Joy

“Joy,” the battered wooden sign said.  It was leaning up against an old, very run-down house in a neighborhood that was equally beaten-looking.  It was, I assume, a nod to the Christmas season, and was the only such indication of the holiday on the entire block. The home looked abandoned.

I wondered how much joy that house, and its inhabitants, have seen, do see.  By appearances, not much.  But I could be wrong and hope I am. After all, they’ve put a sign out. It is a sign of hope, I believe, if nothing else.

It sure got my attention and has kept it in the week since I spotted it.  I have no such sign up against my house or in my yard.  And maybe I should have one, because my life does truly contain great joy.  I am most blessed.  Should I be advertising it?  I think . . . yes.  And maybe you should too.

We’re surrounded by pain and anguish, all of us, experiencing it ourselves personally and watching as others get clobbered as well.  In the past three days alone, 160 migrants were involved in an horrific truck accident in Mexico, fatal to 55 of them so far.  Tornadoes in the southern part of the United Sates cut a deadly swath through the region and at least 100 individuals have died, with more anticipated.

COVID continues to take an awful toll, with relatives, friends, and relatives and friends of relatives and friends succumbing right and left.  The brother of one of my dearest friends is fighting for his life as I write this.  And there was a memorial service yesterday for another friend, dying from the same cause.  There have been, and will be, many more.

This is sobering in the extreme, and could be disheartening.  However.  Our hope in Jesus lends us courage, optimism, confidence, assurance (and reassurance) in each of our individual circumstances.  It enables us to stand tall, stand firm, and stand true.  It promises better to come.  Life as we know it is temporary.  Jesus pledges to put an end to this misery and come get us.  Among the many verses that speak to this hope – nay, more than a hope: a certainty – are the two that follow.

Revelation 1:7 says, “Behold, He is coming with clouds, and every eye will see Him, even they who pierced Him” (NKJV).  And in 1 John 2:28 we read, “And now, little children, abide in Him, that when He appears, we may have confidence and not be ashamed before Him at His coming” (NKJV).  Hooray!!!

Again, this life is fleeting and temporary.  We need not despair.  We should not.  “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning,” said the psalmist (Psalm 30:5, NKJV).  And it’s true, happily.

I wish you joy this Christmas season.  Because Jesus came once and will come again, and soon, it would appear, we can and should indulge in the fulness of joy that that assurance brings.  I pray you might experience this in the midst of your own sorrows and travails.  And I pray it for the family a few streets over who claim it via a sign.  May it be their reality.

We may look forward to morning, and everlasting joy.  Let’s!!