The Joy of the Lord Is Your Strength

a sermon preached on March 7, 2004

at First Congregational Church, Coventry, Connecticut by

Rev. Marie LaMarre Ford

Like some of you, perhaps, I was raised in the New England Congregational tradition. This means that I came to faith and understanding through the Congregational Way. The Congregational Way gave me an openness to the various ways we can come to know Christ. It gave me the support of community to affirm my faith journey, or when necessary, to help me make corrective turns. I learned from those around me what and how to believe, and how to respond to my beliefs. As I matured, I made this faith more fully my own. As a New Englander I also learned to keep a stiff upper lip. As a Congregationalist in the middle of the last century and beyond, I learned that those who showed their emotions in worship were different than we who come from the stiff upper lip brand. We were reserved. When I was growing up, we didn’t express our sadness, our fears, or our joys, especially not in worship! For Gosh sakes, we didn’t even clap our hands in worship – even when we felt moved by something said or sung, unless maybe if the children did something cute. It was only later that I learned from my African-American friends of faith that clapping in worship is different than applauding for the one who said or sung something that moved me. Clapping in their tradition clearly is offered in thankfulness to God. This helped broaden my understanding. In one of the churches I have served, the organist felt very uncomfortable when folks clapped for his “performance.” I attempted to explain to him that the clapping was their expression of joy for being moved by the spirit of God through his music, not for his performance, per se.

As my faith and biblical understanding grew, I realized the Bible calls us to emotional expression to give life and energy to our beliefs. It is probably the main reason for my early and continuing infatuation with the Book of Psalms. It brings forth so many emotions. It validates my desire to allow my emotions to express my faith in action. And yet, I must confess, my stiff upper lip and my early instruction to be still and silent in church has affected my ability to express myself in worship, and that conflicts with what I read in scripture, especially as to the emotion of joy.

In our reading this morning from Isaiah we are told that the exiles are promised a return to Zion. It also tells us that the wilderness and the desert shall rejoice and blossom. This chapter ends with talking about a highway called the “Holy Way” on which the returning exiled people would come to Zion with singing in joy and gladness. Perhaps we New England Congregationalists have been able to take our faith for granted whereas the exiles could not. Would they ever return to Jerusalem? They didn’t know.

The way in which we take our faith for granted reminds me of some of us who are married. We often take the love of our spouse for granted and our relationship can become routine with very little expression of the joy of that love. The joy may be so deep inside we may have forgotten it, and then a calamity happens, or one dies. A classmate of mine in seminary, Marilyn, lost her husband to cancer when he was only 48 years old. It was a few years later that she and I met in seminary. She was then resigned to her roles as widow, single parent and one-half of a couple. However, during our last year of seminary Marilyn fell in love with an old friend who had also been widowed. Marilyn told me she felt like a teenager again. I would watch Marilyn and Jack walk hand in hand with their eyes focused only on each other. Their smiles brightened their whole being. Watching their love and joy blossom gave all of us around them a sense of joy as well. This was not simply happiness, it was real joy! For love had been lost and buried, and now was found once again. It seems to me that joy is brighter and can be more thrilling when we’ve also experienced a lack of joy, pain or loss in relationship, or suffered from illness. A new loving relationship seems more joyful, health is experienced anew, and we are more grateful for what we might have once even taken for granted.

I was with Joan’s family at her bedside in the hospice unit of Martha Jefferson Hospital in Charlottesville, VA the night Joan died. Her husband, Mel, held her hand. Her daughter, Martha, stayed by her side. I was having my own emotional reaction to this dying because it was the first death I witnessed after my own mother’s death. I was remembering holding my own mother’s hand as she was dying. One of my sisters kept a wet cloth on her forehead and my other sister stayed by her side as well. Suddenly I was brought back from my personal thoughts as Joan’s facial expression changed. She was looking at something far off and she was smiling. Mel said to his wife, “You must be seeing something beautiful, Joan. I’ll join you there someday. I love you.” Joan, who had not spoken in several days, looked at Mel and said with deep emotion, “I love you, Mel.” With those words spoken, she died. I could almost reach out and touch the depth of love in that room. We don’t often associate dying with a sense of joy, but I was filled with joy for their love and their ability to express it to the end.

In our reading from Nehemiah, the people rose to their feet when Ezra opened the book to read the Law of Moses. The people had not heard scripture read in public while they were in exile. When this priest offered blessings to God, the people raised their hands and said, “Amen!” Ezra proclaimed the day holy and told the people, who were moved to tears, “do not weep, for the joy of the Lord is your strength!” The people were rediscovering the Word of God. They were also realizing their sin and they wept, but Ezrah’s words caused great rejoicing because they had understood the words declared to them. And these words renewed their souls, instructed the ignorant, brought joy to the heart, and enlightenment to the eye.

As part of my doctoral program, I meet regularly with a small group of church members. When I met with my parish project group regarding the subject of this sermon, it was made clear by several of these church members that there is a great difference between joy and happiness. As a matter of fact, joy is probably one of the most misunderstood and least appreciated of all the Christian virtues. It is often confused with happiness which is only a kissing cousin of joy. Joy is less a state of mind than it is a state of being. Happiness can come and go according to external circumstances. We can even fake being happy, but we can’t fake being joyful. We can even convince ourselves that we are happy (even if we are not) but we can’t convince ourselves that we are joyful. Happiness tends to be based on external things that are going on around us, but joy tends to be based on internal things and runs deep.

There is an old piece of Christmas lore that concerns the history of the church in Paris during the 12^th century. On Christmas Sunday it was the practice that the “people of low decree” filled the churches rubbing shoulders with the “mighty,” the aristocrats. Can’t you just picture the service elbow to elbow, shoulder to shoulder? The incense would be strong, the candles flickering. The elite would be wearing their silks of various colors while the poor and lowly would come in their coarse clothes of gray or brown. When the Magnificat was read during the course of the service, and when these words were spoken, “He has put down the mighty from their thrones, and exalted them of low decree,” the folk of low decree, as if on cue, would yell their heads off in approval, with a noise that raised the roof. Can’t you just picture it?! “Yahoo! We’ve been exalted!” For some reason too many of us simply refuse to let the joy of God move inside them. One theologian once said, “Christ’s followers should look more redeemed. He was right.

I remember hearing a mother speak to me of her daughter who she said was such a wonderful Christian. The daughter often told her mother just what she should do to be a better Christian. She had grown up in the mother’s church, but in adulthood had become part of a different kind of church. In the process, she had become very judgmental about her old church and its faith expression. But about once a year, the daughter would “honor” her mother by coming to her mother’s church. As I looked at the daughter from the pulpit, I saw her angry and dour expression. My first thought was “where is the joy of the Lord” in this wonderful Christian? If she loves the Lord as she says, where is the joy? It reminded me of something Robert Louis Stevenson once wrote in his journal, as if recording an extraordinary event. He wrote, “I have been to church today and I am not depressed.” What is depressing to me is the way in which we try to hide the joy of the Lord. It makes me wonder if we even experience the joy of the Lord within us if it doesn’t express itself outwardly.

The Campfire Girls have a motto that says, “Love is for joy of service so deep that self is forgotten.” That is another fine attribute about joy to remember. Happiness is something we try to attain for ourselves, but joy is something we share with other people. Indeed, as the Campfire Girls like to point out, real joy makes us forget about ourselves and concentrate on the needs of others. Joy is the most infallible sign of God’s presence.

At every moment of our life, we have the opportunity to choose joy. We can choose joy even in the midst of illness or suffering. We can choose joy even during difficult personal times. Let us recall that Paul’s letter to the Philippians was written under circumstances of severe suffering. And yet, this letter is also the most joyous of all his letters. External circumstances can affect our happiness, but these circumstances are transitory, and are not meant to dampen the joy of the believer. Through this joy, we are given the strength of the Lord and enabled to hope despite our present difficulties.

One member of my Parish Project Group explained her discovery of her vocational calling in childhood. She felt joy whenever she visited her grandfather’s farm. For there she fed the animals and milked the goats. She loved doing these things! The feeling of joy enabled her to be a “helper.” She also nursed sick animals back to health and that eventually led her to a career in nursing and helping others. What may have been repulsive to others and considered drudge work, brought her joy. God had given her certain gifts and by using them she experienced joy.

Joy is to be shared; it is not to be kept to ourselves. When we share our joy, it produces more joy for ourselves and for those with whom we share it. Joy gives us strength – strength to persevere through hard times. There are times, however, when we let the joy of the Lord be pushed aside and covered over. I know that has happened to me. There are times when I have let a negative remark ruin my day. There are times when someone else’s attitude has affected my attitude. There have been times when I have wrapped myself up in a blanket of sadness or anger rather than reach for the joy of the Lord to help lift me up beyond these things. But I also know from other experiences I’ve had that joy is a gift of God given to us who are willing to receive it. And when we believe and trust in the love of God, the joy of the Lord will, indeed, be our strength!

Amen.