Joy

By Robert Feduccia

Something terrible has happened. Going twenty years back and beyond, Christians enjoyed a good reputation. Other perceived them as “kind”, “honest”, “trustworthy”, and “hard-working”. However, over the past decade research conducted by many organizations has revealed the same sentiment: Christians are no longer perceived in a favorable light. In fact, “honest”, “trustworthy” and “hard-working” have been replaced with “judgmental”, “hypocritical”, and “divisive”. For an organization whose founder said to go to all the ends of the earth and make disciples, this perception does not bode well for realizing its mandate.

Nowhere in the canon of scripture is judgment, hypocrisy, or divisive used to describe the work of the Holy Spirit. Instead, we read that the fruits of the Spirit are love, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and …joy! In the mid-1970s Pope Paul VI wrote on the Christian Church’s mandate to evangelize and he spoke first of all about the living witness a Christian should be. The document named Evangelii Nuntiandi, says that Christian lives should provoke questions about the joy they possess. “What do they have that I don’t have?” The life a Christian should exude joy. It would be wrong to equate joy with having a bubbly personality. It does mean that Christians are easy to smile; they live life with enthusiasm; they are comfortable in their own skin, and they exude an abiding sense that all things will work toward the good. Where does this sense of joy come from for the Christian? Let two things be considered: 1) God became one of us 2) God knows us as individuals.

We are in the so often called season of joy. Buried deep within the tinsel bedecked halos on kindergarten angels, the make shift shepherds’ garments made from dad’s old bathrobe, and the manger scene hastily nailed together by the men’s club there is a mystery greater than the creation of the universe itself. God became human. God walked with human legs. He crafted wood with human hands. His human heart broke and he cried human tears. He knows what it is like to be us because he is became us. He experienced the human need for rescue. Yet, his knowledge of our need for rescue, his empathy with us is no good unless he also possesses the power to actually rescue us, and he does. Being 100% human he has felt our need to be saved. Being 100% God he is our Savior and he is our joy.

Moses holds a unique place in the Hebrew Scriptures. Certainly, he holds this place because he lead the Israelites out of Egypt, but upon his death he was remembered as the one who spoke to God face to face as a friend. God rescued the Israelites as a people, but he spoke to Moses as a friend. For the Christian, the baptismal immersion into Jesus Christ gives access to something even greater. The Christian speaks to God face to face, not as a friend, but as a child speaks to a parent. In Jesus, the Christian is know by God in the most intimate way. In Hebrew, the word for mercy, racham, is from the same root as the word rechem, womb. There is a womb bond between God and each individual just as there is a personal intimacy between a mother and her child. God knows us and God allows himself to be known by us. He communes with us. He allows us to speak to him and in return he speaks into the intimate details of our life. Yes, this includes job and matters of decision, but it goes deeper than that. He looks at us face to face and speaks about our identity, our personhood. Having a Savoir who knows us and can actually save us, having the God of the universe invites us into a person to person intimacy gives the Christian a joy for life that should be unparalleled. This is what Christians should be known for.