Advent Visions

December 16:  Joy

Christmas is a time of joy.  In our church today we lit the third candle of the Advent wreath.  It is a pink candle among purple ones, to remind us that joy erupts in unlikely times and places--even in the midst of troubles and sorrow.  That is what distinguishes it from mere happiness.   We can do things to try to make ourselves happy, and certain people or situations are likely to elicit a sense of happiness in us.   The word "happy," in fact, comes from the same root word as our word "happen," which points out that happiness is dependent on what happens in our lives.   But joy is different.  Joy rises from the heart, and sometimes it surfaces unbidden, like a shooting star or a sunbeam, in an unexpected time.   

I know this to be true.  A week or so ago while we were putting up the Christmas tree in our living room, we listened to Christmas carols and laughed as we placed the ornaments on the tree.  Each one seemed to bring a memory, or connect with some special Christmas or person in our lives.   We were feeling happy, of course, when out of a bin of ornaments we found a little wreath with a primitive Santa sitting in the middle.  Around the edge were the words, "Merry Christmas, Adam."  Adam.   Our beautiful son, who died a couple of years ago.  Suddenly the levity of the moment was broken by a wave of grief and loss.    Our happy moment was engulfed in the momentary chasm of sorrow, as in that tiny ornament we glimpsed the boy who would never come through the Christmas door again.    And then joy, knowing that Adam had been such a blessing in our life, that his laughter is not forgotten, that we can still hear him play "Silent Night" on his saw on Christmas Eve, that we have such wonderful stories about his life.   That he is, still, with us, forever.

The writer Jan Richardson reflected that "it is wondrously strange, how in the deepest, sharpest grief, joy can come and inhabit the very same space. One does not negate the other. But in the mysterious physics of mourning, they abide together. Joy allows sorrow to have its say, but it does not let despair have the final word."     Happiness is an achievement.  Joy is always a gift.   Joy is, also, forever, the final message of life itself.

Joy

Joy comes as gift,
not sought or earned.
Like a wave on the shore--
splashing up on rocks,
scattering light--
or as a whisper
in the night
bearing a wondrous secret,
joy is the holy heart
of our given lives,
the thing born in us
when love comes calling,
the thing which then
gives birth
to love again.