“Joy is the Gift of Love”

Karen Sloan 20/12/2020

Readings - Luke 1:46-55

So we come to the last week in advent, and we light the candle of joy.  We have lit the candle of hope, peace, love and now joy to reflect our faith journey that culminates in the celebrate of the birth of Jesus, a birth that has changed the world or at least ours. For he shows us a different way to be in the world.  And shows us the divine mystery that sits behind it all.

So how to talk about joy.  It reminds me of the poem that we often use from Mary Oliver,

We shake with joy, we shake with grief.

What a time they have, these two

Housed as they are in the same body.

Joy and sorrow, what a time these 2 have, housed in the one body. While we shared some of our memories I know that sometimes Christmas is a hard time.

This week Matt and I have had some beautiful, joyful moments, looking at the Christmas lights in Perth, being able to get together with long-time friends for our annual pre-Christmas bash, seeing all the kids that belong to our church here gather at our place for a dinner and pressy exchange which we have been doing for a number of years.

But then I spoke to my friend Nazar, a refugee from Pakistan, who has been here for 7 years, and reality struct home.  He is still in Melbourne as most people know, but has made the decision to go back to Pakistan early next year.  He still cannot work and is still on a temporary visa here.  But that is not the only reason. Covid has hit his family hard, he has lost his mother, many of his uncles and aunts,  a brother and sister and a nephew all through the disease.  His nephew died in Saudi Arabia because he was a temporary worker and did not have access to any health care when he became sick.

Nazar has only a sister left plus other extended family and feels totally burdened by the loss and how his family is coping.  Such sorrow. But somehow within that sorrow there is an incredible  will to live.

He sent me a video to watch, which is of his sister who has subsequently died, helping to feed the poorest members of their village, a village of about 7000 people.  Whenever she had spare money she would provide rice and vegetable to those without many resources, regardless of who they were and what religious group they came from.  Particularly at this time of the year, she would set up her pots and provide help to others.

Show video – just a few minutes

 When I watched it I cried.  The joy of seeing people being looked after, sorrow for the loss of this person, sorrow at how little these villagers had.

Joy and sorrow, what a time they have housed in the same body.

Nazar told me his niece, the daughter of this women wants to carry on providing food for the people in their village.  And needs some financial help to do it.  When I mentioned to Nazar that I will give him some money, and I am hoping others might help, his voice lit up and he said his heart felt bonded, I think he meant warmed or mended, his English is not so good.

Either way the joy of some assistance for his village seemed to bring joy in an otherwise shitty old year for him.

Hope, peace, love and joy, they are the ways in which life is brought in times of darkness. 

As we heard from Richard Rohr last week…

“Love is more than a feeling.  Love is a form of sweet labour, fierce, bloody, imperfect and life giving, a choice we make over and over again. If love is sweet labour, love can be taught, modelled and practised.  This labour engages all our emotions. Joy is the gift of love, grief is the price of love. Anger protects that which is loved.  And when we think we have reached our limit, wonder is the act that returns us to love…

Joy is the gift of love

The reading today from Luke is a famous reading, of Mary’s Magnificat, and says so much to us as well.

This is the great liberation song of the New Testament detailing a wider vision which will challenge the lordships of this world.  Mary is expressing her joy about carrying Jesus in her womb.  The hope it brings to the poor and downcast that a new kingdom of love will be born.

But she also knows full well the joy and sorrow of life. She was a woman of humble circumstances who lived at a time of political turmoil, military oppression and social inequality.  In the Christmas story an angel appears to this woman, who feels inadequate to bear God’s word to the people.  But eventually she bravely relents, submitting to the call of the spirit on her life, and the life of her loved ones. The call of love.

I started this series on Advent looking at prophets, and Mary is one of the great prophets of the bible. She’s not really noticed or acknowledged, because she is a woman in a man’s world, a man’s religious world. Seen as meek and mild, a woman of importance only because of Jesus,  she was far from that.  She was a prophet in her own right in the tradition of the great prophets of the Old Testament.  Well before the birth of an infant. 

This Mary is a prophet of the poor, the champion of the downtrodden, proclaiming the overthrow of the social, economic and political order of things.  This Mary proclaims the coming of God’s kingdom, soon to be born into the world.   This Mary does not sound so meek and mild, suggesting that God will show his power by filling the hungry with good things and exalting the lowly.

Out of faith Mary sings, and we want to hear more of this person, who surrounded by hardship and injustice, shows incredible strength of character and clarity of vision.  She becomes alive to us in a way that brings out the strength of all women at all times.  Without her the light would not have shined in the darkness.

Out of faith Mary acts. Out of faith Mary sings.

 Joy in the midst of darkness and despair. 

Not the joy of temporary possessions, but a deeper seated joy.

This Mary found in our religious tradition and Nazar, found here and now , challenge us like nothing else.  Where do we find joy in our lives, that deep seated joy, that comes from within, regardless of external circumstances. And how can we help foster that in others. And I think the key is love. Revolutionary love.

Often in our 1st world joy is misinterpreted, a lot by the money men, such that many think joy will come from owning more things, like bigger houses or cars or televisions, or being in a powerful position at work or in the community or even having a great social life. Yet we know this type of joy is transient, easily lost as we have seen when disaster strikes or when the novelty of those things wears off, and the need for more overwhelms us.

The real joy we have is through relationships with other people and with the spirit of God who urges us to connect with one another in love. This joy comes from the heart and gives us a fullness of life that has nothing to do with what we own. We have seen this recently. People turn to each other and community during dark days and we are often amazed by the sacrifice and compassion shown by complete strangers to each other. Suddenly the two tvs and the three cars and the big house do not seem important anymore. Suddenly their meaning is worthless. Care for others seems to take over and we are drawn to compassion and love rather than competition. At these times the sounds of the world are dimmed long enough that we get a hint of what life should be like. Even when things are going bad.

We find joy in love, as Richard Rohr says. 

But where does love arise?

I believe it arises from the urging of the divine presence within and between every thing that exists, now, in the past and in the future. Which connects and transforms us, if we let it. If we listen to it.

And how do we listen to it….

Maybe by being here, by sitting in silence occasionally, by helping others, by sharing and being generous, by protecting the earth. By meditating, contemplating or maybe by praying a bit.

All of the above, as long as we eventually leave our heads and go to our hearts, because what gives life resides in the heart.  Where is our passion, where is our harmony , where is our purpose. Where is our meaning? Heart stuff!

Joy and sorrow, what a time they have housed in one body.

But that body also houses the spirit of God. 

What Nazar has taught me, not just recently but ever since I met him, is that joy comes from within and that it leads us to connect with others in a way that we are in God’s stream.  It shapes our interaction with others, our view of community and urges us to seek love and compassion and justice. When we strive for these things, things that are life giving and transforming, we find we are in harmony with God’s purpose and the purpose of the universe. Suddenly we are transformed.  Regardless of what life dishes out to us.

And what about Mary! Out of Mary’s vision comes a vision for us, today.  Mary invites us to move beyond the world given to us by the money men and into a new different world.  We in turn are to act in and for this new age, with the hope  that the new reality that Christ brings will someday come to pass. A reality based and embedded in revolutionary love.

Through love of others, through caring for others, we live a full joyful life, with God, the spirit of life, within and between it all.

It’s as simple and as difficult as that!

Amen