Hi Reader,
Welcome to Living Contentment Weekly. Here are your three contentment-related thoughts for today. Something for you to: read | do | pray
Contentvent #3: Happiness to the World, the Good has Come
READ THIS
It’s that time of year again when the word “joy” suddenly becomes part of everyday language. After the 26th it will return to its 11-month hibernation for most people, but for Christians, it should not.
One impact of having a culture that cycles through various festive seasons is that it’s easy for the deeper, truer meanings in these seasons to get missed as we hurry on to the next one. Like what will happen with ‘resolution’ in a few weeks at New Year’s, and the attention “Giving Thanks” had just a few weeks ago, the ideas associated with “joy” around Christmas for most people are not actually that helpful. We reduce ‘resolution’ at New Year’s to not at all mean something we are resolute about, most people aren’t actually ‘giving’ thanks to anyone or anything, but merely acknowledging that they have a lot. Now at Christmas time, most people will assume that joy is simply happiness. Which is really too bad.
The Biblical idea of Joy is like the concept of contentment. First, it’s often understood. Second, we long for it. But also – although happiness depends on circumstances, contentment and joy do not.
You can have joy during pain – the same as contentment.
You can have joy when things look bleak – just like contentment.
You can have joy when you’re sad (like contentment).
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Joy, like contentment, is so much bigger, so much more powerful, so much more impactful than mere happiness. Emotions like happiness are fleeting. They are our responses to things that happen to us.
When something infuriating happens to us, we get angry. When something disappointing happens, we get sad. When something good happens to us we become happy.
But Joy – true joy – does not come and go like an emotional response. Joy is similar to happiness in some ways – but so different.
However, this is only true when we have true Joy that originates outside of ourselves. Our happiness comes out when something happens to us. Joy is something that we are given. It’s not something we need to try harder to have, but something we merely accept.
We accept it because it is given to us. It is a gift. It has come.
DO THIS
Read the story from the second chapter of Luke in a paraphrase, so it hits you differently. (like The Message)
1-5 About that time Caesar Augustus ordered a census to be taken throughout the Empire. This was the first census when Quirinius was governor of Syria. Everyone had to travel to his own ancestral hometown to be accounted for. So Joseph went from the Galilean town of Nazareth up to Bethlehem in Judah, David’s town, for the census. As a descendant of David, he had to go there. He went with Mary, his fiancée, who was pregnant.
6-7 While they were there, the time came for her to give birth. She gave birth to a son, her firstborn. She wrapped him in a blanket and laid him in a manger, because there was no room in the hostel.
8-12 There were shepherds camping in the neighborhood. They had set night watches over their sheep. Suddenly, God’s angel stood among them and God’s glory blazed around them. They were terrified. The angel said, “Don’t be afraid. I’m here to announce a great and joyful event that is meant for everybody, worldwide: A Savior has just been born in David’s town, a Savior who is Messiah and Master. This is what you’re to look for: a baby wrapped in a blanket and lying in a manger.”
13-14 At once the angel was joined by a huge angelic choir singing God’s praises:
Glory to God in the heavenly heights,
Peace to all men and women on earth who please him.
15-18 As the angel choir withdrew into heaven, the shepherds talked it over. “Let’s get over to Bethlehem as fast as we can and see for ourselves what God has revealed to us.” They left, running, and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in the manger. Seeing was believing. They told everyone they met what the angels had said about this child. All who heard the shepherds were impressed.
19-20 Mary kept all these things to herself, holding them dear, deep within herself. The shepherds returned and let loose, glorifying and praising God for everything they had heard and seen. It turned out exactly the way they’d been told!
Sit for a minute and think about all the ‘problems’ present that first Christmas. An unwed teenage girl giving birth in a town far from her family without a proper place to stay – for starters. An oppressed people longing for deliverance from an occupying force. No place to stay, and poor, uneducated boys who tend animals at night were the witnesses.
Yet there was Joy. Joy to the world, for the Lord has finally come. Come to save all people.
Even though all the problems didn’t disappear that night, the final solution to them did come.
Knowing that is what brings true, lasting, JOY.
PRAY THIS
Emmanuel,
God with us,
You came so our Joy may be complete,
So we may know true Joy.
You didn’t take away all the pain of this world;
you didn’t make all sin and sickness disappear.
yet you offered us joy.
Help us to believe that.
Help us to receive that.
Give us strength to live in that Joy
Give us the courage to share it with others.
Amen
Talk to you next week!
~George
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