(sermon #1 in the My Favorite Disciplines)
The Discipline of CELEBRATION
Nehemiah 8:10; Philippians 4:4; Psalm 118:24
CHCC: December 7, 2008
INTRODUCTION:
This fall some of our Pueblo groups studied a book called The Life You Always Wanted by John Ortberg. It’s a book about Spiritual Disciplines … which doesn’t exactly sound like the BOOK you always wanted. What comes to your mind when you think about Spiritual Disciplines? Prayer? Bible Reading? Getting up at four a.m. for hour-long devotions? Fasting?
Well, I thought I’d spend a sermon or two talking about Some of my favorite Disciplines. If you’ve looked at the Bulletin you know my favorite: the Discipline of CELEBRATION.
Maybe you never thought of CELEBRATION as a Discipline. I never did. But when I saw that the first chapter of that book was called The Discipline of Celebration, I thought, Hey, there’s a discipline I can do! You see, I’m an optimist by nature --- I’m always a glass-half-full kind of thinker and I’m always up for a celebration. But not everyone is that way. Some people are kind of “joy-impaired.” They have to work at it.
And even for us happy-go-lucky types, JOYfulness is a skill. That’s why God actually COMMANDED His people to Celebrate. When God set up rules and laws and traditions for the new Nation of Israel, He put a lot of emphasis on FEAST DAYS. Celebration was an important part of life for God’s people. C.S. Lewis put it this way: “Joy is the serious business of heaven.”
In Leviticus 23 we discover that God commanded His people to celebrate 7 different festivals each year. Four of the festivals were held in the spring (Passover, unleavened bread, Firstfruits, and Feast of weeks), then in the fall were the other 3 (Trumpets, Day of Atonement, and Tabernacles). All of these festivals had a historical significance, a religious significance, and, as we now know, a prophetic significance pointing to the time when Christ would fulfill all of them.
And, all of these Feasts involve some elements of fun and enjoyment, like getting together for lots of good food and music. God wanted these CELEBRATIONS to bond the nation together. And He wanted His people to experience great JOY on these Special Days.
1. SPECIAL DAYS
You may remember that earlier this fall we studied the book of Nehemiah. This book tells about the Jewish exiles who returned to Israel from Babylon after 70 years of captivity. After they built the walls of protection around Jerusalem, the first thing Nehemiah commanded was a special day of Celebration.
Nehemiah 8:10 And Nehemiah continued, “Go and celebrate with a feast of rich foods and sweet drinks, and share gifts of food with people who have nothing prepared. This is a sacred day before our Lord. Don’t be dejected and sad, for the joy of the LORD is your strength!” (NLT)
Doesn’t that sound fun? Rich foods, sweet drinks, and gifts! Kind of makes me think of a celebration we have coming up in 18 days. The Old Testament makes it clear that God values CELEBRATION. In fact, we probably don’t celebrate enough. I heard a comedian complain: How come the Jews get to have 7 celebrations? As far as I can see the Christians only get to have 3: Christmas, Easter, and the Daytona 500! (Larry the Cable Guy.)
The point is that God loves it when we celebrate. The way we celebrate Christmas is probably more like the Israelite feast days than any other celebration.
We tend to think we are only pleasing God in our solemn moments … we think God is pleased when we say the blessing before the meal but then he probably loses interest when we’re laughing and talking and enjoying the food. I have a feeling the opposite may be true. God takes great pleasure in riotous (yet wholesome) happiness.
JOY is at the heart of God’s plan for human beings. I suspect most of us seriously underestimate God’s interest in pleasure, laughter, fun, and all kinds of celebration. Think about a child on Christmas morning. Now there is GREAT JOY … excitement, anticipation, jumping up and down kind of JOY. GOD created that capacity for JOY. G.K. Chesterton said this: “It may be that He (God) has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.”
In the book we studied in our Pueblo group, John Ortberg suggested the idea of setting aside one day every week to celebrate. Here’s what he said: “One day a week devote a specific day to acts of celebration: eat foods you love, listen to music that moves your soul, play a sport that stretches and challenges you, read books that refresh your spirit, wear clothes that make you happy, surround yourself with beauty and give thanks to God for his wonderful goodness. Take time to experience and savor joy, then direct your heart to God so that you come to know He is the giver of every good and perfect gift.”
Susan and I are always looking for any excuse to “celebrate.” Tuesday she had a doctor’s appointment, so we made an occasion of it and went out to celebrate the good report.
Years back my wife reminded me “Tomorrow will be trash day.” I responded to her, “Well, that makes this trash eve. What can we do to celebrate?” You see, if we work it right anything can be an excuse to celebrate, even trash day.
Even more than setting aside one day a week for celebration, try this discipline: set aside one hour a day for JOY. God commands us to make CELEBRATION a way of life: Dietrich Bonhoeffer was imprisoned and eventually executed for speaking out against Hitler in the 1940’s. He wrote that his meals in prison made an opportunity to exercise the discipline of joy. “God cannot endure that unfestive, mirthless attitude of ours in which we eat our bread in sorrow, with pretentious, busy haste, or even with shame. Through our daily meals He is calling us to rejoice, to keep holiday in the midst of our working day.” Even in prison, he understood that celebration is a discipline – it’s not optional. God commands us to have JOY every day.
2. EVERY DAY
Another man who was in prison wrote these words in Philippians 4:4: "Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!"
Jesus told his apostles that his aim was that they should be filled with joy, but not just any kind of joy. John 15:11: “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”
The problem with people, according to Jesus is not that we are too happy for God’s taste, but that we are not happy enough. Lewis Smedes wrote, “To miss out on joy is to miss out on the reason for your existence.”
Joy is a command and that means that joylessness is a serious sin. Maybe you never thought about it that way, but that means there are a lot of Christian people who are sinning all the time. I’m glad it’s not true here at CHCC, but I’ve walked into a lot of churches where every face you see looks sour!
You have to wonder how much damage the sin of joylessness has caused in God’s church. How often have people misunderstood God because the Christians they know are all grim, judgmental, defensive, bitter, and miserable?
As Christians we have every reason for JOY, no matter what is going on in our lives. So what is it that steals our JOY? I’ve noticed in my own situation that my biggest joy stealers are hurry and worry. In my world, they tend to be twins and they often arrive together. In fact, I’ve noticed that worry makes me hurry and hurry makes me worry, especially when I’m driving. And I know I’m not the only one with that dilemma.
The other day I was almost creamed by another hurry/worry addict. I entered Dezavala Rd. off my street turning right at the light. I had plenty of room between me and the car coming at me from the east-bound lane of Dezavala. But I didn’t realize they were traveling over 70 mph and I was dawdling at a mere 30. And I guess the other driver was concentrating on something besides the road ahead, when all of a sudden he realized I was in front of him going half his speed. He hit his breaks and slid all over the road barely missing me, then he threw up his arms in a gesture indicating something about my idiocy for taking up a lane of highway in front of him. I thought to myself, “Well, Bozo, you weren’t watching the road were you.” I could easily see the fault in the other driver, but it’s not so easy when the fault is all the hurry/worry coming out in my own driving.
I can recall a memorable moment many years ago when Susan and I were taking Kimberly, age 2, and her slightly younger cousin, Able, to church in the car. Kimberly was in a foul humor that morning, but her smily faced cousin decided it was time for a word of exhortation. Though he could berely talk, he looked her in the face and said happily, “Rejoice Kimmy!” We didn’t think Able even knew that word, but he certainly knew the context in which to use it. Since that time, we’ve often used Able’s exhortation when ever we see Kimberly’s mood begin to deflate.
3. TODAY
Psalm 118:24 Exhorts us, “This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”
Most of us tend to think that happiness is just around the corner. JOY will come one of these days … when things get better … when we finally get out of school … or get a better job … or get married … or get our kids raised and out of the house … or after we get that surgery over with … or maybe when we finally win the lottery. We live with the allusion that joy will come someday when conditions change. But the truth is that if we are going to know joy it will be today.
Here’s how John Ortberg put it: “I tend to divide my minutes into two categories: living and waiting to live. Most of my life is spent in transit: trying to get somewhere, waiting to begin, driving someplace, standing in line, waiting for a meeting to end, trying to get a task completed, worrying about something bad that might happen, or being angry about something that did happen. These are all moments when I am not likely to be fully present, not to be aware of the voice and purpose of God.” (P.60)
JOY is a command, and it takes the DISCIPLINE of CELEBRATION to build JOY into our lives. Just like you can have a habit of hurrying or of worrying … you can develop a habit of CELEBRATING the goodness of God every day! So rejoice Kimmy! Or who ever you are.
We’re taking advantage of an opportunity to CELEBRATE today.
This is mortgage shredding Sunday. This will be the first month we won’t have a $4,000 payment to make to the bank for a loan on our worship center. I believe we can get happy about that. Next year we can spend $48K on other things besides mortgage debt. Rejoice People! Hang around at the end of the service and that is exactly what we will do together with our Spanish Speaking brethren, children and teen agers. Let us praise the Lord together for what he has done to enable us to work together to become debt free.
Our congregation has many challenges ahead, but it’s important for us to set aside time for CELEBRATION, when we can REJOICE before the Lord in THIS moment, TODAY!
CONCLUSION
Some of you completely understand the idea that CELEBRATION is a discipline. You don’t FEEL like celebrating because you are going through a time of trial and suffering. To a Christian JOY does not come from mere “positive thinking.” We have reason for confidence and JOY even in the middle of suffering. In fact, it is often the very people closest to suffering who have the most powerful joy.
That’s because true joy, comes only to those who have devoted their lives to something greater than personal happiness. One test of Joy is its compatibility with pain – joy in spite of something. Karl Barth called Joy a “defiant nevertheless” set against bitterness and resentment. If we don’t rejoice today we will never rejoice at all.
