Surprised by joy
How would we define the experience of becoming a Christian? "Surprised by joy" is how C.S. Lewis described it.
The Thessalonians, who welcomed the message with the joy given by the Holy Spirit, experienced it as deliverance from fear and bondage. They "turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God" (1:9). What an exchange - the dead and false for the living and true! Along with conviction of the futility of their past life, the Holy Spirit gave these new believers joy.
This joy was no ephemeral thing, no frothy emotionalism. It sustained the Thessalonians through the persecution that followed their acknowledgment of Christ. And it issued in an extraordinary change of behaviour. Their lives were characterised by practical love. Writing to the Corinthians, Paul commended the churches of Macedonia (of which the Thessalonian church was one) that "out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity", and they gave, far beyond their means, to help the famine-stricken Christians in Jerusalem.
I wonder whether joy is a missing element in our churches, or in our individual lives, today. Perhaps our culture is to blame. Comfortable agnostics may not find conversion such a radical change as the exchange of the dead and false for the living and true. Or maybe we have so many other support systems that putting our faith in Christ is simply adding one more to our portfolio.
But Christian faith and life are still as radically different from that of the surrounding culture. We have been transferred from darkness to light, from the emptiness of seeking our fulfilment in material things and the opinions of others to fullness of purpose, security and identity as children of our heavenly Father. Some cause for joy!
This joy, which is the fruit of the Spirit, then enables us, as those who have found a priceless treasure, to stand up and be counted, in our daily life and work, in spite of opposition and ridicule. And it spills over in energy, love and an almost reckless generosity.
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