Joy Comes With the Morning

The days may be sobering, but they need not be bleak

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

Life isn’t getting easier friends.

Each week seems to bring more injustice, strife, sorrow, and fear.

Whether it’s in our own homes, or across the world… life is hard.

So how do we move forward? Are we to be led by our anger or by our denial? Do we run full speed into battle or retreat and plug our ears?

What if we chose to pick up the weapon of joy?

For his anger is but for a moment, and his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.

-Psalm 30:5

When Jesus walked the earth, the world was just as broken as it is now. There is nothing new under the sun. Since the first rebellion in the Garden of Eden, there has been enmity and strife, uprisings, assassinations of leaders, natural disasters, loneliness, illnesses, ungraceful aging, brokenness, and sorrow.

Jesus entered into as corrupt a world as we are currently experiencing. And for some reason, as his first miracle, he chose to participate in a celebration and add to the bountiful joy that was present in that event (John 2).

Before Jesus tackled big theological issues, or displayed his power over the storm, or raised his friend from the dead, he took time to attend a wedding. He celebrated with friends, danced, ate, sang, hugged and laughed.

Later in the book of Acts we find Paul and Silas in jail and they are singing. Singing so loudly that all the other prisoners could hear (Acts 16:25).

In Hebrews, Christians were described as “joyfully accepting the plundering of your property” (Heb. 10:34).

And we learn that Jesus endured the cross out of a deep understanding of the joy that was before him (Heb. 12:2).

Over and over in Scripture we see God’s children, and even God himself pursuing joy as a weapon against the darkness of the world. Pushing back, if only for a moment, the destructive effects of sin on our world.

So my encouragement to you this week is this: Find something good to celebrate.

Intentionally seek out good things God is up to in our world, and join Him in celebrating those things.

My family celebrated this week by attending an adoption and baptism party for a sweet baby girl at our church. We sang happy birthday to two beloved family members. We are finding specific things to cheer over our girls each day and say “job well done!” And we are intentionally giving God thanks for his never ending goodness.

The darkness in our world will not end until Christ returns. The days will continue to be sobering and exhausting. But they do not have to be bleak. Joy does come in the morning - both as we pursue the true joy of Christ now, and when The Morning Star returns and the trumpets declare that eternal joy has begun.

-M