Advent 3: Joy
Jesus spoke to them again: “I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life” (John 8:12, CSB).
You reveal the path of life to me;
in your presence is abundant joy;
at your right hand are eternal pleasures (Psalm 16:11).
For the wellspring of life is with you.
By means of your light we see light (Psalm 36:9).
And there it was—the star they had seen at its rising. It led them until it came and stopped above the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were overwhelmed with joy (Matthew 2:9-10).
How can we define joy? It’s not happiness, although it can contain happy feelings. It’s not satisfaction nor contentment, although elements of each have a home there. C.S. Lewis called it “Sehnsucht”; the German word describing life longings or yearnings for something that leads to fulfillment. While hope (ἐλπίς) in a biblical sense is a confident expectation of something, joy (χαρά) appears as the thing accomplished: the Word was received (Matthew 13:20), the treasure found (Matthew 13:44), the news proclaimed (Luke 2:10), the sinner repentant (Luke 15:7), and the King worshiped (Matthew 2:10).
Perhaps, then, we have glimpses of joy here on earth: a wedding, a new baby, a child’s accomplishment, a goal achieved. But these tastes of joy are short lived because life in this temporal realm means nothing lasts forever. Maybe that’s the “Sehnsucht” Lewis described as unattainable (Lewis 6). Maybe that’s why he wrote that joy must have “the stab, the pang, the inconsolable longing” (Lewis 68). The psalmist wrote that abundant joy is in the presence of the Lord. Those Sunday morning worship services where the Spirit is undeniably present from opening prayer to benedictions are a taste of joy that leave us longing for more. A new-to-us discovery during Bible study may spark an instant understanding of the joy that awaits us. A rush of overwhelming and indescribable emotion during fervent prayer may define what worship in heaven will be.
The Magi of old experienced overwhelming joy when they saw that the star stopped over the house where Jesus lived. No longer the babe in swaddling clothes (Matthew 2:7, 16), the boy was old enough to recognize strangers and curious about these men who fell to their knees in front of him. We don’t know how Jesus responded, but the visit impressed Joseph enough that when the angel warned him that Herod wanted the boy killed, he took their gifts and fled to Egypt. We don’t know Mary’s response either, but I imagine her mind alternated between wonder at her son, confusion about Babylonian astronomers at her door with gifts, and pangs of fear about what the future held. We do know that the Magi knew joy in full. They were in the presence of the King, completely taken over by the presence of God in human form. They returned to their own country by a different route to avoid Herod, and from there, the Bible is silent about them.
The visit of the Magi, who followed the light of the star to experience joy for a moment, had to mark them for life. Like all who come to Jesus in faith, there was a before and after. Likewise, our lives divide into time and eternity. In time, we hope in Light. In eternity we dwell in Joy with the Light. There is no night, no sorrow, no hardship there; God will always be with us (Revelation 21:3-6). Death is defeated and Joy replaces fear forever (Hosea, 13:14; 1 Corinthians 15:55). In our mortal selves, we walk in a Light we cannot always see toward a fullness of Joy we can barely understand, and our longings point us to our true home.
Resources
“CSB Bible.” CSB Bible, Holman Bible Publishers, https://csbible.com/.
Blue Letter Bible, https://www.blueletterbible.org/
Lewis, C. S. Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life; The Four Loves. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011. Surprised by Joy copyright 1955, The Four Loves copyright 1960.
Defaulting to Grace 