HIS MIRTH

  Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something.

  Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth.

- the closing words of "Orthodoxy" by G.K. Chesterton

I WILL SEE YOU AGAIN

So also you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. (John 16:22 ESV, emphasis added)

In John 16, Jesus spends many of his words warning his disciples of hardships to come. In verse 22, he speaks of their sorrow when he must leave them for a little while, but he also offers comfort.

I noticed something peculiar about the way Jesus phrased this comfort -- the words in bold.

When I think of a lover leaving his beloved for a short while, I hear him telling his darling something along the lines of, "You're sad now, but you will see me again, and you will rejoice." It would be a bit odd if he were to say, "You're sad now, but I will see you again, and you will rejoice."

After all, what would his vision of his beloved have to do with her joy?

But it seems to me that this is the wrong way of looking at this. Instead, I'll conjecture that when Jesus says "but I will see you again," he is betraying his humility and humanness in a wonderfully subtle yet moving way. The emphasis in his comfort is that he will see his disciples again, not that they will see him.

When the lover assures his beloved that she will see him again, the emphasis, the weight is placed on him -- on his face being seen.

However, when the lover assures his beloved that he will see her again, the emphasis, the weight is placed on her -- on her face being seen.

Jesus is fully justified in placing the emphasis on himself and himself alone, yet he doesn't. His emphasis was, is and will always be on us, his beloved, together with him.

HAPPINESS VS. JOY

"The difference between shallow happiness and a deep, sustaining joy is sorrow. Happiness lives where sorrow is not. When sorrow arrives, happiness dies. It can't stand pain. Joy, on the other hand, rises from sorrow and therefore can withstand all grief. Joy, by the grace of God, is the transfiguration of suffering into endurance, and of endurance into character, and of character into hope--and the hope that has become our joy does not (as happiness must for those who depend upon it) disappoint us." - Walter Wangerin Jr.

FAIR-WEATHER JOY

One of my co-workers walked into the office this morning sporting a New York Giants hat. He wasn't alone: I saw a few people wearing Giants apparel in and around our building today. It was notable because in my approximately 1.8 years working in this office building, I don't recall ever seeing a single person wearing Giants gear. Then there were the countless people on Facebook changing their profile photos to show Giants logos and players.

I understood why this was, of course. The Giants won a thrilling game last night and earned a spot in the Super Bowl. The team's fans, though contributing nothing to the thing they were celebrating, had a right to boast and be happy. I couldn't help but grin at the sight of emerging Giants fans today, both online and off-line. While I didn't doubt their allegiance, I wondered why these fans didn't display such conspicuous pride for their team until today.

Then I began turning this lens on myself, the only fair thing to do. I began searching my own heart for this inclination toward timely, fair-weather pride, and it took me less than a minute to find it.

There's not a shade of doubt in my head or my heart that I love God. Though my actions and inactivity, my words and silence often betray otherwise, I do love him. He is the only good part of my life. No, actually, he is much more than that. Exclude "the only good part of" and that sentence rings truer. To call anything "good" apart from him is akin to calling today's weather "cupcakes." It's nonsensical, for apart from him I am not.

I am also certain that God has assured victory for me, and not an incremental one that takes me to yet another battle. He has defeated death -- the final opponent -- in all its forms. Depressions that seek to murder my soul, perversions that seek to rape my thoughts, false whispers that seek to seduce my pride -- these, and more, are all defanged. My God has destroyed all my opposition, everything that would seek to drag me away from my love to unimaginable perdition. Not only did he win, but he confers the benefits of his victory to me, though I had not a single mite to do with it. No, not even that: He grants me its glorious benefits though I was a lifeless heap of evil on the wrong side of the war. It's as if he conquered the opposite trench, animated one of the adversary's sand bags and awarded it a victor's homecoming.

Yes, all this he did for me. Yet, somehow, I fail to express sufficient joy in this. There are those rare days when I do sense this victory in a very real way, and on those occasions I may wear my allegiance to my good Father on my sleeve. But on most days, I do not sense this and go on with my life as one who does not have this victory to beat his chest about.

So, no, I don't scoff at Giants fans for donning their hats, jackets and new profile photos today. If not now, when?

I only wonder how such a small victory in an inconsequential game could draw such joy and pride from some, when an infinitely greater triumph in the only arena of life that matters could draw so little out of me.

For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? This is he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood. And the Spirit is the one who testifies, because the Spirit is the truth. (1 John 5:4-6 ESV)

I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33 ESV)

ALONE

Here's something I wrote back in 2008, unedited:

"You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created." - C.S. Lewis

Living alone has been mostly enjoyable so far. The pros have considerably outweighed the cons. It might have to do with the newness of it all, since I have never lived alone before, but still, it is pleasing to me.

I get to bask in my introvertedness for most of my evenings, and I like that.

I've heard people say they want to live alone because they desire to be away from people that annoy them at home.

While I am not one of those people, I have found that the appeal of being away from the annoyance of other people is a fleeting, if not false benefit of living by yourself.

I can only speak for myself, but I have found that the more I am alone, the more I annoys me.  Terrible grammar, I know, but it's the best way I know how to say it.

Especially as a student who is constantly being humbled and challenged, there are many sober realizations as I look into that proverbial mirror, which has become ubiquitous somehow.

I constantly wonder - after more than 26 years of living, is this all I have become? Is this the furthest point I've reached so far in my life? Mentally, physically, spiritually, is this the zenith of my existence-to-date? Is this the return on all the investments poured into me?

Immediate sadness, regret and resignation imbues my heart, and at once I become irritated with me.

I realize that no matter where I am, no matter who I am with or not with, I am my own permanent roommate. I cannot get rid of me or leave me and instead choose another me.

Still, I begrudgingly count this as a benefit to living alone.

Because in this isolated condition, each passing minute feels more measured, deliberate and meaningful as I become familiar with what is approaching.

I cannot help but to bear with me, and I am led to believe that God also cannot help but to bear with me in the same manner, though he is glad to.

Just as I am alone with me, God, unbounded by time and place, is alone with me, every second of my miserable being.

The difference, I am trying to understand, is while I am unhappy to be stuck with myself, God is infinitely happy to have me as his - not because of who I appear to be in my own eyes, but because of who I actually am in his.

The rest of my years will be mostly the same - I will continue to be disappointed with who I am, and he will continue to be pleased with who I am becoming and have already become.

My joy is knowing that his pleasure will eventually meet with my discouragement - and his sentiment will win and overcome mine, and will evenbecome mine.

It will be a delight like none other I have ever known, because it will, for the first time, be absent of me. That joy will finally be one that is perfectly calibrated and wonderfully aimed.

The struggle to embrace this thought allows me to dig further underneath what I see and to hold my head a bit higher as I tolerate me, alone.

"This is not a perfect illustration, of course. But it may give just a glimpse of what I believe to be the truth. God is not hurried along in the Time-stream of this universe any more than an author is hurried along in the imaginary time of his own novel. He has infinite attention to spare for each one of us. He does not have to deal with us in the mass. You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created. When Christ died, He died for you individually just as much as if you had been the only man in the world." - C.S. Lewis

"They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory." - C.S. Lewis

Alone

"You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created." - C.S. Lewis

Living alone has been mostly enjoyable so far. The pros have considerably outweighed the cons. It might have to do with the newness of it all, since I have never lived alone before, but still, it is pleasing to me.

I get to bask in my introvertedness for most of my evenings, and I like that.

I've heard people say they want to live alone because they desire to be away from people that annoy them at home.

While I am not one of those people, I have found that the appeal of being away from the annoyance of other people is a fleeting, if not false benefit of living by yourself.

I can only speak for myself, but I have found that the more I am alone, the more I annoys me. Terrible grammar, I know, but it's the best way I know how to say it.

Especially as a student who is constantly being humbled and challenged, there are many sober realizations as I look into that proverbial mirror, which has become ubiquitous somehow.

I constantly wonder - after more than 26 years of living, is this all I have become? Is this the furthest point I've reached so far in my life? Mentally, physically, spiritually, is this the zenith of my existence-to-date? Is this the return on all the investments poured into me?

Immediate sadness, regret and resignation imbues my heart, and at once I become irritated with me.

I realize that no matter where I am, no matter who I am with or not with, I am my own permanent roommate. I cannot get rid of me or leave me and instead choose another me.

Still, I begrudgingly count this as a benefit to living alone.

Because in this isolated condition, each passing minute feels more measured, deliberate and meaningful as I become familiar with what is approaching.

I cannot help but to bear with me, and I am led to believe that God also cannot help but to bear with me in the same manner, though he is glad to.

Just as I am alone with me, God, unbounded by time and place, is alone with me, every second of my miserable being.

The difference, I am trying to understand, is while I am unhappy to be stuck with myself, God is infinitely happy to have me as his - not because of who I appear to be in my own eyes, but because of who I actually am in his.

The rest of my years will be mostly the same - I will continue to be disappointed with who I am, and he will continue to be pleased with who I am becoming and have already become.

My joy is knowing that his pleasure will eventually meet with my discouragement - and his sentiment will win and overcome mine, and will even become mine.

It will be a delight like none other I have ever known, because it will, for the first time, be absent of me. That joy will finally be one that is perfectly calibrated and wonderfully aimed.

The struggle to embrace this thought allows me to dig further underneath what I see and to hold my head a bit higher as I tolerate me, alone.

"This is not a perfect illustration, of course. But it may give just a glimpse of what I believe to be the truth. God is not hurried along in the Time-stream of this universe any more than an author is hurried along in the imaginary time of his own novel. He has infinite attention to spare for each one of us. He does not have to deal with us in the mass. You are as much alone with Him as if you were the only being He had ever created. When Christ died, He died for you individually just as much as if you had been the only man in the world." - C.S. Lewis

"They say of some temporal suffering, "No future bliss can make up for it," not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory." - C.S. Lewis