Joy

Life and people fascinate me.  I wonder what makes you tick?  How do you make the choices you make? How you live your life, your motivations, the personality you have and who you are.  You intrigue me; the why and how you do the things you do.  Your outlook on this thing we call life.  

But most of all, I love living life with you.  

Together, we make a community; a community that weathers the storms with each other and celebrates when the skies are clear.  God brings us joy through those around us. 

This year has been yet another tough year; there has been a lot of injustice and frustration and, as a result of this, I have had to make a number of choices. Many of these choices have been mainly around how I respond to my situation and circumstance.  It is not the first hard time I have had, nor is it likely to be my last. In fact, it has not been the most difficult, but nonetheless, it has been a challenge. I have changed because of this and have been moulded.

A number of years ago I had an understanding during a stormy season.  In this season I was devastated, broken, and honestly, I wasn’t even sure that there was a God.  I had no understanding of why; I saw no purpose in the why.  I could not even think or see a future.  All I knew, felt and still feel, is grief. 

Yet in this time I had a very distinctive moment of choice.  It did not matter about what the very bleak and broken picture I had at the time was; I had to make a choice. 

I remember Rich and I having a conversation about whether we even still believed there was a God.  In those, how I term them, moments, I had choice.  In our conversation we made a choice to follow Jesus, that despite our circumstances, we still believed.

We are so often told to choose hope over despair; love over hate; peace over fear and joy over grief and sorrow. This is what I find interesting when living life with you people.  That somehow, we have to muster a choice to love or hate, have peace over fear etc.

I don’t know about you, but I find that these are simultaneous feelings or emotions that we experience within the same moments, day in and day out in our lives, but seldom are they alone.  

This for me is that supernatural living.  My choice to keep following God, rather than walk away, allows me to receive gifts from God.  My choice then was, and still is today, to accept Jesus, who was born to become the person that ultimately gives me the freedom to choose.

My gift for making the choice of following Jesus is a supernatural gift we read about in Galatians 5. 

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. 
Against such things there is no law.
Galatians 5:22-23

Where there is despair, there is a supernatural hope that is our gift.  When there is fear, we find a supernatural peace.  The best bit is we get the whole of the fruit of the spirit, not just one.  It’s like a multi-layer. 

Joy is part of this package.

So today, don’t choose A over B, but choose Jesus; he is the bringer of good gifts that enable us to live a supernatural life.  In His presence, we can have the confidence that He has everything under control and He gifts us with what we need to live. 

After all, without Jesus being joy to the world, we would not be able to receive his good gifts. 

written by Lois Evans