This month’s
issue of Guideposts magazine has a story written by California pastor Dave
Beckwith about what happened to him three weeks before Christmas one year.
Their Christmas decorations consisted
of three big words illuminated on the eave of their house: Love. Joy. Peace. They’d been erecting these three words on their
house since 1982. People snapped pictures of them; others left thank you notes.
Then one morning, Pastor Beckwith
opened the door and found a gaping space where his Joy should have been. Someone had clipped the connecting wires and
spirited his “joy” away. He couldn’t believe someone would steal it! His wife
quipped that someone must have been depressed and needed it.
Ever felt like that? Depressed and
in need of joy?
Many people experience that void
this time of year and don’t know why or how to find it. They think they’ll find
it in the office party after a night of revelry. Or they think they’ll find it
in a gift they’ve put on their wish list, if only someone will buy them the
gift. Or they might purchase the gift for themselves. Unfortunately, both
methods of receiving often result in a brief, transient joy, and then we feel
the void all over again. This is supposed to be a supremely joyful time of
year. If that’s true, why do so many people alone and depressed?
Maybe it’s because we’re looking for
the wrong people and things to give us joy. Maybe we don’t really know what the
source of it is.
Advent is a time where we look
forward with hope, in remembrance of God’s promises to humanity that He will
come again. We also prepare our hearts to receive God, both now, in this life,
and when He does return. We celebrate joy with the remembrance of the angels’
announcement of Jesus’ birth, which I wrote about last week. And we celebrate
love—the unfathomable, unconditional love of a God who sent His only son to
Earth to redeem mankind.
In reality, Christmas doesn’t just
last one day, it is a “season.” A season that should keep on going—at least in
your heart—throughout the year. We use this season to remember, to look forward, to prepare our hearts for the upcoming year.
Pastor Beckwith eventually got his
Joy replaced, made by a carpenter who fashioned a Joy sign with his gifted
hands, and also learned the source of true joy in the process.
Yesterday, Christians around the
world specifically focused on “joy” and lit the “joy” candle on the Advent
wreath in their churches and in their homes. Did you light your candle? Did you
celebrate? Is your internal, and eternal, candle lit brightly? Are you carrying
it around with you in your heart, to warm your soul and illuminate your life?
My challenge to you this week is
this:
If you possess true joy, look for
ways to spread it around this week. There are a lot of people looking for it.
Pray for God to open your eyes and ears to the joy-deprived. Sometimes all you need to do is look in their eyes to know if they know joy or not. Shine your
candlelight of joy in someone’s life, and use your light to spark a flame in
someone else.
If you don’t know the source of true
joy, or are looking for it, ask someone who seems to possess it—someone who is
illuminating their joy light—how and where they got it.
And let me know what happens!
Until next week,
Thanks for
joining me!
Blessings (and
prayers for your hearts to be full to overflowing with joy!),
Andrea
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