Clergy Comment column

Here is my article published in the March 29, 2018 Camrose Canadian Clergy Comment column.

   Hope and joy. What or who gives you hope and joy?

   The Bible mentions hope and joy well over 100 times. Stories of hope and joy abound in the Bible. For example, in the Hebrew Bible there are stories like those of Abraham and Sarah, thanks to God’s promise and intervention, being able to conceive and give birth to a son Isaac in their senior years. There is God liberating the Israelites from Egyptian slavery as they miraculously make their Exodus into the Promised Land. In the New Testament, there is Mary being chosen by God to miraculously give birth to the long-awaited Messiah. There is the promise fulfilled that Jesus is the Messiah and Saviour of the world by conquering the powers of sin, death and evil through his life, ministry, suffering, death and resurrection. The Christian faith therefore is, among other things, one of hope and joy.

   In the movie Good-Bye Girl, a relationship develops between a woman and a man. The man leaves, and promises to return to her later. She doesn’t believe his promise, and thinks he’s left her until she realizes that he has left behind his most important possession—his guitar.  It was a sign of his promise and his full intention to return.

   The Bible is God’s promise to us of Jesus the Messiah’s return—both his resurrection after three days in the grave, and his return again at the end of time. As Christians, we celebrate that hope every Sunday as we worship together.

   We also are a people of joy. Joy however, as many may think, is far more than a fleeting emotion. Joy goes down deep into our being since it is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, listed by the apostle Paul in his Letter to the Galatians 5:22. Joy deep within us, thanks to the Holy Spirit, reminds us that Jesus is always with us in our day-to-day living.

   Author and scholar C.S. Lewis wrote a book titled, Surprised by Joy. Lewis didn’t come into the Christian faith eagerly. Rather, he had the impression that Christianity was a faith that brought people misery and sadness. He was surprised by joy to discover otherwise. Joy comes in realizing that the gift of being in relationship with Jesus gives deep meaning and quality to life, even when one least expects that to be the case. Such was the case for the first disciples as they met the risen Jesus. “And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.” (Luke 24:52)