2017-12-18
Brooke Strong
(No Audio File available)
Scripture Psalm 126
Some of you know that my brother Tim is a TV sportscaster in Maine. In the mid-1980s, early in his career, the Boston Celtics played an exhibition game in Portland, Maine one fall. Tim was covering the game, and invited me to join him on a press pass. When the game was over, he said, “Do you want to go into the locker room and do some interviews?” I thought that would be great, so off to the locker room we headed. As we got to the door, Tim paused and said to me, “You know, I have to run the camera, so you have to do the interviews.” He hadn’t wanted to tell me that until we got to the door, because he knew I’d fret about it and stew about what questions to ask. He wanted me to be spontaneous.
One of the players I interviewed was Bill Walton, then in the latter stages of his Hall of Fame career. Walton is seven feet tall, so as I interviewed him, I had to extend my arm straight up. When we left the locker room afterward, Tim said to me, “Did you hear what you said to him?” And I said, “No, what?” Disbelief all over his face, he said, “You said to Bill Walton, ‘You play with a certain kind of joie de vivre.’ Joie de vivre! Who says ‘joie de vivre’ in a sports interview?”
That was my ignominious, one-day foray into sports journalism! But I’m going to stick by my guns! Bill Walton did play with joie de vivre, a sheer delight in being alive. And there’s something about that sort of joy that is transcendent and contagious. It’s something that fills you from beyond. And it’s something others want to be part of.
That sort of joy is unfortunately not something you can manufacture, of course. Much as we might like it, there’s no toggle switch that can suddenly make us joy-filled. It happens to us. A woman I know said to me recently, about her son, that since he became part of Federated, something had changed in him, that he seemed far more settled, more at peace, more centered. Part of it, I think, is Federated. But most of it is God. Federated had given her son a much richer grounding in God, a deeper trust and sense of hope. If I could put words to it, I would say it was joy this woman was describing. A joy like that happens when you are able to let go and put your trust in the Holy One. It happens when you come to know that you are treasured just as you are. It happens when grace and peace overtake you and you know that all shall be well. That’s joy. And it’s a gift.
This sort of joy is not dependent on happy circumstances, either. Part of what’s striking about the psalm we heard earlier is that the Israelite people were not in a particularly happy place when this psalm was written. They had probably just returned from several generations of their people living in exile. And now they were back in their land, but nothing was quite as good as they had hoped it would be. Much to their chagrin, it was not the case that everything had suddenly become sweetness and light. No. It was probably not unlike returning to your home after a long absence and finding scuff marks on the walls, a leak in the basement, and a roof that’s falling apart. This is what we came home for?
So the psalmist says basically, “Yes, it is bad. There’s no pretending it isn’t. But look back at the life we’ve had together, and see the joy we’ve always had. Remember how we’ve thrilled to what God has done for us? Remember how we’ve been filled by the strength and love we have felt for and from each other? That’s what God has always done for us. And it’s what God will continue to do for us.”
Their problems don’t vanish, in other words. The plaster is still peeling, the basement is still wet. But they know something else. They know a richness to life that can only come from God. And so again and again, five times in all, the psalmist talks about joy and gladness. Life may be a mess, but God has been good to them. Problems may abound, but they know a lightness and peace that deserve nothing less than shouts of joy.
Many years ago, I remember reading a piece by the writer Terry Tempest Williams. She used a phrase there that Mary and I have repeated to each other many times since. Williams said there something to the effect that tears and laughter, sorrow and joy live in the same house. It was an “ah-ha” moment to me when I first heard it, because I’m quite sure I used to think that if I had joy, I would be free of sorrow—the joy would just erase the sorrow, and I would be purely happy. In Williams’ remark about joy and sorrow living in the same house, though, I was awakened to a new way of seeing things. Those two could and would dwell together. I would never be purely one or the other.
We all know our share of sorrow and brokenness, don’t we? A friend or child falls victim to the opioid crisis. A mother-to-be miscarries. An old friend stops speaking to us. Zooming out to a larger frame, nuclear war seems to edge ever-closer. Cultural divisiveness seems light years from being resolved. Trust in our leaders seems unusually low.
And even with all of that, here’s the deepest truth: none of that can keep joy away, if we but let it in. Joy abounds, in each life in its own unique way. Maybe it’s gardening. Or throwing a football (though probably not watching a Browns game!). Or wrapping and giving presents. Or texting about a silly family in-joke. Or holding a child in your lap and reading “The Night Before Christmas.” Or taking flowers to a person who’s homebound. Or basking in this morning’s scripture and music. Or most centrally simply taking in God’s boundless love for you.
In Disney’s animated movie Frozen, Queen Elsa has felt imprisoned by the power she has to freeze whatever she touches, and she’s determined not to let anybody know about this power. Finally, though, she feels too constricted by having to hide herself from others. So she sings her iconic song, “Let It Go.”
It’s funny how some distance
Makes everything seem small
And the fears that once controlled me
Can’t get to me at all
It’s time to see what I can do
To test the limits and break through
No right, no wrong, no rules for me,
I’m free!
Let it go, let it go
I am one with the wind and sky
Let it go, let it go
You’ll never see me cry
Here I stand
And here I’ll stay
Let the storm rage on . . .
Let it go, let it go
And I’ll rise like the break of dawn
Let it go, let it go
That perfect girl is gone
Here I stand
In the light of day
Let the storm rage on
The cold never bothered me anyway!
If you don’t know the song, or if you do, listen to it. It’s a song of joy in the face of internal struggle and suppressed identity. Elsa realizes she may always suffer. But she also knows she’s not going to be held down. And from the perspective of faith, we say: she has been given the gift of joy—a joy that cohabitates with sorrow and loneliness, yes, but a joy that finally transcends all its paler rivals.
We come together here today to hear a glorious story and to sing and to make music! Why? Because it’s the third Sunday in Advent. Jesus is coming; Jesus will soon be born. So this is the Sunday of joy. May we be filled with God’s hopeful radiance. And may we live our lives with a huge and passionate joie de vivre! That’s the great gift God has given us.