Count It All Joy

To us that is like counting yesterday as a balmy day and going outside in our shorts to enjoy the sunshine. I think my outside thermometer has stuck on 18° for the past 24 hours; how do I count that as balmy? People will think I've gone barmy. In this world we will have tribulation. I didn't come up with that, Jesus said it. We will have funerals, unless ours is next of course, illnesses, job losses, economic misfortune, physical calamity, childish cacophony, and maybe a little bit of failed recipes. How do we count all of this as joy? How do we be of good cheer?

My answer is that it must not be in the circumstance. I cannot look at a coffin, wonder whether the person in it knew Jesus as Lord and Savior, and then feel a great upsurge of joyous praise. Why? Because in the very wondering, I am doubting his eternal destination and that is not a comfortable, joyous kind of feeling. I want to know that I am saved, but even more I want to know that everyone else is too. Carnage is the word of the day in our news media. There are more funerals than anyone could possibly attend. How do I count all of that as joy? Why am I smiling now? It isn't from the circumstance!

Joy is given to us through our friend and comforter, the Holy Spirit. Jesus sent His Spirit into us at our rebirth to give us the joy we cannot find in this world. It is also in the promise of a new day. Not necessarily tomorrow, but the new day that Christ will bring with Him when He returns in His glory and power. We find our joy in the promise of eternity. Jesus has gone to prepare a place for those who will believe in His promise. We find it in the love God showed to us in giving His Son for us. We find our joy in knowing that Jesus is Lord. We find our joy in loving one another and in loving God, no matter what circumstance comes our way.

If each of us knew the circumstance of the other, not just a verbal knowledge from what he or she said, but knew as God knows, we might wonder how that person can go on and find any joy at all. Yet, we do endure the tribulations and we do cry out to our Lord, and our Lord responds! He knows and gives us the Comforter with joy in His very touch. What? You mean He doesn't respond with some practical help? Don't you doubt it! The Lord knows each of us better than we know ourselves. His aid, his rescue from the circumstance will come in God's perfect time. Hold on, find your joy in the Word. Let the Spirit remind you of what Jesus said. "These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world!" (John 16:33)

Bucky