God With Us Brings Joy

During Advent, we experience active, assured, and hopeful waiting.

Advent is an opportunity to share in the ancient longing for the coming Messiah, to celebrate His birth, and to renew our sense of anticipation for His second coming.

Each week we focus on a different attribute of God who came as Jesus Christ: hope, love, joy, and peace. Jesus is Immanuel, “God With Us,” the embodiment of all these traits and the one who fills us with them all.

Joy is boundless and uncontainable.

Joy overflows, and when you’ve experienced joy, you want to share it with someone else—or as many people as you can.

Joy bubbles over and touches everyone it comes in contact with.

Joy is what we are celebrating this Sunday of Advent.

Elizabeth: Joy Overcomes Shame

On the first Sunday of Advent, we talked about Zechariah, an aged priest, and his wife, Elizabeth, from Luke chapter 1.

Zechariah had been visited by an angel

Zechariah had been visited by an angel and been told that they would bear a son and call him John. Their son would bring them joy.

But there was a problem, Elizabeth was beyond childbearing years, and they had never been able to have a child of their own.

So, Zechariah could not understand or accept that his wife would have a baby. As a result, his voice was taken away until the baby was born.

For Elizabeth to be childless would have been a source of frustration, sorrow, and shame.

It is likely that Elizabeth was married to Zechariah when she was young.

She probably longed for and tried to have children for years.

Since she was the wife of a priest, children would have been present at many gatherings. She would have given encouragement and counsel to younger women and found moments to receive joy with the children.

But, maybe, like many women, she dreamed of holding her own babies.

Maybe she had a list of family names ready to pass on to them.

Maybe, at the beginning of her marriage, she might have dismissed her lack of pregnancy.

Maybe the timing wasn’t right, or maybe there had been a pregnancy.

At first, when realizing that she might be pregnant, joy and hope would have come welling up within her, and when she felt more assured, maybe she told others she was pregnant.

But then, something heartbreaking happened, a miscarriage (such a stark medical term for such a physically assaulting and emotionally distressing time), when any hope seems to disappear in an instant.

Maybe it happened more than once, and Elizabeth would not want to get her hopes up again.

Family and friends may have tried to offer well-intentioned encouragement or advice or to share in her grief.

Either way, Elizabeth suffered for years, and her pain may have come with shame as others considered her unworthy of the gift of a child.

Still, Elizabeth must have known some happiness in her life with Zechariah the priest. She would have been deeply involved in their religious community life.

Though she carried her emotional burden beneath the surface, she and Zechariah remained faithful to God. “Both of them were righteous in the sight of God” – Luke 1:6

They planned to live their remaining days serving God and others.

When an angel an angel showed up and told him about the gift of a son, he could not believe.

And he couldn’t tell Elizabeth because he was left without voice.

Maybe he wrote it down for her or made signs to her like some sort of exciting game of Charades. I guess Elizabeth would have been good a Charades because she eventually understood him.

Elizabeth may have understood Zechariah, but did she believe him? Could she chance to get her hopes up, taking the chance of being let down again?

Unlike Zechariah, Elizabeth chose to accept the miraculous news, like Mary.

Soon she was pregnant and said, Luke 1:25

Luke 1:25 NRSVue

25 “This is what the Lord has done for me in this time, when he looked favorably on me and took away the disgrace I have endured among my people.”

But Elizabeth remained cautiously hopeful.

She spent the first five months of her pregnancy in seclusion.

She seemed to have been cautious, not telling others, or maybe she shared in her husband’s silence.

Elizabeth deeply experienced joy in the midst of the miraculous events as God came to be With Us.

For the ancient Jews, children were a tremendous blessing

Psalm 127:3–5 NRSVue

3 Sons are indeed a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. 4 Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the sons of one’s youth. 5 Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them. He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.

Children allowed the family to pass on its name and heritage. They provided more hands to take up the work of a family reliant upon farming and other trade-craft.

Children were viewed as a gift from God, a sign of God’s favor.

After six months, Elizabeth experienced a profound sense of joy.

Elizabeth experienced a deep encounter with joy brought by the coming of the Messiah, who was growing in Mary’s womb.

Mary left her home shortly after receiving her angelic message, letting her know she was pregnant with the promised Messiah.

Luke 1:41 NRSVue

41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit

Elizabeth’s silence and seclusion were over, and she was overflowing with joy, greeting Mary with a divine blessing and revelation.

Luke 1:42–45 NRSVue

42 and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. 43 And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? 44 For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. 45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”

Suddenly these two women understood each other and shared their experiences in a way that no others could, and their joy could not be contained.

Joy was flowing, and her joy was contagious.

This is when Mary burst into a song of praise and thanksgiving as she gave voice, affirming the miracle happening within her.

Luke 1:46–55 NRSVue

46 And Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, 47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, 48 for he has looked with favor on the lowly state of his servant. Surely from now on all generations will call me blessed, 49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name; 50 indeed, his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. 51 He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. 52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted up the lowly; 53 he has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty. 54 He has come to the aid of his child Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, 55 according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”

Already Immanuel, God with Us, was unleashing joy on earth.

Already his joy spread throughout the community as Elizabeth gave birth to her son, John, three months later.

There is perhaps no greater joy than a parent holding their newborn child,

especially for one whose hope had been lost for half her life. For Elizabeth, that joy must have been overwhelming, and with that one miracle, a lifetime of hurt, pain, disrespect, and shame would begin to heal. Yet, she would witness many more in her experience of God with her.

Joy Defies Our Circumstances

What would you give to know such joy? To see the scars and shame of our life washed away?

Joy runs much deeper than happiness.

We love to be happy. We love to feel good. But happiness comes and goes as our circumstances change by the minute.

Happiness can come from many things. These are all good and enjoyable things to be savored, but they are all fleeting.

Striving for happiness for the sake of happiness can be a shallow, self-centered pursuit.

Joy spreads throughout our souls.

Joy often looks like your child’s birth, your wedding day, being declared free of cancer, or recovering from another serious medical condition.

Joy is rooted in gratitude, full of meaning, and hope fulfilled.

Jesus is the source of our joy; with his life and his promise of eternal life, we find joy that fills us no matter the pain we experience in this life.

Jesus Christ: Our Source of Joy

This is the joy brought into our world by Jesus, God with Us.

Most of us likely won’t experience such an obvious miracle, but the joy Elizabeth experienced is available to us.

Though we are long past His time on earth, His life and His joy are available to us now.

1 Peter 1:8–9 NRSVue

8 Although you have not seen him, you love him, and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

We find hope and joy in what Jesus has done and know He will faithfully do in the future.

During Advent, we are reminded and reflect with great anticipation for the day when Jesus will return and fulfill his healing work, while today, we experience his joy in the process.

Joy is a Choice

Joy can be a choice, an action.

The word rejoice is an active form of joy, a verb.

Mary used it when she chose to embrace joy with the role she was given to bring God into the world.

God still gave her a choice, as he always has.

She didn’t ask to be the mother of God’s Son, but she did choose to accept it.

She didn’t reluctantly accept but accepted with joy.

Like Elizabeth & Mary, we can embrace the miracle of God With Us and align our vision with His work in and through us.

We have reason for joy because God is with us, and we can choose to embrace it.

Friends, let’s choose to make this a season of joy.

Let’s rejoice as we figuratively await the arrival of Christ, and let’s celebrate His birth with joy.

God is With Us. So, joy is with us.

A joy that flows deep within our spirits and outward because God in Jesus Christ is with us, always loving, always working, especially through any hardship we may face.