Sunday Sermon

 

Real Joy

Isaiah 51:11

The people the Lord has freed will return and enter Jerusalem with joy. Their happiness will last forever. They will have joy and gladness, and all sadness and sorrow will be gone far away.

As we officially enter the Christmas season we as believers begin a celebration of the birth of Jesus that is filled with real hope and abundant joy. At the same time I also want us to see that this hope and joy is not some mythical idea but it arrives through real struggle and difficulty. The glory of God is shown in the silence that is forced on Zechariah or the questions the Joseph has about what is going on. Think about Mary traveling during the last weeks of her pregnancy that must have been some hard days. What I want to say is that the hope and glory that the birth of Jesus brings was done in the real world with real problems and the daily battles of authentic humans. The hope we have does not happen because we don’t have trouble in our lives but precisely because we each struggle with the hardship that life brings. Joy does not arise out of a lack of pain but in the middle of our daily activity and struggles and I want us to know that Jesus comes because we need the hope and joy that God gives us. As I have said before I think the birth of Jesus is the saddest thing that has ever happened in the history of the world. That Jesus comes not to bless us because we are great people but to save us from the destruction of sin by dying for our sins and this is filled with sorrow. And yet all of heaven celebrates the birth of Jesus because they know God is bringing an end to the question of how do we finally deal with sin once and for all. Our hope in Jesus is not because Jesus takes our regular problems away from us but instead in the middle of those things there is this loving God who offers strength and peace as we deal with those troubles. We find joy in a God who gives us directions about how to fill our lives with wisdom and understanding. This is why we celebrate the birth of Jesus and it is what I want us to focus on. Being joyful as we go through, each day is a real part of our faith. Each day we should be reminded that we have joy because we have a God who comes into this world not to preach about how bad we are but to die because we are that bad. Our faith is about the real world and about how to live in a world that is broken and in need of answers. Living with joy and hope happens not because we don’t have problems but because we have a God who knows what is going on and wants us to know joy and hope as we go through each day. In all the celebration that happens we need to not miss that each human in this story has their own issues and the joy and hope that occurs does so while they are all coping with their daily problems.

Of all of the stories we find about the birth of Jesus the one that has the most power for me is the story of the three wise men. There is not much information about them but what we do know is interesting and exciting. What little we know tells us so much about them and about what real faith looks like. As we study, who they are and what they did over the next few weeks we want to think about what it means to follow the star. Foremost the word that springs to my mine every time I read these verses is the word joy. Think about this, these men have traveled far and are in a foreign land searching for a child who is to be king. The weight of what they are doing must have been awful and yet they could not and would not stop. Best of all is that in the end we are told that they were “filled with joy.” Before they find Mary and Jesus, before they bow down and give gifts to the child who is to be a king they find joy that God has guided them. This joy came with a lot of fear and trouble and I like the idea here. Following the star did not mean they were not going to have hard times but following the star was worth all of the problems because it produced joy. Over and over joy is connected to seeking Jesus which tells us something about our faith. These three men found joy because they went looking not for joy but for the one who gives joy. Seeking the God who wants to deal with our sin and who longs to teach us about how the real world works will always produce joy and we need to know that in the deepest places in our lives. What is really great is like the star that these men followed God makes seeking Him very clear. God does not hide Himself from us but instead sends out a signal that is clear and easy to understand we just have to be willing to follow that star. If we want joy all we have to do is follow the information God gives us and I love that about our God.

One of the great promises that God makes is that of healing. When we think of healing we often, think of physical healing but there is something more to God’s healing then just dealing with our bodies. At death God tells us that our physical bodies will return to dust. This means that no matter how hard we try death is going to come to our physical bodies. Even all the people Jesus healed died. So the idea of healing has to be more then just our physical bodies and this is the great hope we have and the source to joy. God wants to heal our immortal souls because those are what will transfer into eternity. Our verse speaks to the deal God offers and the joy that is found in the work God does in us. First is the concept of God setting us free from the bondage of sin and this is so cool. Sin enslaves us and it is God who sets us free so we can move from sad broken people to people who are filled with joy. All of heaven rejoices when Jesus is born because they know that Jesus has come into the world to set people free from the destruction of sin. How can we not feel joyful when we stand in the presence of a God who wants us to have the lives we were meant to have? Notice people are not just happy that they have been set free and are able to go back the place where God is but they are joyful. It makes me think about David dancing with joy because the Ark had come into Jerusalem. When the savior of the world calls to us and tells us that He wants to set us free why would we reject that. When we stand in eternity we will not hand God a list of grievances about how things have gone in our lives, we will instead feel the joy of the place and sing with all of our hearts to the glory of God. We need to grasp that we are set free by both the cross and the empty tomb. It should humble us as we consider the pain and suffering of God so that we might be made free. Rejoicing and singing should reflect the joy we find. The cost of setting us free should astound us and humble us because we have a God who would do such a thing. As people of faith joy should not depend on our circumstances but should happen because there are no situations that God is not bringing healing and teaching us how to be the people He longs for us to be. Joy is the only response to being set free and then shown the path to the throne of God and our verse makes that so clear.

There are all kinds of descriptions about what eternity looks like but the one I like the best and the one that I understand the best is in Revelations chapter twenty one. In that chapter we are told that God will wipe away every tear from our eyes and there will be no more death, sadness, crying or pain. The only way we can really know what eternity is like is in the negative. God’s throne and His presence is so far from our understanding that we can only see what is not there but what won’t be there is so wonderful that it breeds joy in our hearts. That same idea is stated here in our verse. The idea of joy starts with the negative because we all know that. Who has not suffered pain and who has not been sorrowful. Let it be clear our joy in this life is not because we won’t have pain and sorrow right now but we hope in the God who’s glory and righteousness drives all pain and sorrow out. Those things that are missing in eternity tell us about a God who we want to know and to follow. Our joy is in the hope we have in the living God. What I like about this verse is that it looks forward and speaks not only of now but of forever and that is why the joy God offers is so much more powerful then anything we can create on our own. Joy that last forever is a joy that fills us with a love for the God who offers to set us free. The words that are connected to joy in this verse also intrigue me. Happiness and gladness are the words that surround the word joy. This helps us connect things in the way they should be. Joy teaches us how to be happy in the Lord and from that flows how we build our lives and the choices we make about what principles and ideas we are going to work from. A side effect of joy is gladness and that is an attitude we should have. Being glad means we have a hopeful spirit even when things are not all that they should be. Our God is the one who makes us glad because He loves us and wants to teach us what is good and right. Being people of joy is a reflection of the God we worship and serve and it will tell us about our journey of faith. The closer we get to God the more we will find joy fills our lives.

The starting point for “following the star” has to be that following the star is not easy. These wise men had to travel and risk things to find the king who would bring such joy and I want us to know our journey of faith is going to take effort. We are told that Jesus is the great Shepard but the flock must follow the Shepard and Jesus never says that following Him is easy. As a matter of fact Jesus warns us many times what He is asking is hard and will take courage and strength. If we want the joy God offers it will mean we will have to learn to trust God and to look to Him for the answers we need in life but if we are willing to seek God the result will be a deep and wonderful joy. Let us learn from the wise men and start our journey of faith by looking up and knowing that the star that shines so bright directs us to a God who rules as a loving king and the result of that is joy unspeakable.