Pure Joy!

Before the Reformation, when the Roman Catholic Church looked for reasons to canonize a Christian as a “saint,” one of the standard qualifications was the evidence of hilaritas. Hilaritas is a Latin word that means “cheerfulness, good humor, joyousness, merriment and hilarity.” In other words, they had to be a person of joy to be considered for sainthood — capable of laughing, praising, and celebrating, which, by the way, is one of the things that rankled the Pharisees about Jesus. Jesus was certainly a man of sorrows, able to enter into genuine grief, but he was also a man of joy. Did you know…

Jesus is full of joy

He’s joy incarnate, the embodiment of joy, joy come in the flesh. The same Jesus who wept over Lazarus in John 11, turned water into wine at a wedding in John 2. The same Jesus whose heart broke for Jerusalem in Luke 19, was accused of being too joyful on occasion in Luke 7:34. Hebrews 1:9 describes Jesus as having been anointed with the “oil of gladness.” The word “gladness,” in the original language, means to leap or jump for joy. This image is echoed in Luke 1:44, where the unborn John the Baptist leaps for joy in his mother’s womb in the presence of the Son of God, foreshadowing the joy that Jesus would bring to humanity. God is full of joy. His Son, Jesus, is full of joy. And…

Jesus is our joy

He said,

“I have told you this so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete (John 15:11)."

Anyone who gets in touch with Jesus gets in touch with joy! As Eugene Peterson wrote, “All true joy is derivative. It doesn’t originate from the world. It doesn’t originate from us. It originates from him. And when we get close, it rubs off.”

My wife and I have a little dog named Milo. He’s a miniature poodle with such a sweet spirit, Dianne babies him like she birthed him, if you know what I mean. And she’s not the only one. I have never felt so compelled to hug and hold a dog in my life. Why? He’s full of joy. The pastors and I have often talked about how important it is to hire people of joy. Well, Milo is a dog of joy. Every day is a party.

He greets me at the door to my bedroom each morning, wiggling with delight, like he hasn’t seen me in months. And it never gets old. What a great way to start the day. His unbridled adoration has provided a tremendous boost to my self-esteem. I know God really loves me and my wife really loves me, though she doesn’t wiggle with delight at the sight of me anymore, if she ever did. But Milo really loves me, too, and it shows. When I walk into the kitchen, grab a cup of coffee and take a seat, he immediately catapults himself into my lap, throwing his head back in rapturous ecstasy as I rub and scratch his neck and remind him of what a good boy he is. I get the same greeting when I come home from work each day. There’s lots of wiggling and prancing. He brings me every toy in the house, inviting me to play. And, at bedtime, when I bring him in after he’s done his business, he leaps bodily into my arms, licks my ears and puts his head on my chest as I carry him in to say goodnight to “Mommy” before I put him to bed. I used to make fun of people who had this kind of relationship with their dogs. Now, I’m one of them!

My wife likes to say that Milo is a constant reminder to her of how we should relate to God, our loving, heavenly Father. And she’s right. He cares for us and loves us lavishly, unconditionally and extravagantly, like Dianne and I love Milo. And we should love him in reply, responding with love to the God who is love. But there’s more to the metaphor.

Milo is a dog of joy. I’d like to be Jesus in this example. I’d like to say that he gets it from me, that the joy he feels and shows daily originates with me, and when he gets close, it rubs off. But, the truth is, it’s the other way around. He is full of joy and when I get close to him; it rubs off on me. The joy of the Lord is contagious. The closer you get to him, the more like him you become. His joy rubs off on you. His joy is resident in you and, as a result, your joy can be complete (mature, full, full to overflowing).

That’s what we need. It’s what I need in dark times. I need to draw close so I can experience his joy, so his joy will rub off on me. What is his joy?

His joy is a sign

…a fruit of the Spirit. That’s what it says in Galatians 5. Joy is the “surest sign of the presence of God” in our lives, direct evidence of the presence of the Holy Spirit. His joy is not a fleeting emotion, but the fruit of his presence, a presence that can be experienced by all who follow him. To put it another way, joy is the flag flown high over the castle of our hearts announcing that the king is in residence there.

It’s also a sign of those who’re walking the Jesus way. Joy is a characteristic of Christian pilgrimage. As you go, as you walk with Jesus, his joy is your constant companion. As William Barclay wrote, “We are chosen for joy. However hard the Christian way, it is both in the traveling and in the goal, the way of joy. There is always a joy in doing the right thing. When we evade some duty or some task, when at last we set our hand to it, joy comes to us. The Christian is the person of joy. The Christian is the laughing cavalier of Christ. A gloomy Christian is a contradiction in terms, and nothing in religious history has done Christianity more harm than its connection with black clothes and long face.”

Joy is a fruit, the result of a life lived in close communion with the source of all joy. It’s not a moral requirement. You aren’t required to be joyful. Joy is not compulsory. You aren’t expected to maintain a slap-happy facade in the face of profound pain or loss. Life is full of consolations and desolations, peaks and valleys and, in my experience, the valleys often seem to get harder and last longer. We often find ourselves slogging through long seasons of disappointment and sadness, descending to low points in our lives where the joy of the Lord seems to have abandoned us. In times like these, we must never say, “Well, that’s the ultimate proof that I’m not a good Christian. Christians are supposed to have their mouths filled with laughter and shouts of joy, and I don’t. I’m not joyful, therefore I must not be a Christian.”

Look. Joy is not a requirement, it’s a byproduct, a sign! It’s not what we have to acquire in order to experience life in Christ; it’s what comes to us when we’re walking in close communion with him, walking the way of faith, following Jesus, come what may.