“Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I will say, Rejoice” (NRSV, Philippians 4:4)
The keynote of the Christian Faith is joy, and when individual Christians truly accept that faith as the basis of their whole relationship with God, and freely allow it in all its depth and power to shape their thinking and to direct their lives, then there is of necessity found in them that essential element of joy.
And it is a joy that touches them at the centre of their being because the Christian Faith is not only concerned with the ultimate reality of life both here and hereafter; it is also something that is actually experienced in one’s own soul.
The cause of the Christian’s rejoicing starts from the historical facts which are commemorated during the Church’s Year – now once again beginning – facts which are re-enacted in the Christian’s spiritual life, that is, in his or her relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
So after this solemn season Advent, there is the joyful festival of Christmas when we celebrate how our Saviour came down among us and was born into this world of ours with the angels singing their hymn of joy above the hills of Bethlehem.
And we too, like the shepherds, have our tidings of joy still today. For at our Baptism Our Lord has so united himself to us that we can share his life and he can share ours – share, that is, not only the course we are given to pursue but also our inmost hearts. In the words of the carol:
“How silently, how silently,
the wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
the blessings of his heaven.
No ear may hear his coming,
but in this world of sin,
where meek souls will receive him,
still the dear Christ enters in”. (1)
So the year turns, until Good Friday and the Crucifixion vividly reveal to us the grim and tragic fact of human sin, and the fearful cost of the Saviour’s mission to deliver us from its power. For sin is that attitude of heart and mind which instead of looking outwards to God to determine one’s actions, perversely and rebelliously looks inwards and makes self the deciding factor – and often self in its most unpleasant form.
And just as there can be no fellowship between darkness and light, so there can be none between a self-centred and self-seeking person on the one hand and God on the other.
So the Child of Bethlehem became the Man of Sorrows, who did not flinch from the cost of his mission to make possible the full restoration of that broken fellowship – possible, because before it can become actual, individuals must themselves first respond by their repentance: turning from self to God and renouncing all those things which have kept them from him.
So that same carol goes on:
“O holy Child of Bethlehem,
descend to us, we pray;
cast out our sin and enter in,
be born in us today”.
Good Friday was followed by Easter Day, by the joy that cometh in the morning (2), when Our Lord’s risen life began and he passed from this natural world into that supernatural world of God which is the background of life here and the essence of eternal life hereafter. And it is as the Risen Lord that the holy Child of Bethlehem now enters one’s heart and shares one’s life – or rather enters one’s heart so we can share his life.
For it is not so much that he comes down to us at our natural level as that he raises us up to his supernatural level. This means that, as the Crucifixion was followed by the Resurrection, so our repentance, if it is to blossom and bear fruit, must be followed by newness of life. The old life of self and its sins must go and a God-centred and Christ-like life take its place.
That is a theme to which St Paul often turns:
“If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” (RSV, Colossians 3:1).
And again:
“…if any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come” (RSV, 2 Corinthians 5:17).
And this new life is made available for us through the Church. In Confirmation, when we are made full members of the Church, we receive the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of that boldness and joy which were so prominent a feature of the life of the Early Christians.
And through the Church, too, we receive in Holy Communion the Risen Christ himself in his glorified Body, enabling us – provided we come prepared with penitence and trustful love – to become as he is, attaining in St Paul’s words, “…to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ” (NRSV, Ephesians 4:13).
And lastly, the joy of faithful Christians is unclouded by the prospect and the certainty of death. For they know that death merely ushers in a change of environment which, so far from diminishing their life and fellowship with the Risen Christ, rather brings nearer its eternal fulness in his visible Presence. Then they will see the King in his beauty and will know the joy that cometh in the morning when they enter into the joy of their Lord.
References
1. Brooks, P. (1868) O little town of Bethlehem. Available from: http://www.oremus.org/hymnal/o/o376.html (Accessed 25 November 2015) (Internet).
2. See Psalm 30:5.