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Today I’m beginning a three-week sermon series called, “Discovering Joy.” For three

weeks we’re going to focus on joy in worship. My aim for this series is to share with you tools

of our faith that can help each of us to discover joy in our life. This week I’m talking about

everyday joy, next week I’m talking about letting go, and we’ll conclude by celebrating

Communion and looking at how to stay centered in the Almighty.

Each week in worship we’ll have an opportunity to participate in a faith ritual that can

help us experience joy.

This series originated late last year. At least twice a year I take some time to do sermon

planning. As part of that planning I invited all of you to take an on-line survey. In answering the

survey questions you shared with me some real-life issues with which you struggle and you told

me about sermons on spiritual practices that would help you grow in faith. Many of you shared

that you struggle with the pace of life. One person wrote that the biggest challenge for folks

under 45 is dealing with how to balance work, family, and spiritual life.

Originally I designed this series around the theme of letting go of anxiety. But when I

shared that idea with our staff, they nixed it. They shared that I had already done that, and letting

go of anxiety seemed to be a downer. We changed the focus of this series to joy because when

we experience joy we won’t be full of anxiety.

This is how I like to develop sermons—in community and with lots of input from you.

Each week I put a question on my Facebook page about my upcoming sermon. I encourage you

to respond to it.

I encourage you to get out this brochure that is in the bulletin. On this brochure is a place

to take notes. I believe I might say something that you’ll want to remember this week. I
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encourage you to write this down. I’ve included a daily devotion on the topic of joy. I

encourage you to use this everyday this week. And you’ll find a place for prayer requests.

We need some joy this time of year. I’ve lived in Minnesota most of my life and have

gotten used to the cold winters. This winter has sucked the joy from many of us. Listen to these

statistics. We’ve had snow on the ground since November 13th. We’ve had 55 inches of snow

—the average this time of year is 30. We’ve had snow on 20 of 23 days in January. Eleven

times in January the lowest temperature in the 48 contiguous United States has been in

Minnesota. It was -46 in International Falls last Friday; -26 in Hugo. This time of year our kids

look at a thermometer and think it’s broke. We need some joy

What is joy? The Scriptures describe joy in many different ways, but let me share three.

You might want to write these down.

First, joy is an occurrence of intense almost ecstatic happiness. This week in the devotion you’ll

read the story about what David did after he re-captured the ark from the Philistines. He and the

house of Israel danced with all their might, with songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and

castanets and cymbals. When the angels appeared to the shepherds on the plains of Bethlehem

they announced that Jesus was going to be born. Remember what they said. I bring you good

news of great joy.

By definition these occurrences of intense happiness don’t happen often. I remember the

week after I met Amy for the first time. I was 34 years old and in my fifth year of being a pastor

in Plainview. Our ministry was going well, but I was single. I hadn’t had a date for a long time.

In fact I had come to the conclusion that it was very possible that I was going to be single in my

lifetime.
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One weekend I went to visit some friends of mine in Madison, Wisconsin. During that

time I met some couples who were in serious relationships. I asked my friend—how did those

people meet. My friend told me—the personals. In 1998 the personals weren’t the big business,

on-line business they are today. They still had a distasteful flavor to them. But I thought, why

not, maybe I should try it.

The Rochester newspaper would put Personal Ads in the Thursday paper. The Thursday

evening after my trip to Madison I unexpectedly had some free time, so I decided to check out

the personals. I opened up the paper and I found a personal that said “ad of the week.” It started

out with “All Bach and all rock make for a dull soul”. I thought that was interesting. At that

time if you were interested in a personal you would call a number, receive a code, listen to a

person’s message, and then leave a message with your phone number. I started to listen to the

message from the personal that said, “All Bach or all rock make for a dull soul.” I was still in

absentminded stage. Then I listened to the message. In 30 seconds my life was changed. In

listening to the message I could tell that the values of this person was exactly what I was looking

for. You’ve heard of love at first sight; I experienced love at first voice.

Then I had to leave a message. It had to be a message that would encourage Amy to call

back. I thought, “I have one shot here; I better do this right.” I listened to Amy’s message three

times. Then I wrote out “word for word” what I was going to say. I shared my message and

hung up, and I said a prayer, “Lord I hope she calls back.”

That was on a Thursday night. Two days later she called back. We talked for a hour on

the phone on a Sunday night. We decided to meet each other the next day at at Silver Lake Park

in Rochester.
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I know this sounds strange, but I knew I was in love. I was just hoping that when I met

Amy I would like her. I got to Silver Lake Park a bit early. Right before we were to meet a

woman started walking towards me. I thought to myself—and I know this wasn’t right—I

thought—please God, don’t let that be her. She kept walking—right on past me. Then Amy

showed up. We walked around Silver Lake. I liked her. I knew right away she was the one for

me. That was the Monday after Father’s Day in 1998. It was a beautiful June evening. We sat

on a bench and still have a picture in my mind of seeing the sun shine on the waters of Silver

Lake. I thought I was in heaven.

I experienced such joy—such beautiful intense happiness. I was just living my life and

doing my job, and all of a sudden I was in love. It made no sense, and it was unexpected, and I

really had nothing to do with it. I still believe today that God wants us to be together. It was a

gift. Because of what happened I experienced intense happiness. Joy!

A second type of joy from the Scriptures is the anticipation for the future. In the Old

Testament we’ll sometimes read about a vision for the future that gives joy.

SLIDE: You will say in that day; I will give thanks to you, O Lord
With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. Isaiah 12: 1a, 3

SLIDE And the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with singing;
everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and
sighing shall flee away. Isaiah 35:10

As followers of Jesus Christ—as disciples—you and I are promised the gift of salvation—eternal

life. This promise can fill us with joy. This isn’t the emotional joy of meeting the love of your

life. It’s anticipation about the future. I don’t want to die, but I’m actually looking forward to

what happens after death. I can’t wait to experience heaven. This promise of heaven can fill us

with joy. I hope that we at Chain of lakes are full of joy because of the promise of salvation.
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A third type of joy is what can happen when we suffer. This is a counter-cultural idea.

Our culture teaches us that we should do everything we can to avoid suffering. The Scriptures

don’t teach us that lesson at all. When we suffer we have the opportunity to experience the

presence of God in a powerful way—in a way that we wouldn’t if we weren’t suffering.

In this series I am talking about Everyday Joy. To understand Everyday Joy we need to

know the difference between joy and happiness. By definition happiness is dependent on the

circumstances of our life. If something goes well for us like we get a job we want, or

relationships close to us are going well, or our kids or grandkids are doing well, or we get a raise

at work—we’re happy. When we have an experience of intense happiness we experience joy.

Can we experience joy when we’re unhappy? Can we experience joy when the

circumstances of our life are not going well?

I respond to this question with a deeply felt yes. My conviction comes from the

Scriptures. At the end of Psalm 16, the Psalmist—most likely David wrote this Psalm—said

SLIDE “You show me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy; in your
right hand are pleasures forevermore.” Psalm 16:11

This is a Scripture worth committing to memory.

Notice what David didn’t say,

“when I get the job I want there is fullness of joy”

When I meet the person of my dreams there is fullness of joy
When I feel proud of my kids there is fullness of joy
When I get a good checkup from the doctor there is fullness of joy”

He said in your presence there is fullness of joy.

Experiencing the presence of God is not dependant on how happy we are. It’s dependant on how

open we are to receiving God.

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Let me make this point by doing some word study

SLIDE
The Greek word that is translated as joy is chara. The verb is chairo or rejoice.
The noun that is close to chara is charis.

Does anyone know the translation of the word, charis.

It’s grace. As Presbyterians we are Protestants. Even though I’m married to a Catholic, I still

am a proud Protestant. One of the central tenants of the Protestant faith is grace is a gift that you

and I receive. We do nothing to earn it. Through the death and resurrection of Jesus we were

given the gift of grace. Through baptism we believe that grace is sealed inside of us forever;

when we take Communion we believe that this grace is deepened. In fact as Christians we often

call Communion the Eucharist.

SLIDE The transliteration of Eucharist is eucharisteo. Do you see the word charis in the middle

of eucharisteo.

Grace, charis—a gift from God; joy, chara—a gift from God.

Remember what David said:

“In your presence there is fullness of joy;”

Joy is happiness, and it’s more than that. Joy is a spiritual condition—we experience it

when we come into the presence of God. When we come into God’s presence we can experience

joy—even while we are unhappy. Our joy can result from our outward circumstances, but our

joy is not dependant on our outward conditions. Our joy is dependent on our being open to

experiencing God.

For the past couple months I’ve been encouraging all of us to make weekly worship a

central part of our life. A few of you have told me that it feels like I’ve hit this point of weekly

worship a bit hard. I completely respect when you tell me this. The reason I encourage everyone
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to worship weekly is I want you to experience joy. A wonderful if not the best way to come into

the presence of God is to worship with others. There is so much possibility for our spirits when

we worship together.

When I encourage you to worship weekly I’m not trying to guilt you into anything. I’m

not at all into creating guilt. As Midwesterners we have enough guilt thrown at us. I look at it

from another perspective. I know the possibilities for us in worship. I want you to experience

joy, so I want you to be here. When you miss worship and tell me I’ll say that I’m sorry that you

weren’t here. I don’t say to guilt you. Instead I say that because I’m sorry about what the

opportunity you missed to experience joy.

Now if our worship at Chain of Lakes doesn’t help you experience joy, then we need to

change the way we worship. One of the ways I evaluate worship is the type of spiritual energy

we experienced. Did we at some point experience joy? If we’re not experiencing joy in

worship, then we need to change. You can help me. Tell me when you’re done with worship

each week if you experienced joy

You might wonder if joy is such a spiritual condition, then what robs us of our joy. I

believe that our own image of God robs us the most of joy. Think about this with me for a

moment. What is your image of God. If someone asked you to draw a picture of God—I’m

talking about God the Creator or God the Father—the first part of the Trinity—what picture

would you draw.

SLIDE In my experience of being with people some people have an image of God as an

angry old man. This image is similar to the god Zeus. If Zeus didn’t get his way he threw

thunderbolts at the people. People were zapped based on how well they followed Zeus. This
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image of God of Zeus doesn’t lead us to joy. If we think God is like Zeus, why would we want

to come into the presence of God?

SLIDE Another image of God that robs us of joy is the image of the school principal.

One job of the school principal is to make sure we behave. When I was growing up we had a

principal named Mr. Marske. I lived in fear of Mr. Marske. He was a loud, mean, and

aggressive man. He was quick to pounce on any mistake we would make. The last place I

wanted to end up was in the principal’s office telling Mr. Marske what I had done.

Do we think God is like a principal—looking over our shoulder waiting to pounce on any

wrong doing that we have committed? If God is like this, then why would we want to come into

God’s presence?

I believe that if we could peer into the heart of God we would find joy. I hope that

everyone at Chain of Lakes Church will have an image of God as a God of joy. God wants us to

experience joy; God so desires that we on earth experience joy; God wants joy to define our

individual lives and the life of our congregations.

Here is the point of the sermon. To experience everyday joy we need to come into the

presence of God everyday. We need to be open to this gift of grace that is inside of us.

Let me wrap up by sharing some practical tips for experiencing everyday joy. On my

Facebook page this week I asked others to share what practices folks do to experience everyday

joy. I was happily surprised by the number of people who responded. I encourage all of you to

look over what other people wrote. A common theme of the responses was to remind ourselves

of the people we love. One woman wrote that she likes to look at the pictures of her kids while

sitting in the morning sun before she goes to work; my dad wrote about the companionship of

my mom—he can’t imagine living without her. I can’t imagine my dad living without my mom.
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These are all wonderful. I encourage you to read them. The response that touched me the most

was by another pastor. She wrote this:

I experience joy when I am doing or being just what God is calling me to do or be at any given
moment. With that idea I don't have a fixed set of things that bring me joy, but attempt to discern
what it is I am called to do right now. When I am able to make that kind of daily (hourly,
minute-ly) discernment a priority I find that I experience more joy.

When we are becoming the person God desires for us to be—we will experience everyday joy.

When we come into God’s presence every day we will experience Every day joy.

Let me challenge you to be intentional this week about coming into God’s presence every

day. Perhaps you can read the devotion in the bulletin, perhaps you can take some time to be

quiet and reflect, perhaps you can make sure treat those who you love with extra special care

We’re going to have the opportunity to come into the presence of God. Today I’m

inviting you to come to this table and prayer. Light a taper. Spend some time praying for joy

everyday this week. Make a circle around the table. Kellie is going to be playing music in the

background. Don’t come up and make a line. Come up to this prayer table at anytime you want.

You might want to sit still and when you are prompted by the Spirit, come on up and pray.