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Originally posted by Chorister:
If Christianity is all about us becoming more Christlike, then perhaps that doesn't mean being filled with more and more joy. Perhaps it means being with people in their suffering.

Not very popular, I know, but perhaps a necessary task.

I remember when I found it very tiresome to be surrounded by Christians who were trying very hard to be happy, happy, joyful all the time - and also in complete denial over the unhappiness and suffering they were causing to others in the church.

Surely being fully Christian (and fully human) is to experience the right emotion at the appropriate time, not to be always full of joy, regardless.

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
This is where I got sort of shocked. Not at calling it stupid, I can cope with that. But poor Marvin! Is that how you're seeing Christianity, as pointless work???? Or work at all, for that matter???

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Well, if there's no need to do any of it - if, as you say, the owner is just giving the dinero away - why bother doing anything other than collecting your share? There's nothing extra to be gained by it, so unless it is worth doing purely in and of itself - unless it causes you joy in some way - it's pointless.

And that's the question in the title of this thread. Why isn't the Christian life a joy?

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That to me is what Christianity is all about. You couldn't PAY me to do some of the things Christ has asked of me. But it's not about payment, is it? The man is out of his head and giving salvation away for free. So anything I do right now, before quitting time comes, is either a waste of time... or done for love.

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There's probably only about a dozen people in this world who I love enough that I'll do random shit for them, shit that (as you say) other people couldn't pay me to do.

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Um, that's what I was trying to say. In and of itself the shit I do is not joy-inducing--quite the opposite, in fact. Paul never spoke a truer word than when he said "If this is all we have, we are of all men most miserable."

The Christian life in and of itself can be sheer hell--drudgery, terror, disgust or any combination of the above. But in my experience what makes the difference is who I'm doing it for--and as you say, there are only about a dozen people in this world I'll do it for, for love. But there is Christ, then. And now I'm going to be very un-Lutheran and un-Germanic and make a fool of myself on the Internet.

(Damn, how do I start?)

I love him. He's the only one who never let me down, never lied to me, never betrayed me. He was there when I was a teenager going through my parents' divorce. He was there when I was suicidal. He was there when I did all kinds of dumb shit from day one till now, and he never treated me like everyone else, even my own mother, treated me (and like I deserved). He was there when I almost lost my life and my family. Even when he disciplines me, it's a hell of a lot kinder than love notes from most the people I know. And he never does that without cause.

He knows all the most embarrassing things about me, and still loves me. He takes pleasure in me--and isn't that a fucking wonder? He watches me screw up time and again and again and it doesn't change a thing in his attitude toward me. He's the only person I can truly let down my guard with, and not be afraid he'll walk away. He won't. He's had thirty years to prove it.

He doesn't put me on guilt trips. He doesn't remind me of all I owe him and then get after me about my obligations. He's interested in my life, which is more than I can say of all but my closest friend. He doesn't make me feel like an idiot when I'm thrilled about some minor success, or happy about some tiny little thing. He's happy for me and with me.

He doesn't just take care of my needs (though that's very important) but he once in a while adds something about my wants--things that are totally frivolous and I'm more than half-embarrassed to pray about them. (Given his track record, I should do more asking.)

He's patient with me, and he doesn't roll his eyes.

How could I NOT love someone like that? To the point of sheer idiocy. If he asks me to jump, I'll do it. If he asks me to bark like a dog, I'll do it. (Thank God he doesn't do that--how embarrassing.) More to the point, if he asks me to suffer, I'll do it.

He made it very clear long ago. If I was willing, he would give me (like any other Christian) a share of his work in the world, meeting the needs of lost and dying people. And he made it very clear that this would involve suffering. Quite a bit of it.

I'm just as chicken as anyone else. I didn't say "Yes" to him, I don't have the guts. I screwed up my eyes, hid my head under the blankets, and said, "You pick for me, Lord."

And so I have the life I have, and there's been a hell of a lot of crap in it. But I also have him. And I'm still an idiot in love with him, and I will still jump if he says so. I like making him happy. It makes me happy when he's happy.

Darn you, Marvin, for making me say all this.

--------------------
Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

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Live your life and enjoy it (if you can) and let God find you - He will. Be the younger brother; rebel and do all you've wanted to; park the guilt (if you can), shout out the anger and enjoy life. If God is there he will leave His other sheep and go search for you. And He will rejoice when one day he finds you and brings you back into the fold - and you will come willingly and joyfully. Only this time, you will come along laughing and in conversation with Christ. [/QB]

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That's what I want from Christ and never seem to quite find it at church.

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
And now I'm going to be very un-Lutheran and un-Germanic and make a fool of myself on the Internet.

[snip]

Darn you, Marvin, for making me say all this.

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Originally posted by Chorister:
When people start going on about how the Christian life isn't a joy, I wonder if it is actually something else in their lives which is currently making them miserable

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
All I could think when reading what [Lamb Chopped] wrote was "that must be nice". I've never had that, or felt that, or even really believed that.

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Gosh, Marvin, I'm so sorry.

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
I really can't help it if this is the way the Lord chose to deal with me.

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Originally posted by Chorister:
Meanwhile, the crappiest piece of advice I've ever seen was on a church banner:

If you put:
Jesus first
Others second
Yourself last,
you get JOY.

Is there anyone on this planet - or for that matter on Mars - who has ever tried this and found it works?!

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Originally posted by Chorister:
(and advice that if you think you are depressed, get thee to a physician)

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
There are plenty of things in my life that give me a certain amount of joy - cricket on the lawn, playing my guitars, watching the trains go by on a warm afternoon, the spark in my fiance's eye when she looks at me, and so on.

But it struck me that none of them are particularly related to being Christian, and furthermore it struck me that if I was ever seeking to find joy they would be the places I would go to, and not to (any) church. Nor even to God.

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And there was me just thinking that was normal.
Perhaps you've been brought up in a place which had too many expectations of Christianity.


The only difference is that I love singing in the choir - that gives me joy, and it is also something I can do in church as well.

Does playing your guitar give you joy in church as well as when you play it somewhere else? And if not, is there some way you could adjust your playing, or the situations in which you play, to make it so. It may not sound much, but perhaps it is a good place to start.

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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.

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Originally posted by Chorister:
Does playing your guitar give you joy in church as well as when you play it somewhere else?

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Originally posted by Yerevan:
It was sad how little joy she seemed to get out of her faith

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
It's come up in the "Deborah - Servant of God" thread as well now. Yerevan posted:

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Originally posted by Yerevan:
It was sad how little joy she seemed to get out of her faith

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It's this sort of quote that makes me want to scream. You mean there are people who get joy from their faith? Not from tertiary sources that are tangentially related to faith at best, but actually directly from their faith?

A lot of people on this thread seem to have been saying "that's not what faith does". Yet so many people say it is - Yerevan's quote is only one of the many, many places where faith and joy are shown as directly linked...

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Posted                       

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Originally posted by Chorister:

quote:

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
There are plenty of things in my life that give me a certain amount of joy - cricket on the lawn, playing my guitars, watching the trains go by on a warm afternoon, the spark in my fiance's eye when she looks at me, and so on.

But it struck me that none of them are particularly related to being Christian, and furthermore it struck me that if I was ever seeking to find joy they would be the places I would go to, and not to (any) church. Nor even to God.

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And there was me just thinking that was normal.
Perhaps you've been brought up in a place which had too many expectations of Christianity.

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
It's come up in the "Deborah - Servant of God" thread as well now. Yerevan posted:

quote:

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Originally posted by Yerevan:
It was sad how little joy she seemed to get out of her faith

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It's this sort of quote that makes me want to scream. You mean there are people who get joy from their faith? Not from tertiary sources that are tangentially related to faith at best, but actually directly from their faith?

A lot of people on this thread seem to have been saying "that's not what faith does". Yet so many people say it is - Yerevan's quote is only one of the many, many places where faith and joy are shown as directly linked...

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
You mean there are people who get joy from their faith? Not from tertiary sources that are tangentially related to faith at best, but actually directly from their faith?

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Originally posted by Chorister:
If you believe in a panentheistic approach to God then he is already in and through all the things you find joyful, not someplace else you have to go and find him. Is that what you mean, Qlib?

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Well, sort of. Though of course, that would mean you could find God anywhere, even in a church or meeting house.

If I was looking for a sense of God, I would probably walk up a hill, or by the sea, or by a stream or something. But, as any good Zen teacher will tell you, "chasing teh high" is not what it's about.

I actually think that you find Him best when you encounter another person in depth. As the Namasté prayer has it: the divine light in me honors the divine light in you.

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Tradition is the handing down of the flame, not the worship of the ashes Gustav Mahler.

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Originally posted by Golden Key:
Wonderful recounting of your experience, LC, and I'm glad you have that.

But lots of Christians never have anything like that. I think some of it is due to biochemistry, wiring, socialization, past experiences, etc. A person can be totally commited to Christ and never feel what you have felt. Some people feel it periodically, or maybe once in their lives. And sometimes, as Dave said, it's a matter of how you choose to relate to God.

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My husband had a sudden conversion experience. From then on, he lived with a sense of God being truly present in his life. He experienced no doubts and regularly experienced the pure joy of prayer. Funnily enough, I have many friends who have a similar experience of faith. It seems to me that God is alive inside them - they sort of 'shine' and regularly experience joy in their prayer and woraship. For 15 years I looked at them from afar with my purely 'head' faith - I couldn't feel anything at all. I put it down to the fact that I was a Myers Briggs 'T' and they were all 'F's. But over the 15 years I never stopped praying for what they had. And recently I had a similar experience of God's presence and joy - a long time coming but it was worth the wait. Philip Yancey was helpful during that long dry period, as was Brian McLaren's A New Kind Of Christian - which helped me gain a sense of joy from my intellectual Myers Briggs 'NT' vs 'NS' faith.

But what helped most of all was at one stage giving up. I decided that I was not going to be a Christian any longer - it was thankless, hard work (!). As I lived in the world as a non-Christian (a sort of intellectual stance I adopted) I felt an overwhelming sense of anomie and meaninglessness. I didn't get any pleasure from living like this - in fact it filled me with depression, despite having lived like this for the first 30 years of my life. It made me realise that although I had a rather dry and joyless faith, that faith was sustaining me in a way that I was hardly conscious of.

I like the quote from Romans:

'Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. 11Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 13Share with God's people who are in need. Practice hospitality.
14Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. 15Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. 16Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.[c] Do not be conceited.'

There is a self sacrificial element in this passage and yet there is the clear expectation of joy - a joy that comes from the hope of salvation, a joy that is rooted in faith.

It seems many on this thread are saying, that if you have a dry, even depressing faith, you should just accept it. I would suggest that we should expect joy and continue to pray for it until God answers our prayers. It is not naive to expect some elements of joy in our faith life, nor is it, as some suggest, merely associated with 'young' Christianity. My joy is associated with a freedom from worldly values, an ability to travel light, a rejection of the stupidity of striving for success, wealth, achievement, status and an ability to live in the moment and appreciate the simple things in life. All of this has grown out of my faith.

Maybe that is naive. But Christ told us that we had to become like children before we could enter the Kingdom. Children are full of joy, as well as sorrow. Most are also full of optimism -The Romans passage says joy comes from hope; its important not to resign oneself to an unsatisfying faith especially if, deep down, one knows one wants more.

sorry for long post

[ 13. March 2009, 09:00: Message edited by: Nia ]

Posted                       

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Originally posted by Marvin the Martian:
It's come up in the "Deborah - Servant of God" thread as well now. Yerevan posted:

quote:

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Originally posted by Yerevan:
It was sad how little joy she seemed to get out of her faith

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It's this sort of quote that makes me want to scream. You mean there are people who get joy from their faith? Not from tertiary sources that are tangentially related to faith at best, but actually directly from their faith?

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quote:

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A lot of people on this thread seem to have been saying "that's not what faith does". Yet so many people say it is - Yerevan's quote is only one of the many, many places where faith and joy are shown as directly linked...

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Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.

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Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Just wondering--is there some kind of correlation between huge amounts of suffering and the experience of joy? Because the people I know who seem to show this most are those who have been through hell, often on a regular basis.

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This is actually something that bothers me from time to time. Because I too have seen time and again how people who have expereinced real pain, been right at the end of their rope, now have what seems to be the most faithful, passionate, "alive" relationship with God.

It kind of scares me to think that maybe you have to go thrugh something completely horrendous before you can really appreciate God's love and have that kind of relationship with him.

That said, I've often been told by people who have heard me talk about my past that I actually have been through a lot of pain and struggle, the kind that traumatises most people. But that because I'm generally a happy, hopeful, optimistic person I'm just not as aware of it as I might be and I bounce back. Maybe that's God. Maybe it's just me being kind of numb.

Reading your (Lamb Chopped) post describing your love for God was very moving (it actually did move me to tears), but I have to confess it left me feeling rather inadequate. Because I have had moments of passion, praise and thanksgiving and an overwhelming desire to serve Christ no matter what, but it's nowhere near as intense or long-lasting as you describe.

It left me wondering if there's something wrong with me that I just don't feel that way about God, like maybe I'm missing something or doing something wrong. Because I think I'm generally a loving and emotional person, so why don't I feel that way about God? Surely I should, surely it's bad that I don't, given all He has done and continues to do for me.

So I tried talking to Him about it later and was somewhat reassured by what I believe I heard back. Being, in essence, that while I am indeed emotional and loving I'm also the quiet type. I think more than I speak (usually!) and keep a lot to myself, so I shouldn't worry or be surprised if my relationship with God is equally quiet and unassuming. The fact that I'm not overflowing with joy and love and passion doesn't mean that I don't love Him or that my faith isn't real.

Crisis of faith averted

[ 13. March 2009, 16:07: Message edited by: PrettyFly ]

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Screw today. I'm going for ice cream.

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Originally posted by Nia:

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Originally posted by Golden Key:
Wonderful recounting of your experience, LC, and I'm glad you have that.

But lots of Christians never have anything like that. I think some of it is due to biochemistry, wiring, socialization, past experiences, etc. A person can be totally commited to Christ and never feel what you have felt. Some people feel it periodically, or maybe once in their lives. And sometimes, as Dave said, it's a matter of how you choose to relate to God.

---

My husband had a sudden conversion experience. From then on, he lived with a sense of God being truly present in his life. He experienced no doubts and regularly experienced the pure joy of prayer. Funnily enough, I have many friends who have a similar experience of faith. It seems to me that God is alive inside them - they sort of 'shine' and regularly experience joy in their prayer and woraship. For 15 years I looked at them from afar with my purely 'head' faith - I couldn't feel anything at all. I put it down to the fact that I was a Myers Briggs 'T' and they were all 'F's. But over the 15 years I never stopped praying for what they had. And recently I had a similar experience of God's presence and joy - a long time coming but it was worth the wait. Philip Yancey was helpful during that long dry period, as was Brian McLaren's A New Kind Of Christian - which helped me gain a sense of joy from my intellectual Myers Briggs 'NT' vs 'NS' faith.

But what helped most of all was at one stage giving up. I decided that I was not going to be a Christian any longer - it was thankless, hard work (!). As I lived in the world as a non-Christian (a sort of intellectual stance I adopted) I felt an overwhelming sense of anomie and meaninglessness. I didn't get any pleasure from living like this - in fact it filled me with depression, despite having lived like this for the first 30 years of my life. It made me realise that although I had a rather dry and joyless faith, that faith was sustaining me in a way that I was hardly conscious of.

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