parade dancing. With bright shiny eyes, leaping and circling, and shouts of acclamation, he praised God.
The New Testament word for joy is chara. It is very close to charis or grace. The idea is that if one is saved by grace (charis) then he should experience chara or joy.
Look at the portrait of Jesus painted in the New Testament. Sure it has its somber tones -- denouncing Pharisaism, weeping over Jerusalem, wincing at unbelief, and dying on a cross. But there is also the color of joy -- wine at a wedding feast in Cana, taking time out to be with children. Luke 10:21 even tells us that during a time of intense conflict Christ was moved to sing a hymn of praise and he became "full of joy through the Holy Spirit."
What was the early church like? A persecuted minority, poor, and meeting in secret, Acts 2:46 still says they "ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people." Paul used the word joy sixteen times in his short Philippian letter written from prison.
It is against this background of rich biblical heritage that the church today must answer why we are so joylessly boring, so overly serious, and so somber. Instead of a community of joy we've become a community of sourpusses. We speak of fasting but never feasting. The sound of tambourines is replaced by complaining. And we justify ourselves by pointing to the specter of nuclear warfare, widespread famine, and the sins of a wayward generation. "Who can be joyful in such a world?" we ask.
I once traveled to south Texas to try to make myself useful at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes camp on the border. And never have I been to such a dull place! The towns are one-horse towns in which the horse has already died. And it's so flat that people pass by a fifty-foot rise in the desert and call it a mountain. And hot! Why, in April it was 97 degrees with humidity so high a breeze felt like a dog breathing on you.
The landscape was all tumbleweeds, mesquite trees, cacti, and 200 miles to anywhere. And I've never been to a place where so many things bite and sting: scorpions, rattlesnakes, and more spiders than you can shake a shoe at! And mosquitoes! Why, they're the state bird of Texas!
Barney and Sherry Sarver have been ministering in south Texas for over ten years. I spent five days ministering alongside them and found it fascinating. Barry explained to me how mesquite trees burn hot and long and thus help make the best barbecue. He got me up at 1:00 a.m. to show me a meteor shower. He fed me a chili pepper so hot I still sweat just thinking about it. He pointed out roadrunners and armadillos, Texas blue bonnets, and cactus flowers.
There was an electrical storm so bad I wanted to find a bomb shelter in which to wait it out. And Barney explained to me the differences between ball lightning, chain lightning, and heat lightning. He could look into the desert and see dozens of different plant species, look into the faces of children and say if they were Incas, Mestizos, Spanish, or Anglos.
And I realized something with him. It is possible in Jesus Christ to have joy in a hot, humid, flat, rural desert infested with the occult even after ten years of labor.
Most of us today confuse joy with happiness. Happiness comes from the same root as "happening." Thus, happiness is circumstantial. It depends on your happenings happening like you want them to happen. So to be happy we must spend all our times trying to arrange our circumstances so things will happen like we need them to so we can be happy. Are my stocks maturing? Are my children on the fast track for success? Did I have a good vacation? Is my car tuned? Does the new house meet my expectations? Is my weight just right? Is the business booming?
Two things here: One is that by the time I so arrange my happenings that they happen so I can be happy I am simply too tired to enjoy them. And, two, there are always at least one or two happenings that have the poor taste to get out of line and ruin my day. The children act up. The stock market crashes. I get a dent in my new car.
I preached at a singles' conference and a 29-year-old woman approached me to talk. She was lovely to look at, educated, wealthy, a Christian, enjoying the company of many friends, but totally unhappy because she had no husband. Just one thing was out of line, and she was unhappy.
Joy, on the other hand, is not circumstantial. It is based on God's presence and a moment by moment celebration of the gospel. Paul wrote of joy in Romans 5:2, 3, and 11. "And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. More than that, but we also rejoice in our sufferings ... we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation."
The Past
Three things here Paul says are fuel for joy. First, "We rejoice in God through Jesus Christ through whom we have now received reconciliation." This means there are things in our past that are cause for joy. God has redeemed us. The Greek for "received" is a bookkeeping term. For example, let's say I'm hopelessly in debt. $463,249.12 to be exact. I've lost my job, depleted my savings, the bank has foreclosed on my house, and my cars have been repossessed. Tomorrow I'll be on the street.
But then I receive a phone call. A rich friend calls to say, "I hear you're in real trouble. I can help. And I want to. I'll be right over with my checkbook. Don't worry. Leave it to me!" That is how it was with me and my sins. I was morally bankrupt, getting in deeper all the time. And Judgment Day was coming. Then Jesus came. "I can help," he said. "Put your sins on me," he soothed. "I can offer you my rich grace."
Hence, I can rejoice in my past reconciliation. With bright shining eyes, shouts of exaltation, and the antics of a clown, I can joyously celebrate being debt free in Jesus Christ!
The Future
Paul also points to the future as fuel for joy. He says, "And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God!" The word for "hope" here means "overwhelming confidence." And our world is losing hers. In fact, few in our world handle the future very well. Doomsayers, survivalists, hoarders, alcoholics, party animals have all taken on the attitude, "Eat, drink, and be merry for tomorrow we fry, die, choke" or whatever particular blend of disaster they foresee.
I like watching the reruns of Hawaii Five-O. It's about a world of crooks, plots, guns, groans, lawlessness, and impossible odds. Yet no matter how bad things get, I know how it will end. McGarrett will triumph and say, "Book 'em, Danno!" And that's how the Bible says history will end. Christ will triumph. Good will win over evil.
The world sees only a hopeless end. In Christ, however, we have an endless hope, an overwhelming confidence.
So where is my fuel for joy? It's in a sense of what God's bookkeeping grace has done to my past. It's in what God will do in the future. And now Paul says joy is also to be found right here today, even in my present sufferings.
The Present
Most of our lives are like the beds we sleep on. The headboard is straight up. The footboard is firm. But the mattress sags in the middle. And our faith is like this. The headboard is our future and we are confident of going to heaven. The footboard is our past, and we do rejoice knowing our sins are forgiven. But our todays are sagging like a worn-out mattress!
Not Paul's! He speaks of his todays, saying, "Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings." The Greek word for "sufferings" means pressure or stress. And for Paul, it was chronic illness, poor eyesight, singleness, rejection, disappointment, trouble with the law, the stress of responsibility, trying to write, and living on a tight budget. And can you believe it? Paul made the bold assertion that we each rejoice in such present sufferings?!
Now Paul tells us why. He says that "suffering produces" endurance, character, and hope. At Colonial Williamsburg I visited a blacksmith shop. The smith heated his forge white hot and thrust in an awkward-looking piece of metal. When it glowed red, he removed it to his anvil and hammered it into shape. This process he repeated several times until he'd fully refined it, hardened it, and shaped it into something useful.
When I came to Jesus Christ, I too was an awkward Christian -- weak, shallow, unreliable, superficial. And God put me under the stress of suffering. Loneliness, rejection, poverty, tests, mental anguish, accountability, failure, enemies -- I've known them all. Oh, the pain of being purged and broken and shaped! Oh, the agony of God's hammering, shaping, and strengthening. But I conclude as Paul does. Rejoice! Because suffering produces endurance, character, and hope. And thus, suffering is not something to be avoided but something to be embraced. It means you are growing up.
I'm convinced so much of the unhappiness and depression of our world today is theological at root. When German theologian Helmut Thielicke visited the United States, he commented, "The American people have an inadequate view of suffering." Our happenings do not happen like we want them to happen, so we pine away in misery. But beyond our circumstances is joy in knowing that God can grow us up even in a time of suffering.
Conclusion
I was jogging with a friend and we ran past a lilac bush. Spasms of fragrance swept into my nostrils and I stopped to enjoy it. My friend turned around and jogged back asking, "Is something wrong?"
"Smell that!" I exclaimed.
"Smell what?" he asked, mystified.
"Concentrate! Smell!" I urged again.
"Oh, that," he said dully.
You see, it is possible to get so busy making a living we forget to make a life. When we concentrate on arranging our happenings so that they happen the way we want them to happen, we can walk and run right past lilac bushes in full bloom and never even enjoy. But in Jesus Christ, the fruit of the Spirit is joy! And we've got time.
