If you’ve seen the movies Inside Out and Inside Out 2 (if you haven’t, go for it, you’ll be glad you did — but be ready for tears!), you already know the importance of one of its central characters: Joy.
In these films the emotions of 11- and then 13-year-old Riley Andersen are personified as gathered around the control panel of her sense of self. In the first movie Joy is joined by Sadness, Fear, Disgust and Anger and they learn to work together to keep Riley healthy and moving forward. Then later Envy, Embarrassment and Ennui crash the party, along with Anxiety, who brings a lot of baggage. Joy faces a new set of challenges, and lots of valuable lessons are learned.
A main one is this: Riley can’t afford to lose Joy.
Neither can we.
The Bible talks a lot about joy. (The noun joy and the verb rejoice are used 136 times in the New Testament alone.)
Now we may wonder if this is just more of that uber-positive, “best life now,” hot air that Christians are known for spouting. It’s not, and such joy doesn’t negate sadness. There are things that can and will grieve us, breaking our hearts.
Sometimes we’re scared of the future or angry with God or confused by our circumstances or simply exhausted. But somewhere in there can also be a spark of joy as by faith we feel God near us.
That’s because this joy the Bible is describing is based on one thing: our salvation.
“With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation,” the prophet Isaiah once wrote (Isaiah 12:3). This joy of salvation was referred to by King David when he prayed, “Restore to me the joy of your salvation…” (Psalm 51:12).
This joy is the effervescent realization that our sins have been washed away and we’ve been made clean, that we are right with God, our future is bright, our home is heaven, and that really, we’ve nothing to fear, nothing to dread. That we’re set for life (eternal life!) because we have a benefactor, the crucified and risen Son of God and Savior of the world.
This “well of salvation” is one we can keep returning to every day, in many moments throughout the day, in our own minds and hearts. Each time we do, we can drink in joy.
G.K. Chesterton said, “Joy is the gigantic secret of the Christian. … It is easy to be heavy: hard to be light.”
Walking through life in this world will weigh us down; this is a fact. We become heavy with worries and wounds, like so many barnacles we accumulate along the way. It is a miracle of God what we can shake them loose and cast them off. Joy in His salvation makes that possible.
C.S. Lewis once observed, “Joy is the serious business of heaven.” I love that. It’s only as we take our faith seriously that we discover how brimming with joy it really is.
Dr. Rob McCord is senior minister of Outlook Christian Church in McCordsville. This weekly column is written by local clergy members.
