A few years back, Catherine bought me a T-shirt that says, “In a world of Grinches, be a Griswold!”
I love Christmas. I am a Griswold. I go all out with decorations, both outside and inside. I just put up nine trees in the house. Themed. There are wreaths and garlands and snow globes and lights. Lots and lots of lights.
And it all brings me such joy, such absolute, extravagant joy!
Susan Shaw
Too often, we don’t center joy in Christian living. We focus on sin and repentance and all that’s wrong with the world, and pretty soon living a Christian life seems more drudgery and obligation than sheer joy.
What if the point of it all — God’s exuberant creation, incarnation, resurrection, redemption — is simply joy? Why is it so hard for us to believe God created us for joy — both God’s enjoyment and our own?
Process theology says this is the point. Joy — being fully present, fully attentive, embodied and transcendent, loving, feeling, embracing the moment, being self-consciously alive — is the point. Whatever gets in the way of joy is sin and evil.
Now this joy is not hedonism; it’s not hoarding or selfishness because our joy cannot come at the expense of the joy of others; that would be sinful because we would prevent another’s joy.
Rather, it is a complex joy, a joy that simultaneously can hold both gratitude and wonder, love and ecstasy in mind along with sorrow and pain, injustice and loss.
And it’s not a joy about having or possessing. It’s a joy that comes with being so deeply involved in the present moment that we forget ourselves, lose our self-consciousness and simply experience the wonder of everything around us, every person, every gift, every atom of the universe.
This kind of joy is both a gift and a discipline. Sometimes it comes upon us when we are not expecting it at all — in the embrace of a loved one, the light shining through the kitchen window, the pitch-perfect harmonies of two voices in a song.
But it’s also a joy we learn to discover within our everyday moments by our directed attention to even the smallest of objects, sensations and emotions in our path at each moment.
“This kind of a joy requires practice.”
This kind of a joy requires practice. We have to teach ourselves to look for it until our looking becomes habituated. For example, have you ever marveled at your hand? At how it works? At what it can do? At the fact that every single subatomic particle in your hand has existed from the time of the Big Bang, has been many other things (perhaps a star, perhaps a meteor, perhaps a wild herb), and will continue to exist forever, even after your body returns to the dust? Doesn’t that make you want to shout “hallelujah” out into the universe?
Or have you ever stood marveling at the beauty of a sunset over the ocean (or sunrise if you’re on the East Coast) or a shooting star on a crystal-clear night or the light dancing on a stream bubbling over stones? Have you been filled with wonder at the fact that the world is such that light comes into your eye, your brain can perceive it as beauty, and your whole being can be filled with emotion at what you perceive?
Practicing joy asks us to be mindful to look for these things. When you eat, stop and notice the colors, smells, textures of your food. Savor the taste. Remember with gratitude all the people who were involved in getting that food to your table.
Do the things you love most with purpose, looking for joy. Sit in a darkened movie theater with a bucket of popcorn and a large soda and pay attention to the fact that you’re sitting there, eating movie popcorn, drinking a cold soda, watching a movie on the big screen. Marvel that we can capture scenes on film. That we can project those images on a screen. That people can act so effectively. That digital artists can create computer-generated images. That we can forget ourselves for a couple of hours and willingly set aside our disbelief to immerse ourselves in a story that makes us laugh or cry or feel triumphant.
We can spend four days hanging outside lights and another four days decorating indoor trees, lovingly unpacking every ornament that has its own history, hanging them in just the right place, and then sitting back to take it all in.
“We can realize that all those experiences of joy are experiences of God.”
We can realize that all those experiences of joy are experiences of God. God is present in our joy. God enjoys our joy. God comes to us in our joy, whether in a baby in a manger or a lighted star on top of a tree or a bucket of movie popcorn. God desires joy for us, in the here and now.
Of course, there are also suffering and injustice, and we hold those in our present moment as well, and our joy compels us to remove as much suffering and injustice from the world as we can. This is how we work with God to bring in God’s community.
We sing it this time of the year: “Joy to the world! The Lord is come.” But can we live it? Can we live in the joy that God is with us, in the smallest particle of the universe, in a baby in a manager, in our being and living?
Isn’t it enough to send us all shouting “hallelujah” for the rest of our days? Joy to the world! And as Three Dog Night reminded us, “Joy to you and me.”
Susan M. Shaw is professor of women, gender and sexuality studies at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Ore. She also is an ordained Baptist minister and holds master’s and doctoral degrees from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Her most recent book is Intersectional Theology: An Introductory Guide, co-authored with Grace Ji-Sun Kim.
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