| |
February 16, 2003 |
"Jesus: Man of Joy" Series |
Pastor Brian Shimer
| |
"That One Gift Desired"
John 15 and 17
I. Cars in my possession have often had problems with leaks, but
usually leaks out not in.
Over the past couple months, I have had trouble with a leak into my grey Lebaron. This week, I discovered what I had not known, that there was water in the wheel well below the trunk. Oh, not just a little water, but 5" of water! Anna had said this week that she heard something
sloshing around. That sounded like an unusual description to me, and indeed, it was a bit extreme. I used our towels to clean it up. I tried to choose the darker ones. Karen does not appreciate the use of her towels for some of these projects much!
When I think of leaks, I think of a quote by Billy Sunday, the great evangelist of more than
a century ago said, "If you have no joy,
there's a leak in your Christianity somewhere."
Perhaps this year we can patch up some of our leaks - the places where we are letting the world and concerns seep in and steal our joy.
II. In John 15 and 17 Jesus says He has spoken in order that
our joy can be made complete by His Joy!
A. So what is Our joy? We find joy in relationships, in laughter, in pleasure. But joy can not feeling based - our feelings fluctuate.
William James, the distinguished Harvard psychologist (1842-1910) wrote "If we were to ask the question, 'What is human life's chief concern?' one of the answers we would receive would be, 'It is happiness.'" But he never could tell how to find it.
It is interesting that the word "happiness" is not a Biblical word. It comes from an Old Norse word "hap" or "happ" and carried the specific meaning of "good fortune," "chance," or "luck in life" Our current words "perhaps," "mayhap," "happening," "happenstance," are all derived from the same root as "happiness." "Happiness then meant simply what happens, the 'luck of the draw'."
"I'm the happiest one hour a day when I'm on stage. It's my time." Said David Letterman in an interview. "That's when I'm real" Quite a statement. Out of 24 hours a day, only one hour is a place of true happiness and reality for this man, and that is when he is acting in front of a camera and audience. It is very easy for this to happen to those of us who speak in public - our identity can become placed in the performance.
B. Joy is much more than a performance, than "happiness" or feelings - although our feelings can be involved in it, as I experienced when my daughter Grace sang "I love my lips" to me while I was working on a newsletter article.
We have had a new puppy for 12 days now. Oh my! What an adventure. I have taken the night shift this week and have slept well on the couch downstairs, but not as well as when upstairs. Finally Jenni is sleeping from 11 until 5 which gives most of a night's sleep. The family said I was looking a bit weary and stretched on Wednesday evening: Actually they said I looked "intense" "your eyes are wild".
Friday was a jumbled day of arrangements for a birthday Party for Gabrielle, and preparations for the Sweetheart banquet, in the midst of pastoral needs and responsibilities. My day went much differently than planned -- that is the motto by which I live. And by afternoon I found myself literally stumping down to the office to grab another hour before the birthday was to begin. I had a pounding headache. I was exhausted. I was frustrated. I was not feeling anything joyful. And ironically was supposed to preach about it today! There was no joy in my countenance. No joy in my step. No joy in my heart that I could find as a feeling. I journaled: "Joy! Well if I have it, it isn't a feeling! It is not laughter!"
I do believe God chuckles when we reach such points.
I felt so "finished" -- as in spent and emptied. All I needed was to be revived.
I wrote out much that I was feeling. Then thought of one phone call I had neglected to make. I dialed Russ Hilsinger to ask him a question, and when he answered I could tell he was doing more poorly than I was! Russ' last Sunday as pastor at the First Baptist church in FG is the 23rd of February, and last Friday, his wife Pam was laid off her job suddenly because of a lack of work!
As I reached out to Russ what a change happened for us both. We were lifting our eyes up to Jesus, and our own lives were uplifted. It was something of this passage come to life. "My command is this," Jesus said, "remain in my love. If you obey my commands you will remain in my love, just as I obeyed my father's commands and remain in His love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete. My command is this: love each other as I have loved you." (John 15:10-12)
Joy is wrapped in the garment of love in John 15.
As I loved my brother, what joy surged into both our situations.
III. So the "My Joy" of Jesus -- what was it?
We see him throughout the book incredibly aware of God. God's time in chapter 2, God's words and actions in chapter 5, and onward.
A. "my" ** joy was something jesus possessed as an anointing from God - the "oil of joy" set jesus apart from his companions (Heb 1:9). And he offers it to us!
B. Jesus radiated joyfulness - it was a visible approach to life-but what was this approach? Could "my joy" simply be the eyes Jesus had to see God at work? Jesus said I say what God speaks, I do what I see Him doing - he was totally immersed in the presence of God.
C. This joy was a view of all of life. An ability to see God at work in the day by day reality. An awareness that the trustworthy, heavenly, loving Father was carrying him through each moment. Some call this looking for "God sightings" The kind of trust spoken of in Psalm 37: A delight in the Lord, a commitment to Him, a stillness-for He is answering your prayers… Trust, joy and peace all fit together in this picture of joy.
The WWII Concentration camp barracks, where Corrie and Betsie Ten Boom were imprisoned, was infested with lice. Corrie hated this until Betsie pointed out God's sovereign mercy and grace: No guard would rape the women in this barracks because of the lice. They were free to have Bible studies and pray. This was the joy of the Lord: seeing the lord protect and guard even through something hard.
D. So, on the one side joy is the God sightings. Don't those give us joy, to see God at work?
And on the other side: It was the view of all the dimensions of God's character or attributes in life. At one of our Adult Bible Fellowships this summer, we began by sharing an attribute of God which had come to mean the most to us and why. What a great picture of God's generous care of each of us. Some said the fact that God is the Healer, and shared how they had experienced this; others that God is Sovereign, and how God being in control of all things had been a great comfort and gift in tough times-- the fact of Sovereignty is place to rest in seasons of international unrest; Others shared how the fact that God is Holy-- totally other from us, meaning he hates sin as much as we hate encountering it in ourselves and others; Others spoke of God as Shepherd, and what this image means day to day to them; some spoke of His creativity: These folks delighted in thinking about how much fun God must have had making the orangutan with his colorful bottom or aerodynamically impossible bumblebee.
Reflecting on these gives is joy. God is so big, bigger than anything we could ever encounter. We can rest in this fact and in the fullness of grace that He has poured upon each of us that we can even glimpse this greatness. And if we can work and see the attributes of God manifest around us, how much more could Jesus see this and delight in it!
Perhaps as we begin to walk in the perspective Jesus had - seeing God at work, looking for the attributes of God around us, we won't have any of the world leaking into our lives - and the fruit will be our joy made complete.
|
|