Unhiding Joy: When We Least Expect It

INTRO

• For the next few weeks between now and sermon madness, I want to focus on joy.
• It's one of the most fundamental parts of why we even worry about faith to begin with - The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary begins its own definition of joy saying "The experience of deliverance and the anticipation of salvation provide the most significant occasions for rejoicing among the people of God in the OT. The coming of the Messiah, who delivers his people and brings salvation becomes the basis for rejoicing in the NT. The response of joy, gladness, or happiness is not only a deep inward feeling, but is expressed in celebration when God’s people gather together"  Arnold, C. E. (1992). Joy. In D. N. Freedman (Ed.), The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (Vol. 3, p. 1022). Doubleday.
• This is a direct connection between us and God.
• At first, I wanted to call this series "Hidden Joy," because at first, I was thinking about how we might find joy in short supply.
  • Yet, to do so, creates a strange market for something transcendent.
  • Joy, in relation to God, isn't something scarce. There is always a well of joy to pull from.
  • The better question, then, how we might create a scarcity of joy unnecessarily.
• So instead, I want us to consider the ways we might hide joy from ourselves, and how we might be able to reclaim it.

SCRIPTURE

• We're starting this series with a complex circumstance in the Old Testament: the birth of Issac.
• Let's lay the landscape a little bit:
  • Abraham (at the time, called Abram) was told by God that he would be the father of an entire nation - more numerous than the stars and the grains of sand.
  • He, and his wife Sarai (then later called Sarah), start to pilgrim their way throughout the region, waiting on God's faithfulness.
  • Keep in mind, too, that when this all started, so says the text, Abram was 75 years old, and moreover, through some creative translation, we come to find out that "it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women"... or, put more honestly Sarah had gone through menopause.
    • This combination of issues would obviously raise some concerns.
    • And it seems Abraham and Sarah try to solve the situation for themselves in some questionable ways.
    • In two circumstances, Abraham goes to royalty, says that Sarah is not his wife but instead his sister, and marries within the royal house.
      • This doesn't go well for the new family: in both cases, there's the potential of death, or plagues on the land.
      • And, in each case, God has to intercede with the royalty to fix what Abraham causes.
    • We also hear the story of Ishmael, which is an incredibly messy story as well.
      • Even while God continues to promise to Abraham a child with Sarah, and in consultation together, they to take this into their own hands, and a child is born through Hagar, a slave of Sarah.
      • Sarah is contemptuous of Hagar and Ishmael, to the point, it seems of Hagar fleeing for her and her child's safety.
  • Only after all 25 years of escapades, do we land on the birth of Issac.
    • And, interestingly enough, for all of the vivid storytelling of the chapters in Genesis that tell the story between the promise and the progeny, this is a straight-forward accounting.
      • God promised, and God followed through
      • But what is fascinating is the final thing Sarah says, here in 7: "Who would have ever said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have born him a son in his old age."
      • Who did say that to Abraham? God did. 25 years ago.

APPLICATION

• I wonder about what was in Abraham and Sarah's hearts during this whole situation: I cannot imagine the constant cycling of getting hopes up, having them dashed, trying to come up with a solution and seeing how it failed.
  • However, they had a benefit - God was speaking directly to them. At my count, God speaks directly or through an angel to either Abraham or Sarah five times from the point of the promise to the birth of Issac. And, again, this about what Sarah says! Who said this about this child? God had, right at the beginning!
  • This begs the question - why could they not just listen? How could they not hear?
• This may be how we most often start to hide joy from ourselves - we question God's follow through, the promises become duller, the voice quieter, the miracles lackluster.
  • I imagine all across the country right now, in countless pews and on countless screens, the same thing happens with us. We question where God's promises our leading us. We want to see big, as big as nation building! And so we try to figure it out on our own - likely not as radical as Abraham and Sarah here, but we certainly try to gussy up all these grand promises of God to make it feel like it's happening, and more often than not, we're left with a feeling of incompleteness. And that incompleteness we want to hang on God, as though God has stopped doing what God's always done.
  • And this is where we need to make a turn: because if we're comfortable with saying that the joy we're seeking is in abundance, and not hidden, and that God's promises will always occur, that God will follow-through, then it's not really a matter of God at all, but of us.
  • So perhaps it's not so much action that matters, at least at first, but discernment: to go back and find God's promise, to find where God still speaks - to look for miracles.
• Yet, there is a silver lining to all of this still: God still redeems!
  • One of the things I noticed throughout the entirety of this saga is that even when Abraham and Sarah try to solve the concern they have on their own, God still finds a way to care for everyone.
    • The Royalty who Sarah is wedded to are made aware of the issue by God before too much damage can occur.
    • Hagar and Ishmael, in spite of Sarah's contempt, are cared for by God - Ishmael himself is lifted up and God makes a great nation of him as well.
    • This redemption is itself a place to find joy! That God can create good out of brokenness, can make a way for healing and growth to occur, and that nothing and no one is out of bounds for God's grace is another place to discern promises again. That even when we try it, God will achieve what God said.

CONCLUSION

• When Lindsey became pregnant with Abe, we decided (or maybe, more appropriately, Lindsey wanted and I figured I'll do what Lindsey wants to do in this situation) to have a natural home birth.
  • And while I was hesitant at first, I found a real joy in the process. I loved the midwives, I loved thinking about being in a place that we loved that was warm and beautiful to welcome our child into the world.
  • And we kept moving forward, until mid-November of 2013. I remember the day so clearly: we were hanging out with good friends of ours that had moved to Michigan and we're coming back for some fun before our child was born.
  • Towards the middle of the night, Lindsey noticed that her water broke. This wasn't the plan; this is seven weeks too early.
  • And so we rush to Grant Hospital in downtown Columbus.
  • And I need to help you understand what the transition here is: we went from natural home birth to now at the downtown hospital for an emergency c-section. And we felt like, especially because midwifery isn't completely accepted, that we were at that hopsital becuase we weren't doing somethign right... like we weren't caring for our pregnancy in the interim.
  • And there was a moment, between hospital room and OR, that I sat with one of the midwives. And clear as day, I can remember the moment. I wept. I wept because what the promises we had made to ourselves we not going to happen. We had a plan, we worked towards it, and it wasn't going to happen. I wept for Lindsey in particular.
  • But, yet, just a few minutes later, we welcomed Abraham into the world. And there he was, the real promise for us. This beautiful, tiny, new life - such joy.
  • And yeah, it was just a little dicey at first: Abe's lungs weren't fully developed, so we were in the NICU for a week.
  • But here's what happened - what we found during that time is friends came out of the woodwork to tell us about their NICU experience. We've been able to be support to others. There's joy in that community that we wouldn't have had otherwise.