CHRISTIAN JOY
‘The fruit of the Spirit is … joy.’
The end of religion is not penitence, it is not contrition, it is not conviction of sin; it is something better than all that. The end of religion, to which it is all working, is joy. Jesus Christ Himself ‘for the joy which was set before Him endured the Cross.’ So, again, St. Paul, in prison chained to a soldier, with many disappointments and trials, yet he said, ‘Rejoice in the Lord alway, and again I say rejoice.’
What does Christian joy consist in?
I. The first joy is the joy of being forgiven.—Are there some who do not know the joy of being forgiven? They certainly cannot know that joy until they have known the pain of penitence. Look into your consciences and see what is on your conscience. Only in this way can you work towards the joy of being forgiven.
II. There is the joy of companionship.—Part of the joy of Christ was that He was not alone, and the only moment when He was in real agony of spirit was when the Father’s face seemed to be blotted out from Him, and He cried, ‘My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?’ Christ bore that in order that no one might ever be forsaken.
III. There is the joy of service.—I am never tired of repeating those beautiful words of Bishop Phillips Brooks: ‘It is not when the ship is fretting her side against the wharf that she has found her true joy, but when she has cut the rope which binds her to the wharf and is out upon the ocean with the wind over her and the waters under her; it is then that she knows the true joy a ship is made for as she plunges across the sea.’ Can you not see what is meant? It is not when a man is fretting his sides against the wharf, as it were, of his own self; it is not when he is saying, ‘What will people think of me?’—that is not the full joy a man is made for; but when he has cut the rope that binds him to himself and is out upon the ocean of loving work for God and man, with the wind of the Spirit over him and the water of humanity under him—then he knows the true joy he is made for.
IV. There is the joy of growth.—How lovely it is to think of the Church as a beautiful garden, and the Holy Spirit coming down upon it like dew and making all the plants grow. It is a lovely thing, of course, to see flowers grow, but it is still lovelier to see boys and girls growing up in a family and all their character developing; they seem sometimes to get more loving, more unselfish, like the beautiful flowers, every day under the influence of the Holy Spirit. That is the joy of growth.
V. There is the joy of strength.—‘The joy of the Lord is your strength.’ You know those beautiful pictures by Mr. Watts of Sir Galahad riding forth to battle with his armour on, full of the joy of strength; or that other picture of ‘Aspiration,’ where the young knight looks across the field of life with his spear and shining armour. That is the joy of strength. And there ought not to be a young man or woman present who has not got the joy of strength. We are not meant to be miserably weak people, driven about by every wind of doctrine and beaten down by temptation. We are meant to be young knights, going forth in all the glorious strength of the Holy Spirit, conquering and to conquer. We must ask for the joy of strength.
Bishop A. F. Winnington-Ingram.
Illustration
‘It was said by a great writer that the goodness of work was in proportion to the joy of the workman. I come across, for instance, some parish priest who has toiled in East London for thirty years unnoticed and unknown. Do I find him depressed? I find him tired, weary, old before his time, but find a joy upholding him. You will remember Matthew Arnold’s beautiful words:—
‘ ’Twas August, and the fierce sun overhead
Smote on the squalid streets of Bethnal Green,
And the pale weaver through his windows seen
In Spitalfields, looked thrice dispirited;
I met a preacher there I knew, and said:
“Ill and o’er-worked, how fare you in this scene?”
“Bravely,” said he, “for I of late have been
Much cheered with thoughts of Christ, the Living Bread.”
O human soul! so long as thou canst so
Set up a mark of everlasting light,
Above the howling senses’ ebb and flow,
To cheer thee and to right thee if thou roam,
Not with lost toil thou labourest through the night!
Thou mak’st the heaven thou hop’st indeed thy home.’