Sermon Tone Analysis

\\ The joy is not always in getting what we want but in letting go of what we don't need.

--James S. Hewett,

 

/But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid.

I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people./"

(Luke 2:10, NIV) [1]

 

"/Be joyful always;/" (1 Thessalonians 5:16, NIV) [2]

 

This is the third Advent Sunday and today “joy” becomes the subject of the message.

Never mind all the normal seasonal hub-bub, it seems that it is impossible to ignore that the scriptures introduce the long awaited Messiah in the context of “great joy that will be for all the people.”

If you can somehow find yourself exempted from that qualifier then I guess you can choose to be as “joyless” as you wish.

When I am talking about “joy”, I am not necessarily talking about “happiness”.

*/Happiness is caused by things that happen around me, and circumstances will mar it; but joy flows right on through trouble; joy flows on through the dark; joy flows in the night as well as in the day; joy flows all through persecution and opposition.

It is an unceasing fountain bubbling up in the heart; a secret spring the world can't see and doesn't know anything about.

The Lord gives his people perpetual joy when they walk in obedience to him.

/*

*/ /*

Sometimes the simple fact that we are committed to our sorrow, or our despair, . . .

or the fact that we dismiss the exhortations that we receive from others as insensitivity, . . .

causes us to deliberately refuse to pursue this blessing that God wants to give us.

Because “joy” does come from God.

It is something supernatural.

It is something that we are invited to “experience” that is above and beyond the circumstances of life.

And yet it is something that impacts those circumstances and the way that we live in the midst of things.

Joy is a “spiritual” presence.

The presence of joy may be more difficult to define that its absence.

You know it when a person is inwardly joyful, when they have some sustaining power about them, the kind that helps them to persevere and the kind that others draw strength and encouragement from.

This quality is obvious in certain people and we might not call it joy at first reflection.

Even more obvious is the absence of joy in a person’s life.

They become a cloudy presence in the lives of others.

They kill the ability that others have to laugh and rob them of this simple therapy.

Joy you know it when it’s present and you know it when it’s absent.

The point is that God intends for His people to be a joyful people.

*/“I have everything I need for joy!” Robert Reed said.

/*

*/ /*

*/“Amazing!”

I thought./*

*/ /*

*/His hands are twisted and his feet are useless.

He can’t bathe himself.

He can’t feed himself.

He can’t brush his teeth, comb his hair, or put on his underwear.

His shirts are held together by strips of Velcro.

His speech drags like a worn-out audio cassette./*

*/ /*

*/Robert has cerebral palsy./*

*/ /*

*/The disease keeps him from driving a car, riding a bike, and going for a walk.

But it didn’t keep him from graduating from high school or attending Abilene Christian University, from which he graduated with a degree in Latin.

Having cerebral palsy didn’t keep him from teaching at a St. Louis junior college or from venturing overseas on five mission trips./*

*/ /*

*/And Robert’s disease didn’t prevent him from becoming a missionary in Portugal./*

*/ /*

*/He moved to Lisbon, alone, in 1972.

There he rented a hotel room and began studying Portuguese.

He found a restaurant owner who would feed him after the rush hour and a tutor who would instruct him in the language./*

*/ /*

*/Then he stationed himself daily in a park, where he distributed brochures about Christ.

Within six years he led seventy people to the Lord, one of whom became his wife, Rosa./*

*/ /*

*/I heard Robert speak recently.

I watched other men carry him in his wheelchair onto the platform.

I watched them lay a Bible in his lap.

I watched his stiff fingers force open the pages.

And I watched people in the audience wipe away tears of admiration from their faces.

Robert could have asked for sympathy or pity, but he did just the opposite.

He held his bent hand up in the air and boasted, “I have everything I need for joy.”/*

*/ /*

*/His shirts are held together by Velcro, but his life is held together by joy./*

*/No man had more reason to be miserable than this one—yet no man was more joyful./*

*/ /*

*/His first home was a palace.

Servants were at his fingertips.

The snap of his fingers changed the course of history.

His name was known and loved.

He had everything—wealth, power, respect./*

*/ /*

*/And then he had nothing./*

*/ /*

*/Students of the event still ponder it.

Historians stumble as they attempt to explain it.

How could a king lose everything in one instant?/*

*/ /*

*/One moment he was royalty; the next he was in poverty./*

*/ /*

*/His bed became, at best, a borrowed pallet—and usually the hard earth.

He never owned even the most basic mode of transportation and was dependent upon handouts for his income.

He was sometimes so hungry he would eat raw grain or pick fruit off a tree.

He knew what it was like to be rained on, to be cold.

He knew what it meant to have no home./*

*/ /*

*/His palace grounds had been spotless; now he was exposed to filth.

He had never known disease, but was now surrounded by illness./*

*/ /*

*/In his kingdom he had been revered; now he was ridiculed.

His neighbors tried to lynch him.

Some called him a lunatic.

His family tried to confine him to their house./*

*/ /*

*/Those who didn’t ridicule him tried to use him.

They wanted favors.

They wanted tricks.

He was a novelty.

They wanted to be seen with him—that is, until being with him was out of fashion.

Then they wanted to kill him./*

*/He was accused of a crime he never committed.

Witnesses were hired to lie.

The jury was rigged.

No lawyer was assigned to his defense.

A judge swayed by politics handed down the death penalty./*

*/ /*

*/They killed him./*

*/ /*

*/He left as he came—penniless.

He was buried in a borrowed grave, his funeral financed by compassionate friends.

Though he once had everything, he died with nothing./*

*/ /*

*/He should have been miserable.

He should have been bitter.

He had every right to be a pot of boiling anger.

But he wasn’t./*

*/ /*

*/He was joyful./*

*/ /*

*/Sourpusses don’t attract a following.

People followed him wherever he went./*