Joy when you don't feel it

Rejoice

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: rejoice!

If ever there was a time to think that the apostle Paul was in some make-believe, fanciful world, this verse is perhaps the verse that will get you to that point.

Sure, we’ve all experienced joy. We’ve all had that feeling of true elation. We’re things work out the way you wanted them to. Where you are with friends and there is no tension. Laughter comes easily. All is well.

But… that is not always. It probably doesn’t even happen often. For many, the experience of joy like I just described is perhaps a very rare experience in your life, at least at this point in your life.

We’re now really close to Christmas, and we know we’re meant to be feeling joy.

Now, I’m hoping that for a good many of you, you can genuinely say that ‘joy’ is a word you feel comfortable using as we approach Christmas Day, but this is not going to be everyone.

But even for those of you who are anticipating Christmas with joy, we rarely have a single emotion. We have this mix going on in our lives of joy and sorrow… of excitement and anxiety… even of clarity and confusion.

But when Paul says to rejoice in the Lord always, this doesn’t actually seem realistic.

Advent

Today, we are in the third week of Advent.

Now for those who weren’t here at the start of the season, Advent is all about the coming of Jesus. It starts with a focus of when Jesus will return at some point in the future, but then shifts to a focus on the first time Jesus came.

In the first week of Advent, we started with finding hope even in the midst of despair. Last week we looked at John the Baptist and what it means to prepare for the coming of Jesus. In the preparation, we find the love of God. We find a God who says that he will take us as we are.

In this third week, as we get nearer to Christmas Day, and the focus turns to the fact that Jesus has already come and we are already living in light of what Jesus has done.

And so the theme of this third week is joy.

It is with this background, that this morning, we’re going to look at the words of Paul who tells us to rejoice always.

Because when we read these words through the lens of Advent, it takes on greater significance.

Paul’s letter to the Philippians

But let’s start with the context in which Paul is writing.

You see, when you read the words we read earlier in isolation, it is very easy to think that maybe Paul just didn’t understand real world problems.

But here’s something worth noting - Paul wrote this letter while in prison!

Philippians is a letter that was written to the church in Philippi, which was one of the churches Paul had planted.

If you look in the first chapter, you’ll see Paul alluding to the current predicament he finds himself in. He does so in the context of trying to let them know that God is using it for good, but in verses 12 to 14 of this first chapter, he describes the chains that he is currently in.

Scholars argue exactly which imprisonment this relates to, after all, we know of quite a number of times when Paul was sent to prison. In some ways it doesn’t matter. What’s important is that Paul was not writing this from some comfortable position. Prison was not a fun place to be. Even if Paul was able to put a positive spin on it, it would have been really hard for him.

So we first need to remember that he is saying rejoice always when he is having a hard time in prison.

Context of conflict

But, there’s another part of this context which is worth pointing out.

Our reading started at chapter 4 verse 4, but the three verses that start this chapter talk about a conflict that Paul is aware about in the Philippian church.

We don’t get a lot of detail, but there were two women, Euodia and Syntyche. Paul almost seems at pain to talk about it because both women have worked hard with Paul for the cause of the gospel.

Conflict with brothers and sisters in Christ brings out a different kind of suffering compared with the suffering you might face in prison.

You see when conflict happens between two believers, there is something so frustrating about it.

It’s like on a sporting field when two people on the same team start fighting each other. That almost never ends well for the team that it happens for.

But in almost every single church, that is say, more than a year old, you’ll find conflict.

Just the thought of conflict fills most people with dread. It’s kind of the opposite of joy.

But I want you to notice the way Paul writes this.

He goes directly from talking about this significant conflict, to saying the words “rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: rejoice!”.

Gentleness

Now, I’m actually going to come back to this idea of rejoicing, because I want to skip over to verse 5.

Now, I want to suggest that verse 5 often gets overlooked in all of this. These verses are quite well known. Verse 6, as we’ll get to later, is one of those verses that people might have printed out and put on their walls to remind them when they are getting anxious to shift their focus.

But verse 5 usually gets forgotten.

It simply says: “Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near”.

What if we actually make this verse more prominent in our understanding of all of this section?

You see, we generally skip past this verse because we actually don’t think very highly of gentleness. It’s not something that it valued in society. And that would have been even more so the case when Paul wrote this some 2000 odd years ago.

I wonder if he is even writing these words in light of the conflict that was discussed in the first three verses of the chapter.

So what is gentleness? It’s one of those words we kind of know what it is, but it can be hard to define.

But being gentle needs to at least include a level of humility. It should also include a level of calmness, not on the level of being passive, but in being non-threatening and ready to listen.

But verse 5 says more than just being gentle. It’s gentleness that is rooted in the fact that the Lord is near.

You see, gentleness only really makes sense because of Jesus.

Let’s just do a hypothetical for a moment. Let’s say the atheists are right and there is no God. Let’s assume the physical world before us is all there is. If that is the case, does being gentle and humble have any benefits?

I think you’d have to answer - not really. Perhaps you might argue that through humility, you can get your own way by more subversive means, but really gentleness is just going to result in the powerful getting more power, while you get less and less. This would not fill people with hope. This would lead to despair.

In this scenario, the only hope is if you can cling on to some power, and maybe, just maybe, you might be able to bring about a little joy in your life.

In this scenario, there is not much of a case to be made for gentleness. And for those who like a bit of history, you’ll find that before the teaching of Christ became more prominent throughout the world, there were virtually no voices of people recorded who suggested gentleness was a virtue worth pursuing.

You see, let’s see what difference it makes from the lens of Advent.

Remember that advent just refers to the coming of Christ.

Because Christ came, the whole world changed.

Jesus inaugurated a new kingdom. We talked about this last week. A kingdom that does not have physical boundaries on this earth like every other kingdom, because this kingdom encompasses the whole world.

The kingdom Jesus initiated, breaks through all of the kingdoms of this world.

And it starts to change the parameters in which we operate.

Now, remember, I just made the point, without Jesus, the idea of gentleness doesn’t make sense because it will result in less and less power for you, and this will ultimately end badly for you.

Jesus’ new kingdom, however, shifts the dial on our understanding of power. Earthly power does not equal rewards in the kingdom of God. In God’s kingdom, rewards are found in serving others.

If you want to understand how Jesus shifts the dial on all the parameters of this world, I’d recommend taking a look at the start of the Sermon on the Mount in what we refer to as the Beatitudes. You’ll find this at the start of Matthew 5 if you’re interested, but it says things like, blessed are the poor in spirit… blessed are those who mourn… blessed are the meek… and the merciful… and the pure in heart… and the peacemaker… and those who hunger and thirst for righteouness. It even says, bless are those who are persecuted.

Many people will look at this and say it doesn’t make sense. But that’s because they don’t understand how things work in the Kingdom of God. The kingdom that Jesus initiated is fundamentally different.

Gentleness makes sense when understood from the perspective of God’s kingdom, because the outcomes of this kingdom don’t depend on us. Things are good, because God has made them good, and we just work within that.

This is why, back in our passage of Philippians 4, verse 5 tells us to let our gentleness be evident to all. Because this is the posture that we need to have to experience the blessing of God’s kingdom.

It’s when we operate under the parameters of this world, that is, with power and influence and manipulation… that’s when we bring on conflict.

Instead with the posture of gentleness, knowing that the Lord is near, the world looks different. We start to see Jesus in control. With a posture of gentleness, power dynamics shift in really surprising ways, because the power people actually hold, are really just illusions.

Rejoice

Well, with that in mind, let’s come back to verse 4, where it says “Rejoice in the Lord always”.

We need to read this through the lens of Advent.

Bad things happen. And so we mourn. But because Jesus came, we have a new kingdom. A kingdom where we hear, blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted.

This will sound strange to those who have not experienced God’s kingdom, but we will start to see how we can rejoice, even when we mourn.

You see, joy takes on a new dimension in God’s kingdom.

From a worldly perspective, joy is about happiness, excitement, good times. That kind of joy is not compatible with times of mourning.

From the perspective of God’s kingdom, joy is about knowing that God’s got it… about knowing that whatever happens, your future is secure.

It’s the feeling a small child has when they are lost and frightened, but then they see their parent, and at that point, the world is good.

Joy is more than just a smile on your face, although that will often follow. It’s more than the little skip in your step. It’s rather a deep feeling of security.

And this is why Paul can say, “rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: rejoice!”.

But to get to this point, we need to take a posture of gentleness, because it is with this posture that we shake the worldly perspective off, and start to see from the perspective of Jesus who has drawn near to us.

Don’t be anxious

But let’s move to verse 6, because I suspect many of you have used this verse when you’re feeling anxious.

It says: “do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God”.

Now, there is a lot that we can unpack in that powerful verse, but my intention this morning is not to get bit by bit. I’m going to encourage you to do that yourself.

Rather, I want to think about it from the lens of advent - that is, from knowing that Jesus has come.

You see, let’s think about the idea of being anxious.

Being anxious is the feeling of anxiety. One definition of anxiety I found described it as the ‘normal reaction to stress that can help you to focus or cope’.

In small dosages, a little bit of anxiety is not always a bad thing.

A literal reading of Paul might suggest we need to avoid anxiety altogether, but I think this would be to miss the point. You see, I want to suggest that the problem with anxiety that Paul is noting, is that it is fixated on things of this world rather than God’s kingdom.

In this regard, anxiety becomes the killer of the joy that we find in the Lord.

As you go through the advice in verse 6 word by word, what you’ll start to see is that it helps us shift everything into the perspective of Jesus who has come to be with us - that perspective of advent.

You know, one of the things I’ve started to discover in my Christian journey is that my perspective of prayer has slightly changed.

You see, we often think of prayer as: I pray for something, and God provides.

There is truth to that, and certainly God tells us to ask of him and he will provide. So I’m not going to counter that perspective. However, as we draw close to God in prayer, not only does he answer our prayers, but we actually see our perspective of the world change.

When my prayer life falters, I tend to become more worldly. When my prayer life is better, I tend to see things from God’s perspective better.

You see, prayer doesn’t just help us with anxiety because it makes thing happen, it can also help us get to a point where we see that the Lord is near.

The Peace of God

As we get to this point, where in a posture of gentleness, having the joy of knowing the kingdom is here, we then get to the place described in verse 7, where the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard our hearts and mind in Christ Jesus.

Peace is actually going to be the theme that we pick up on the fourth week of advent, and so we’ll explore it more next week, but for now, just see what happens when we start to allow the Kingdom initiated by Jesus start to dominate our lives. Not only are we filled with joy, but a peace will come over us, one that will guard our hearts and minds.

It’s a peace that is only possible with Jesus in the world.

The world can try to gain peace. People are attempting it at a family level. Within churches. Within organsiations. Within politics. And even on a large geopolitical level. At times we might get some sort of peace deal, but they never seem to last long.

There is only one true peace, and that is the peace that comes from God.

Conclusion

As we go through this season of advent, I really want you to know that not only do we look forward to a future time when Jesus returns, but we have the joy of knowing that Jesus has already come and we are part of his kingdom that exists now.

The mess of the world around us is still hard to take, but like Paul who knew what it was to do things hard, and to know the conflicts that exists even in the church, he can keeps his eyes focused on Jesus, the one who already changed everything.

You can rejoice in the Lord always. Not because you will avoid suffering, but that because even through suffering, we know that we are already secure.

Let me pray...