Joy in the Junkyard

Constant joy. That’s what my name means.

But I can’t say life started out that way.

To this little Roman Catholic girl, God was a frown-faced judge with an almighty list of sins—MORTAL, Venal and cardinal.

Because he was always on the lookout for the slightest misstep, he assigned a guardian angel to watch over me. More like, “Keep an eye on her and let me know what she does wrong.”

Far from being good news, the gospel confused me.

I had no more desire for the Watchful Eye than he presumably had for my sin-infested soul. I kept his sacraments out of fear of his wrath, certainly not as a means of his grace.

As far as I knew, Jesus was the only person God ever loved. He didn’t love me (how could he?) and he certainly never sent his son to ransom me.

The cross served only as a reminder of just how much God hates sinners, me included.

It made no sense. Oh, no doubt God loves Jesus. He announced it from heaven more than once. What good was that to Jesus, though? God “did not spare his own son but gave him up for us all,” and pleased he was to “bruise him” and “put him to grief.” Yikes.

What horrors lie in store for the likes of me?

That, my friends, is what comes of not knowing the Bible.

Long after I began to read God’s Word for myself, I came across Paul’s first letter to Timothy. When Paul referred to his message as “the gospel of the happy God” (1.11, it felt like the Holy Spirit poked me in the eye.

What? God is happy?

I don’t think so.I could not fathom it.

Why would a happy God be in such a bad mood all the time? ALL. THE. TIME.

Yet if God were happy, that would change everything.

Listen, the rest of Scripture provides abundant evidence of God being not only essentially glad, but the fountain of joy for us all. True joy—founded not on God’s promises but on God’s nature. His own bottomless, unshakeable, unending delight in who he is.

This does make sense. God is good. God is wise. He knows everything. He has unlimited power. He needs nothing. He is sovereign and creative and free. The whole rightness of his being is the definition of joy.

So where do we get the idea that he’s so full of wrath that no one can get near him? I’ll tell you. The Bible’s word for God’s perfect nature is Holiness. And the underside of holiness—the side we see from the earth—is wrath. It has one objective, to make all things like itself. How does it do that? Does “consuming fire” sound familiar?

We know that God’s primary attitude toward his creation is joy rather than wrath, because the life of Jesus, who was God-in-the-Flesh, was marked by joy not by judgment. Anointed with the oil of gladness, his joy was rooted in the eternal presence of God: “You fill me with joy in your presence.”

Everyone who met Jesus found more than just a great attitude and good behavior and godly values. Not once do we see him condemn a sinner. Even his rants against the religious were designed to open their eyes to the danger of legalistic righteousness. He stated explicitly that he came to save the world not to condemn it. Surely good news to those who (rightly) fear God’s wrath.

In fact, far from messing things up for this happy God, we sinners provide an opportunity for him to demonstrate otherwise unknowable aspects of his nature, qualities like mercy and grace, faithfulness, love, and peace. Creation may show us what God can do, but redemption shows us who he is.

This happy God has chosen us and loves us. Intuitively, that should make us “happy all the time,” right?

What then do we make of the huge gulf between the joy Christians ought to experience, and our vulnerability to the brokenness in our world?

Of course we want ongoing joy-that-transcends-heartache. We don’t have to be smiling all the time, but troubles that wipe the smile from our faces shouldn’t steal the joy from our hearts.

Too often they do.

Gladness gets lost behind the lessons we’re learning, and the work we’re doing, and the sheer misery of knowing we can never live up to the example of Jesus.

Joy may be eternal, we conclude, but our capacity for it is not. Far better if joy were part of our nature rather than a mood we must cultivate!

But isn't that precisely the hope of the Gospel? God has indeed found a way to transmit his boundless joy to the people Jesus died to save. When the Holy Spirit quickens the life of Christ in us, his joy becomes part of who we are.

Jesus promised as much to his disciples. After the cross, after the resurrection and ascension and Pentecost, his own joy would be in them. It would make their joy full because they would have the full measure of his joy within them. And not just them but all who believe in him.

The Biblical concept of joy is brightness, a radiance of life as it was meant to be, lived in communion with our Creator. The promise of eternal life is the joy—the glory—of knowing God.

Those who have been made righteous shine like stars in the universe as we hold out the light of life. Like a city set on a hill whose light is not hidden, our joy is a beacon to the lost and needy.

Such joy cannot be dimmed by the stuff of this world. Pain and grief may fill our days but they don’t define our lives. The world is a junkyard and its woes, like grime and grit on long exposed objects, produce a patina of infinite value.

Neither do we ignore the sorrows and suffering around us. How could we? Love weeps with those who weep. But to ears tuned to divine joy, every heartache also speaks of hope: this junkyard world is not our home.

When every former thing that separates us from God disappears in the radiance of his presence, we will be home. One day, he promises, we will enter the joy of our Master. We will share his joy forever. Constant joy.

Oh, be ye glad. Be ye glad. Be ye glad.