Not that I’m counting, but there are 7 days until the baby Jesus is born. The creche is out, but no baby or wise people or camels are there just yet. Christmas preparations are under way: decorations, gift exchanges, cookie parties, shopping, making, shipping and delivering. Children gleefully free of school until the new year. Holiday gatherings taking shape. In all the doing, all the effort to create a ‘perfect’ Christmas, where is God?
Merriment and celebrating and exchanging gifts can feel false when we pause in the tension. We celebrate while many in our world live in places torn apart by war or addiction or homelessness. Loneliness and doubt, shame and inadequacy lurk in the corners of our soul. Here in Seattle, where we have just under 7 ½ hours of cloud-covered daylight, heavy darkness is not just a metaphor. We await an advent of light and hope.
Today, the 3rd Sunday in Advent, is Joy Sunday. Our Advent season of tempered waiting and watching and quiet self-examination is shifting gears. With next Sunday being both the 4th Sunday of Advent AND Christmas Eve, this week is about the in-breaking joy of anticipation. That glorious impossible joy we have been hoping for, longing for, is getting closer.
Joy. Something bigger, deeper, more profound than happiness. Happiness is a soft blanket, a yummy flavor, time spent with a friend, a beautiful display of Christmas lights. Those are all good things, and they provide warmth and satisfaction. When we are happy, we feel “pleasure related to the immediate environment or current circumstances.” Which means that, by definition, happiness is fleeting because our environment and circumstances change constantly.
Busy Christmas preparations and celebrations inundate us with moments of happiness. Happiness a good thing. It temporarily fills a void, and leaves us wanting more. Like the sweetness that lingers in our mouth from Christmas cookies that makes us want to eat more.
Joy offers the more. Joy runs deeper and lasts longer than happiness. We feel joy in our bodies, our hearts and minds and spirit. Joy includes euphoria and relief, laughter and tears.
In the quiet moments of Advent, we glimpse joy. When we sit or walk or dance with God. When, in pausing, we notice or appreciate a heart-connection with someone, some beauty, or an emotion. When we name our gratitudes. Even in moments when life feels heavy and lonely, we can experience joy.
Joy reminds us that we are not alone. We are not forgotten. God surrounds us, and never forsakes us. Trusting in God’s faithfulness to us, we align our hearts with God’s and look for joy where God finds joy. Gratitude seeps in, making way for hope.
In Advent, we await God’s coming. As our careful watching and waiting gathers speed this week toward the inbreaking of love at Christ’s birth, I encourage you to let go of some of the frantic preparations and claim a few minutes for you and God.
Spend a few minutes reflecting on joy and gratitude. Wonder about how those experiences have changed you and your relationship with God. And then wonder how you might prepare your heart for more joy and light. As you leave your God time, think about how you might share your joy with others.
God has anointed us, in our particular time and place, to be bearers of good news, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and release to prisoners. In the middle of the wilderness, John cried out, proclaiming good news and hope to all who would come near. And the people came, because they needed to hear about hope. They, like us and our world, needed to hear that God had not forgotten them.
That is our message, our witness, our bright message to shine in a dark and heavy moment. God has not forgotten us, and is with us. Joy comes again.
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