Real Joy: Guaranteed
I love strolling through the mall during the Christmas season. I drink in the atmosphere of decorations, excited children and blaring carols like a mug of hot cocoa. I especially enjoy being out among people and hearing God glorified over loud speakers as citizens of earth mindlessly hum along to tunes declaring such heavenly truths as: “Word of the Father, now in flesh appearing! O come let us adore Him: Christ the Lord!” It makes me pray that somehow the words they’ve known from childhood will spill over from their heads to their hearts and they will actually come to know this Lord they sing of.
This Christmas season, as I turned a corner in the mall, the sign bearing the motto of a large retailer stared me in the face. In bold lettering (and even bolder wording) it offered, “Real Joy: Guaranteed!” Really? Really? Real joy? Guaranteed? My mind reeled with the audacity of such a slogan! What kind of a desperate shot must the advertising exec who proposed this slogan have been making? What kind of a head trip must the retail exec who accepted this as a viable slogan have been on?
“Real Joy: Guaranteed!” The phrase kept ringing in my ears like a par-um-pum-pum-pum. “Real Joy: Guaranteed!” And who, I wondered, am I to demand justice from if I reach January without my “Real Joy“?
How tragic to even consider that one might find “Real Joy” in a package under the tree. And though most of us would hope that our Christmastime is spent enjoying the love and closeness of family and friends, how equally tragic it is to place our hope for “Real Joy” in human beings.
Yet, this is so often precisely what we do. We place our hope of a happy season in experiences and people. That is why so many of us end up a bit disappointed and disillusioned after all the noise dies down. It isn’t usually that our Christmas has been horrible that gives us the doldrums in January, it is that our reality didn’t measure up to our expectations. It is disappointed expectations that cause the biggest challenge.
So is the answer to lower our expectations, become Scrooge-like cynics, and sabotage other people’s Christmases with our dull attitude? Of course not! Only a cursory read of the Bible should tell us that God encourages, even commands, us to be joyful and celebrate! But our focus does need to shift. And I’ll volunteer as the first to admit that a) this is no easy task and b) I personally struggled with this this year as all my children were going in different directions and trying to get everyone together was like trying to herd cats! Most of my beloved traditions went out the window this year.
So where is the “Real Joy” in Christmas? If I am to find “Real Joy: Guaranteed,” to where am I to turn my focus? I find the answer in the pronouncement of the angel to the shepherds. He too promises great joy and tells me where to find it before being joined by the multitude of angels and breaking into their own irrepressible exaltations of joy:
“Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord…. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” Luke 2:10-11, 13-14
I think we are all pretty well versed in the adage that “Jesus is the Reason for the Season” so it may sound trite to say it again. But my challenge is that if I have not experienced the “Real Joy” I was hoping for in December, perhaps my focus hasn’t caught up to my words. Christmas is obviously not about what is under the tree for me, but neither is it all about giving or even cherished time with family. Perhaps what I really need is to spend more quiet moments in worship, thanking the God Who became a man because He so desired peace with me that He was willing to do the extreme to acquire it. Perhaps I need to give glory to God as the angels did, for His theretofore unimaginable plan of glorifying Himself through His outrageous demonstration of love for His own creation.
It may be January, but it is not too late to truly celebrate Christmas and experience “Real Joy….. Guaranteed.”
