Seeking joy : an Advent devotional

by Stephanie Conkright

Have you ever wondered whether we would appreciate Christmas more if it came around less often? Would our anticipation be heightened if it was like the Jewish observance of the Sabbatical, which is only celebrated once every seven years? Or what if we waited like Simeon in Luke 2, who spent his entire life longing for the consolation of Israel? Imagine the depth of his joy when he finally met and recognized the infant Jesus as the long-awaited Messiah.

As children, we can’t wait for Christmas to arrive. But as we grow older, our familiarity with the Advent season, along with all the added traditions, can dull our sense of wonder. We drive through brightly decorated neighborhoods, seeing everything from Nativity scenes to Santa, the Grinch, and Snoopy, and we catch ourselves asking: How did all this happen? When did the birth of our Savior become tangled up with so many distractions? And more importantly, how do we find genuine joy amid it all?

Countless articles and songs urge us to slow down, spend less, and remember that “Jesus is the reason for the season.” So, we follow Advent devotionals, read the nativity accounts in the Gospels, and try to recapture that original sense of anticipation and excitement. We try to find joy. And yet, sometimes that feeling still eludes us. Or is it just me?

In his autobiography Surprised by Joy, C. S. Lewis describes his lifelong search for Joy, which ultimately led him from atheism to Christianity. Near the end he reflects, “But what, in conclusion, of Joy? for that, after all, is what the story has mainly been about. To tell you the truth, the subject has lost nearly all interest for me since I became a Christian… I now know that the experience, considered as a state of my own mind, had never had the kind of importance I once gave it. It was valuable only as a pointer to something other and outer.”

In his sermon Real Joy (April 18, 2010), Tim Keller references Lewis’s comments on joy as a pointer. He proceeds to note that the gospel gives us joy in two profound ways. First, it reveals the magnitude of the danger of our lost condition. Second, it shows us the immeasurable price Jesus paid to rescue us from that danger. He surrendered all joy so that we might receive true
joy.

To recognize that the depth of our sin is met, and exceeded, by the depth of God’s love is the greatest joy we can ever know. Not the fleeting joy shaped by our emotions or circumstances, but the enduring joy rooted in the truth that “God made him, who had no sin, to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Corinthians 5:21.) Thanks be to God for this indescribable Christmas gift. May we all experience this kind of joy
throughout Advent and beyond.

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