Good News Of Great Joy Sermon

Sermon by Judy Turner
Luke 2:8-15

WE ALL WANT JOY
I’m going to start with a statement that I don’t think anybody will disagree with: we all want to be happy. We all want that inner state of well-being, with accompanying feelings of pleasure and delight, good fortune, blessing. Particularly at this time of the year, we want to be happy. If you asked people what their ultimate goal in life is, they might say, “To be happy.”

GOD IS JOY AND WANTS US TO BE JOYFUL
But I believe that even more than happiness, we want joy. Joy is that inner sense of well-being and gladness that is not dependent on what’s going on around us, or on our circumstances, but is the gift of God that nobody can take away from us and nothing can diminish. The source of joy is God. We were created in the image of God, to share Godness. God is joy, and wants his human children to share his great gladness. In fact, He commands it. Just start looking through the Bible for joy, and you see in both the Old and New Testaments an astonishing number of references to delight, joy, bliss, exultation, merry-making and rejoicing. So, joy is a characteristic of the life of a child of God, flowing from God into us who are made in His image. In Galatians 5, joy is included as part of the fruit of the Spirit- something that should grow out of our life, just as clearly as apples grow on the apple tree.

CULTIVATING JOY
But those apples require some cultivation. One of the real estate ads that caught my eye describing the property that became the Christview Ministries Center where John and I have the privilege of living, was “variety of fruit trees”. Oh, I had visions of our own cherries and pears and apples we could pick right off the tree. What were those little hard, green wormy things that appeared on the tree that first fall? I talked with a man who has an apple orchard. He told me what you have to do to cultivate apples: all the pruning and spraying and fertilizing. My eyes started glazing over as I realized I was not going to do the work to help the tree produce the apples. I would just buy them- locally if at all possible!

WHAT LUKE’S STORY OF THE ANGELS AND SHEPHERDS TELLS US ABOUT JOY
So, the Bible indicates that joy is a gift, part of God’s own nature shared with us, what grows in us as we continually make choices to cooperate with God. Let’s explore what the story in Luke 2 of the angels and the shepherds tells us about joy as God’s gift and what we do to cultivate it.
Luke 2:8-9
8 And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. 9 An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them.

JOY IS BEING CAUGHT UP IN THE BIGNESS OF WHAT GOD IS DOING
One of the things I love about this story is that it is about ordinary people going about their daily lives, when suddenly they are caught up in something huge! The best thing I’ve seen sent over the internet in a long time is a video of what happened Saturday Oct. 30 at the Center City Shopping Mall in Philadelphia. The video starts with shoppers in Macy’s, looking at the clothes on the racks, handling the merchandise, making their purchases. They are completely unaware that something big and unexpected is about to happen. 650 singers from the Philadelphia Opera Co. and numerous choirs of the city are stationing themselves at various places in the store and on the balconies at the center of the mall. Then at noon, there is the sound of an organ, and all the singers burst into singing the Hallelujah Chorus. The video shows people looking up, startled, stopping what they’re doing, looking around, puzzled looks turning to smiles of amazement. Some shoppers start joining in the song, whether they know the words are not, some people pull out their cell phones to capture the moment in pictures, children are lifted to the shoulders of their parents to get a better view of what is going on. When the final “Hallelujah” sounds, people burst into applause that lasts very long time. People just stand there, like nobody wants it to be over. The video pans to one of the organizers on the balcony holding up a sign, “You’ve just experienced a Random Act of Culture”. I thought, “No, it’s more than that. It’s more like, “You’ve just been caught up in a moment of holy joy.”
The spiritual writer Stephen Mitchell once described a holy joy as “so large that it is no longer inside of you, but you are inside of it.” That’s the feeling we get with the shepherds in the fields, suddenly caught up in this huge joy. The curtain that usually separates the seen material world from the unseen spiritual realm was lifted. And mortals were able to see and hear the angels rejoicing all around them. It was radiant, terrible in the most beautiful way, a Huge Holy joy they were inside of. That was the gift part of the joy. The Greek word for the good news of great joy the angel announced is “chara” (Khar-ah’) which comes from the Greek word “charis”, grace. Just out of His loving goodness and the overflowing muchness of His being, God gives humans the opportunity to share in His joy, not because we deserve it, but because that’s the way God is.
THE CHOICES WE MAKE TO RECEIVE JOY
But the shepherds have to make some choices to be part of God’s joy. By their choices they receive and cultivate this great gift of God’s own joy.
Luke 2: 9b-10 And they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people.

DON’T GIVE IN TO THE JOY-BLOCKERS. ASK GOD TO BE IN CONTROL.
The angel tells them, “Don’t be afraid.” Of course, they feel afraid, terrified, like they want to run and hide. But the choice is not to let feelings of fear control them. Let God be in control. There are some joy-blockers. Fear and anxiety are big joy-blockers. If we want to experience more joy in our lives, I suggest we adopt a zero tolerance policy toward the joy-blockers in our lives. Maybe you can’t help feelings of anxiety. But are they going to limit your life, control what you do and don’t do, or are you going to choose not to give in to fear, but instead surrender to God? “God, I’m feeling afraid, but I don’t want to be controlled by fear. I surrender my fear to you and ask for deeper trust in you.” We don’t like to admit how totally dependent we are on God for everything. We’d sometimes rather hang on to our anxiety and our small, scared lives, and our misery than give up control and ask God for the trust we need. What do you need to live in the big Joy of the Lord? Ask for it. If you don’t have much joy in your life, don’t settle for such a weak, shriveled life. Ask for the joy of the Lord, which the scripture says, is our strength.

SAY “YES” TO GOD’S INVITATION AND SEE FOR YOURSELF
Then, the angels invite the shepherds to go see for themselves.
11 Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord. 12 This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”
They angels give directions (perhaps not as detailed as Mapquest, but more accurate) by pointing the shepherds to Bethlehem and they will know they have found the right baby when they see him wrapped in cloths and lying in a feeding trough for animals. This is the One, the baby who is God with us, Christ the Lord.
Now, at this point, the shepherds have a choice. It’s a kind of a risky, silly thing to do to go wandering around Bethlehem looking for this baby. They could convince each other this was just a wild dream, just go back to sleep and promise each other they would never say a word about this to anybody. After all, people might question their sanity if they followed up on this. But they chose to risk it, to see for themselves.
15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.”

GOD IS INVITING EACH OF US TO JOY
God is always inviting each of us to see for ourselves, to experience in our own lives who He is and what He is doing. How is God inviting you this morning? Maybe you’re not even sure God is real. Are you willing to find out? Are you willing to start talking to God and holding out the possibility that God might communicate with you, start reading the Bible, start hanging out regularly with Christians?
Maybe you know God is real, but He is remote. He hasn’t come close and personal. You don’t see Him doing anything in your world. Are you willing to see for yourself? Are you simply willing to pray each morning, “God, open my eyes, I want to see what you’re doing all around me.”
But even if you see God at work around you, you don’t fully experience the joy until you ask to be part of what God is doing. “God, I don’t want to just be a spectator. I want to be a player on your team and join you on the field. I want to serve you every day.” Maybe there is some particular step God has been inviting you to take: from forgiving someone to taking a new direction in your life. Whatever the invitation, saying “yes” to God brings joy. Because God’s desire for you is also your deepest joy.

THE FULFILLMENT OF OUR LITTLE LIVES IN GOD’S GREAT WORK
The stories Luke tells us in Chapters 1 and 2 are about ordinary people caught up inside this big cosmic thing God is doing. But they have the choice whether they will say “yes” and take part in God’s redemption of the world. When they say “yes”, not only are they inside God’s Great Cosmic Joy, but their little individual lives are fulfilled as well. Both the Big Story of the salvation of the world, and the smaller human stories of Zechariah and Elizabeth and Mary and a bunch of shepherds matter to God. Zechariah and Elizabeth, the old, childless couple who have prayed for years, now miraculously have a child. Mary, a young person, really wanting her life to count, now finds a purpose for her life far beyond anything she could imagine. Shepherds, nobodies, stuck on the hillside with sheep night after night, longing for significance, something more, now become part of the Adventure of the Ages.
It just may be that the fulfillment of your heart’s truest desires and your deepest longings for joy are just beyond that step of saying “yes” to God. Are you willing to see for yourself?