Give me joy in the waiting, give me patience in the suffering…give me hope in the morning….
JOY!
Christmas ornaments at my beloved Hobby Lobby…
You know, I feel like this is one of those words we see around Christmas time, glittering from a christmas ornament, or written on some wrapping paper…that we maul through to get to the “gifty” we’ve been waiting for inside…..yet somehow we easily breeze on over that tiny, little, word….
When was the last time you thought about that…the word JOY that is….or much less used it in a sentence…..?
Ha…for me, I can confess that it’s not a common word I throw into my daily verbiage..…unless it is needed……you know to persuade my husband to watch just one more episode of Shark Tank….at midnight, when sleep has been calling us for a long time, and we’ve already told each other we need to go to bed 4 times and neither one of us have moved….
“But Josh, it give me such JOY! I think I’ll sleep better knowing if the: no-dairy, no-soy, no-gluten, no-sugar ice cream really tastes good and they get a deal!” Then I try to smile real cute like a 3 year old, and tilt my head to the side hoping that angle makes me look somehow more persuasive….and then….the TV takes care of the rest, as it’s already rolling into the next episode…so hey…too much effort to turn off the TV now…..plus it gives me Joy;-)….
Who doesn’t love a good pour over?
But you know as I started to think about it, lots of things look like and give me JOY…but it’s the process of gratefulness that lets us truly experience joy.
Like a piping hot cup of coffee in the morning….with my furry Costco hiking-slippers (you guys, I have treads deeper than a Mac truck’s tires on these puppies)…
Or what about that moment when you hear a small child squeal in delight when they see one of their parents come home from work? Or when your spouse calls you up and asks you to put on a “pretty dress”….he’s got a surprise date planned for you!
Flowers from Josh before he took me on a surprise date.
Better yet, have you ever heard a 3 year old just randomly sing about something? Bam, they’re in a place of true…you guessed it - Joy! I mean lets be honest, have you ever tried to sing when you were sad? I have, and let me tell you it’s nearly impossible and really really pathetic.…I even tried singing the “Favorite Things” song from the “Sound of Music”…. “I simply remember my favorite things… AND then I don’t feel so bbbbaaaadddd!”(tears streaming down my face, yelling instead of singing, as if that would make it ‘work’). Nope….I was still sad….I laughed a little at my vein attempt…but still sad…
One of my favorite things……subway tie and Edison light bulbs
Favorite things! Leather jacket, copy-cat earrings I made to look like a Sundance Co. pair that were crazy expensive...& my tile.
Favorite thing - This winding road not far from home
How about that amazing feeling when you finish all the laundry, and dishes, and vacuuming, and dusting and the 4 course dinner you made is just waiting to be devoured on a perfectly set table with the wedding china you’ve only pulled out twice, and …. oh wait, I don’t know what that type of joy is...but it’s gotta be AMAZING and way up there on the most “joyful experiences” list;-)
Favorite - things?! Not even going to try to pretend that this isn’t the truth! Hahaha - I’m so basic:)
But what does Joy truly look like…and why did David have to throw in the whole reality-check of sadness when he wrote Psalm 30:5…..”weeping may last for a night, but Joy comes in the morning?”
From my own experiences in life I have found, that when it’s all hunky-dory and life is perfectly how I think-it-should-be, then….its just great, you’re happy but you don’t have that deeply rooted, 3-year-old-sing-about-anything type of joy….why? Because you haven’t known the other side of joy….which is sadness, weeping, sorrow….
But why, oh why, oh why, would we need to experience these things….and for that…I have no answer….ACCEPT that God is shaping us through the sadness and sorrow to that we may experience the JOY and happiness that comes from truly knowing what it is to be delivered and survive that long long night, because he’s there right with us in it…..
I have experienced the night…literally weeping…at night, in bed. But haven’t we all cried at night…..Ok, but this night it was more like yelling….but just once…on a very rainy, stormy night…yes, I yelled. Loud. I wanted God to know how mad I was at him…. Josh was next to me…and he didn’t even flinch…..and you know the strangest thing happened, the louder I yelled the more it thundered….as if I was having an anger match with God….and quickly I realized that, and with some coaxing from Josh I gave up…to cry myself to sleep next to my husband.
Joy - is being with the person you love - even in the hard times
But why such pain, such anger? We lost our long awaited, prayerfully requested, baby in June of this year. While I won’t go into the details about it, I will tell you that my “night of weeping” has lasted much longer than one night….and that first night when I yelled was the only time I yelled, but was first of many nights I have cried.
It’s different now, it’s me sitting at HIS feet, crying because I’m sad of the loss, the potential, the would-have been….but I’m not angry anymore. Through this I have a new value, a new joy (can you believe it?), and a new hope….because I know that this sorrow may last for a season, but God will bring about joy in his perfect way.
One of my favorite things - essential oil, no mistake they named it JOY!
That’s the beauty of Joy and Gratefulness - they’re besties. You can’t have one without the other. I will never feel such amazing joy as I will on the day we find out we’re pregnant…because I will be grateful that my time of sorrow and sadness is over - guys, I will have survived that night! I truly believe that day will come…but for now I must be patient in this time, a time of waiting, a time of “night”….and will turn to find JOY in other avenues, until God chooses to allow me to experience a joy that some may never know….because I have known pain and sorrow….and the night.
I got this basket when we found out we were pregnant...someday it’ll hold baby things...someday....
BE JOYFUL IN HOPE, PATIENT IN AFFLICTION AND FAITHFUL IN PRAYER.
ROMANS 12:12