I have been thinking about joy for the past couple of months, more specifically about its different applications in the Bible and ultimately, about what it means to me, how I would articulate the way it is made manifest in my life. I know our theme scripture is 1 Peter 1:3-9, with the theme Joy Unspeakable deriving from verse 8, which reads,
“Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory,”
But as I thought about joy as it relates to my walk and lived experience, I kept coming back to one verse in particular, which also happens to be one of my favorite scriptures which is James 1:1-4,
“My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations; Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”
In order to put this scripture in its proper perspective, please allow me to tell you a story. I graduated last year with my Master’s and it seemed like after that, every door closed in my face. I couldn’t find a job or a sense of purpose. It took me a few months to realize I wasn’t meant to work in those months, but to re-engage with my Father. He needed me to stop connecting my worth to worldly identifiers and connect it back to Him. After a while, working wasn’t as important as the work He was doing in me to prepare me for what He wanted to give me, not what I thought I wanted. It is my joy to share that I am entering my third week of work, but that’s not the crux of it.
I don’t have joy because I was unemployed and He blessed me with a job, though that is a blessing and I am not trying to make the case that it isn’t. I have joy because James 1:1-4 has become real to me in a way that I don’t think I would’ve been ready for had I not held on to God’s unchanging Hand at a time where literally everything was changing in my own life.
A few months ago, Pastor Jonathan Evans said something that shifted my perspective and is directly correlated to the joy I have today. He said, a lot of times we as believers, say we feel called to a job, person or occupation, and the moment we feel anything other than good and encounter difficulty or opposition, then we decide we made a mistake. We assume that if it is from God, the experience must feel good to us and I would add, we assume it is to come without challenges. However, he made the point that that is untrue, we are not here to satisfy ourselves and these experiences, which challenge us, are meant to grow us and more importantly, impact the lives of others. If we are in the army of the Lord, then we must be prepared to battle. Listening to that convicted me because I had been guilty of that before, buckling under pressure and opposition and wishing away the challenge altogether. But I told myself and the Lord, I would not do that again. I prayed not to do it again.
At the time that I was going through the interview process of my job, two other opportunities surfaced and I was excited, even feeling myself a bit when in reality, there was only one offer on the table. I just didn’t know that yet.
Very quickly, the other opportunities fell away and the Lord led me to the job I have now, and I can attest to the fact that it is one of the hardest things I have ever done. It is challenging, and some days have been harder than others, but more than anything, I feel a determination to persist because I know this is where the Lord has called me to be. I have felt His favor as I navigated the hallways and workspaces; peace in the midst of chaos, access where others have been denied and the affirmation that this is where the Lord has and needs me makes the difficulties worthwhile and the challenges exciting.
It sounds counterproductive and perhaps even impossible, but such is often said of life as a Christian. We are doing and experiencing the impossible through our relationship with Our Father and the Spirit of Christ that is deposited to us. It would be one thing to be experiencing challenges which is par for the course in everyone’s life, believer or nonbeliever, but it is another thing entirely to be experiencing challenges of your own making, which I can definitely attest to doing. However, to be experiencing trials ordained by the Lord, trials that are ultimately working patience and enabling me to ever be more like Christ, how can I not be joyful when that is our daily aim? To be crucified with Christ (Galatians 2:20).
As I am being challenged, God is at work. My other favorite scripture is “Being confident of this very thing, that he who hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” I rejoice because the challenges mean God is at work. The work of Christ is being done in me and for the believer, there should be no greater joy. I was reading Acts a few months ago and after the Apostles were imprisoned and commanded never to speak the name of Jesus, the Bible says, “And they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name.” How many of us genuinely rejoice when we have difficulties? How different our trials would look if we looked at them through the lens, not of our flesh, through complaint or even personal convenience but instead through the lens of faith (2 Corinthians 5:7) ? Everything we must endure pales in comparison to eternity and Calvary. What is a challenging job, frustrating coworker in comparison to crucifixion? What is any challenge in comparison to eternity? Paul said it quite beautifully in Romans 8:18:
“For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.”
I am not immune to difficulty, to experiencing challenges and the trials of life. I’m human, but when I remind myself of the promises of God, one of the chief among them being that “greater is He that is in me than He that is in the world,” (1 John 4:4), I am reminded that I am not alone and of Psalm 118:16:
“The Lord is on my side; I will not fear: what can man do unto me?“
Let us rejoice this day and every day because we have the victory! Because daily we are dying to ourselves so that we may become like Christ. Because in the end, we shall come forth as pure gold and be lacking nothing. This should be our daily lens and aspiration!
