“An Uncommon Joy”
Luke 1:46-55
A Sermon Delivered by Thomas J. Boone, Ph.D.
Central Presbyterian Church, Mobile AL, Dec. 16, 2007

I grew up in the video game age. I still remember my thirteenth Christmas when my parents indulged me with an Atari video game system. And thus began my pursuit for the next best thing. It didn’t take me long to realize that for one week I’d be completely enthralled by one game, but then by the next week I’d be bored with it and want another one. I’m sure that each generation has had its icons of joy, things that appear to satisfy us until the next best thing comes along. And I’m sure that this quest for happiness looks differently for each of us.

I know one man whose quest for joy has taken him around the globe several times, sometimes by air and other times by sea. He has the money to do it so it’s not putting him into debt, but he never seems satisfied completely. He returns from one trip only to be talking about the next one he’s planned.

One woman I knew in New Jersey was a stay-at-home mom who never really stayed at home. If it wasn’t Junior League it was some other civic organization, and even church. So much so that nanny saw her kids more than she did. What fed her joy was moving and shaking the community. But, for her, it was an insatiable quest. She’d not finish one project before she began another, and then another. She wasn’t happy unless she was doing something big for the community.

In his book, Surprised by Joy, C.S. Lewis confesses that for much of his life his search for joy was a misguided one that resulted in idolatry. He moved from one joy to another and so it went until one day he realized he was wasting his energy chasing down the images of true joy rather than finding satisfaction in the source of joy. The night of his conversion to Christianity came when it dawned on Lewis that all the joys of his life were only invitations for him to embrace Joy Himself, that is God.

I’ve been thinking about joy this week and here’s what I’ve decided. Too often have I settled on small-letter joy, when what God wants me to do is to be settled only in capital-letter Joy. When we’re joyful about any THING, that’s God allowing us to taste droplets of Joy so that we will eventually turn our hearts to the source of Joy. At some point we will wake up, God hopes, and realize that our true Joy comes only from being with the Lord without holding anything back.

The first question and answer of the Larger Catechism of the Westminster Confession of Faith reads like this. Question: What is the chief end of man? Answer: the chief end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. I like what John Piper writes about this. He says, “Are glorifying God and enjoying God two distinct things? Evidently the old pastors who wrote the catechism didn’t think they were talking about two things. They said ‘chief end,’ not ‘chief ends.’ Glorifying God and enjoying Him were one end in their minds, not two. God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him,” (Dangerous Duty of Delight, 20-1).

Think about this for a moment. Your highest calling as a Christian is to enjoy God, to be satisfied in a joyful faith. Is this how you’d describe yourself? As a joy-full son or daughter of Christ? I’m not asking whether or not you’re in a perpetual state of exuberant glee. Rather, I’m asking you to ponder for a moment whether or not Christ is your highest, richest, and deepest joy in life? Does Christ give you joy even when your job or health is at risk? When all’s not right with your family, do you still possess a mysterious joy? Can you walk away from stress and anxiety, and find a quiet place in your home or in the outdoors and be filled up again by the God whom Mary lauded with the hymn I read in Luke this morning.

Let’s look at her song: ‘My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.’

Let’s pause for a moment to reflect on these words. Magnify the Lord and rejoice in God. Mary shows no expression of pride, only sheer thanksgiving and joy over the news that she bears the Son of God. Imagine it, if you can. It’s hard for me to touch it. First of all I’m a man and no man, no matter how intuitive, connected, or loving he may be, knows pregnancy from a woman’s perspective. Second, I’m a man, and although I’ve had the privilege of rearing a daughter in this world I’ll never be able to say I’ve had the honor of rearing the Son of God. So I’m twice removed from Mary. And I can even think of another.

At the 9:00 service I showed a film clip from the movie, The Nativity Story. The film is powerful on a number of levels, but with Mary it illustrates so well how great a cost her call to bear the Messiah was. Nazareth wasn’t just a small town, it was a smaller than small town. You didn’t move to Nazareth, you tried to move out of it. Generations of families lived in dirty and poor Nazareth. Everyone knew everyone and everything that went on within the walls. If you come from a small town you know what I’m talking about.

Nazareth was filled with only one type of person: common Jews. Romans didn’t live there and neither did educated, aristocratic Jewish leaders. As some other Jews would say later in Jesus’ life, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” And like every small town that other people disregard, Nazareth dwellers had a lot of pride about their town and traditions. The Jewish law was one such tradition and they stuck to it vigorously. And one part of the law said that during their betrothal Joseph and Mary could live as husband and wife in every way except what would lead to having a family together. The punishment would be stoning at worst, complete shunning and disgrace at least.

Now, away goes Mary to be with her cousin Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, for a few months. And when she returns it was obvious to everyone who had eyes to see that Mary and Joseph had not kept their oath. Mary’s father was in shock, and so was her mother, when she returned obviously with child. Joseph was shocked, too, because he knows what everyone doesn’t at this point: he didn’t touch her, with God as his witness he didn’t touch her.

Now let’s remove the pleasantness of the scenes with which we paint Christmas, and let’s put out of our minds the Christmas carols that speak of lowly animals and adoring shepherds. Think instead about the shame, humility, and disgrace that Mary faced in bearing Jesus in this world. She knew what Joseph faced in even greater measure because he decided to support her. Yet, despite all this Mary sang a song to the Lord, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.” Mary knew that delight in the Lord was a dangerous duty. As one Native American proverb reads, “The soul would have no rainbow if the eye had no tears.” I’m sure Mary wept over what had happened, but she remained joyful.

You see, Mary was tapped into the source of all things joyous. Although young, she could look on the imperfection in her life and say “the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.” We often get caught up in thoughts about Mary being worthy, but she was just like us, as unworthy of the God-appointed honor as you or I. But in this way maybe she differed. That at the age of her teen years she could look beyond the practical implications of her present state and see God’s hand and praise Him even though it meant community disdain for herself and who knows what else for Joseph and his carpentry business.

Mary’s joy came from her deep-down knowledge that her worth rested not in how she viewed herself or how others viewed her, but in how God viewed her. Mary knew the truth that joy supercedes all circumstances. C.S. Lewis describes the beginning of his conversion in this way, “I unbuckled my armor and the snowman started to melt” (Surprised by Joy, 228). It’s a wonderful image of letting God fill a cold heart with Joy; the heart melts. Joy elevates when we have every reason to wallow in dread.

So how do we claim this joy for ourselves? It’s not an all or nothing proposition, rather it’s giving God our all. God wants us to enjoy all the offerings of life through career, family, community service, justice ministries, school, and play, but He doesn’t want us to enjoy these things to the loss of drinking deeply from the well of Joy Himself. God is Joy and He wants us to enjoy Him.

I knew a man who had lost his wife to cancer and although he mourned he still smiled. I knew a woman who had been traded in by her husband of thirty years for a younger model and although she wept, she could lift her hands in praise on Sunday morning. I knew a man who had been fired from his job one day and that very night went to church thanking God for the opportunity around the corner, not knowing how he was going to pay the month’s mortgage. I knew a woman torn by schedules of four children with a husband who was often too busy to take time to appreciate her, and she told me once what each of these people I’ve mentioned have lived out in their lives. “I rejoice in Jesus alone in whom alone I can do all things.”

In Jesus’ birth God is begging us to forfeit the flirtatious nature we have toward things of non-eternal value. God has called us to Joy, not just to touch it, but to drink it as deeply as a camel drinking from a desert oasis. And to do this we turn to His Word daily and open our lives to an ongoing communication with Him through prayer. He wants us to sing Mary’s song with her, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.” This week, make it your song. Hallelujah. Amen.