Joy. I was talking with someone recently about the difference between fun and joy. I feel often in so many life situations that people want everything to be fun. What I really hear when someone says "all I want to do is have fun" is that they really just want it to be easy. Fun is usually easy. But I also think fun--in its most elemental form--can be shallow.
When I think about moments of JOY in my life--they are often moments that were preceded by hard work, investment, prayer and process. Like having my babies. I will never forget the moments when I held them against my chest for the first time. I cried--tears of JOY. But being pregnant was not necessarily fun as we think of it. It was uncomfortable and scary and long and trying. But the end (or should I say the next beginning)-- this little tiny person--this was all worth it. This is JOY.
I have been challenged this Christmas season to pray for my family to experience Christmas with JOY. It will certainly be fun to open presents and give presents. It will be fun to think about Santa and his reindeer. It will be fun in many ways. But I know that these things pass quickly by. I know that fun is fleeting and leaves us only wanting for more--never satisfied.
But JOY--this is something different altogether. I am praying this Christmas season that the Lord will work in my heart and the hearts of my husband and children to experience the JOY of the Lord this Christmas season. To consider the gift that Christmas really is all about. Even as I write these words, I see His hand at work. That 2000 years later, we are still celebrating the birth of Christ speaks to the longevity and depth of JOY.
May the words of one of our favorite Christmas carols ring true in our hearts this Advent season: "Joy to the world, the Lord is come... ." May we pursue more than the "fun" our culture has turned Christmas into. I know I cannot do this on my own. I know that I am drawn to the sales, to the gift giving, to the chaos, which in moderation can all be good. But as my heart flees from moderation to obsession, may the Lord work in my heart to know and experience the JOY of the Lord. Join me in praying for this this Advent season.