Joy - Part 3

Joy – Part 3

By Megann Graf

Hopefully you can read the picture above.  It’s what this whole blog is about.   “Today, we will practice our faith – because we will practice joy.  Practice thankfulness.  Practice counting gifts.  We repent of too often forgetting that we are the Resurrection people and joy is our endless refrain.”-
Ann Voskamp from her Lent to Repent devotional

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oy is our endless refrain?  Again, I do so miserably at this.  Just when I think I am doing well, that darn poo gets in the way.  (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, read last week’s blog J )

But, notice how she mentions and phrases this grasping of joy…something we need to practice.  Practice.  It’s not going to come naturally.  Giving thanks, doesn’t come naturally.  Smiling when I feel crummy isn’t easy.  These are things I have to practice.  I’ve also been reading Ann Voskamp’s book “One Thousand Gifts” where she challenges you to write down 1,000 things you are thankful for.  I started last week, trying to write down 10 each day.  Do you know over the weekend, I was in such a funk, that I didn’t write anything down.  Nothing.  I live in a free country. I have two healthy children. I have a husband who loves me.  I have a home with heat and water.  And I wrote nothing.  Wow.  That’ll wake you up and slap you once you stare it in the face.  I was mad at people, and I wanted to be mad at people.  Practicing joy then would have been hard.  I had the right to be upset with my kids.  They were being brats.  So was I.  (Gosh darn these stupid, hard, incredible lessons that I have to learn from my kids.)  I had to rise above.  I had to practice joy.  I had to practice thankfulness.  I had to, because I WANT joy to be my endless refrain.  I really do.  Who wouldn’t?  But, it’s something money cannot buy.  I can’t save up for it.  I have to put effort into having that kind of life.  I have to overcome pride and self-justification and defeat the lies that the world so desperately wants me to believe.  I’ve heard it said that so often we stand with our fists clenched at the world, at God, and we question everything, instead of standing with our hands wide open, giving over everything.   When we can give up, that’s when He can get in.  And when He can get in, joy will come.  It has to.  His ultimate purpose is for us to know Him and to find peace and joy and grace and salvation in Him. 

This week is Palm Sunday.  A day when people celebrated Jesus coming, and a week later they were the same people who crucified Him.  They let their emotions take over.  One day praising Him and shouting “Hosanna” and the next week shouting “crucify Him.”  When I let my pride take over my joy, I am shouting the same thing.  I am, in my modern day way, telling God that what his son did on the cross for me just wasn’t enough.

 “Father forgive me.  Give me the strength to practice joy, practice thankfulness every day.  Not just on good days.  Not just when the sun is shining. Not just when kids are behaving.  But every day.  Every. Single. Day. 

Because God, what Jesus did was enough.  And even when I don’t know why things are happening, I know You are good.  I know that You love me.  And, I know that joy is a choice I must choose, just like receiving Your love is a choice.  I am part of a resurrection people!   I want joy to be my endless refrain.  Something that lasts.  Something not built on earthly emotions but on sacred truths.  Lord, may those reading this today, not just feel Your joy, but KNOW Your joy.  In Jesus’ name, Amen.”