Restoring Gladness Newsletter

Scripture

¹⁴ Sing aloud, O daughter of Zion;
    shout, O Israel!
Rejoice and exult with all your heart,
    O daughter of Jerusalem!
¹⁵ The Lord has taken away the judgments against you;
    he has cleared away your enemies.
The King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst;
    you shall never again fear evil.
¹⁶ On that day it shall be said to Jerusalem:
“Fear not, O Zion;
    let not your hands grow weak.
¹⁷ The Lord your God is in your midst,
    a mighty one who will save;
he will rejoice over you with gladness;
    he will quiet you by his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing.
¹⁸ I will gather those of you who mourn for the festival,
    so that you will no longer suffer reproach.
¹⁹ Behold, at that time I will deal
    with all your oppressors.
And I will save the lame
    and gather the outcast,
and I will change their shame into praise
    and renown in all the earth.
²⁰ At that time I will bring you in,
    at the time when I gather you together;
for I will make you renowned and praised
    among all the peoples of the earth,
when I restore your fortunes
    before your eyes,” says the Lord.
Zephaniah 3:14-20



Prayer

Lord God, you have taken away the judgments against us and dwell among us. Deliver us from living as outcasts in shame and fear. Give us ears to hear the song of delight that you sing over us. Open our hearts to rejoice and exult unreservedly in your love and grace. We ask this through Jesus, our Lord, whose Cross makes it possible. Amen.

Reflection

What an amazing passage! Zephaniah looks towards a day when the Lord will have taken away the judgments against us and cleared away our enemies (which Jesus did on the Cross – see Colossians 1:21-23; 26-15). Reconciliation and redemption make room for us in God’s presence, quiet us in His love, and allow our shame to be changed into renown.

Because of His gracious work on our behalf, He is in our midst, enthusiastically in our midst! He rejoices over us with gladness and exults over us with loud singing. The most consistent image in Scripture of the fulfillment of salvation is a party. Zephaniah sees the Lord throwing a party over us because His love for us refuses constraint. It’s loud singing!

Just as giggling babies make us smile, and hopscotch courts on a sidewalk make us hop through them, God’s raucous delight in us compellingly invites our own singing, rejoicing, and exulting. We must join the party, even though we are quite an odd lot (oppressed, lame, outcast, ashamed, weak, afraid). But in God’s delight all our spots, wrinkles, and blemishes (Ephesians 5:27) are transformed into splendor.

One day the party will be our whole reality. Today, however, we are invited to listen for the Lord’s song of exultation and to join in the singing with gladness.

Scripture

"For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit" (Romans14:17)



Prayer

Sovereign Lord, our lives are dissonant, filled with pain, anxiety, confusion, betrayal abandonment, weariness. But we know that you oversaw our past and that you welcome us into the future. In the present, then, we choose your kingdom's righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. We choose hope that expresses trust in you, a hope grounded in believing your word and experiencing your love. Amid the dissonance of the world, the flesh, and the devil, we sing a song of joy. Even as we groan with all creation, we rejoice. Even as we weep, we await the day when you will wipe away every tear. In the darkest moments, we hope.

Reflection

If we imagine creation flowing from song (as Tolkien does in The Silmarillion), then we can imagine our earthly lives as songs with infinitely complex harmonies that weave together gladness and sorrow, delight and pain, thankfulness and longing, trust and doubt, peace and anxiety, righteousness and rebellion, love and self-absorption. But, for those of us in Christ, the song of our lives must always have joy as the melody and hope as the tonic chord* (see Romans 5:2,3). Our hope now, however, points towards a time of deeper resolution in the love of the Father when every tear will be wiped away and we will experience fullness of joy in His presence and pleasures forevermore at His right hand (Psalm 16:11). The tonic chord of heaven is God’s love.

I wonder if our heavenly song will still be infinitely complex. But, in that heavenly song, it will be our scars (like Jesus’) that form the dissonance that makes the tonic chord so satisfying. I wonder, too, if our most wonderful moments of intimacy and joy and wonder, our greatest earthly delight, will also be revealed to be mere shadows of heavenly joy, pointers towards God’s infinite love.

If that is so, then a focus on eating and drinking, as Paul says, misses the point. Something more luminous and simultaneously more solid, the kingdom of God, awaits us and draws us and is available to us. A kingdom characterized by righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit; righteousness in Christ based upon His work on the cross (Romans 3:21-25) that leads to peace with God (Romans 5:1) and bubbles out, explodes, effervesces, radiates, or manifests in a thousand ways as joy in the Holy Spirit.

Satan enjoys nothing more than introducing dissonance into the songs of our lives. Jesus, however, weaves every one of those notes into a complex harmony with joy always as the melody and hope as the tonic chord that brings resolution.

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*For those of you who didn’t get a C+ in Dr. Kastner’s Music Appreciation course in 1976 and don’t really want to Google it, the tonic chord brings a sense of resolution in a musical phrase, a sense of “coming home.” To feel the impact of the tonic chord, hum this in your head (or out loud for all to hear), “Twinkle, twinkle little….” Without the “star” (tonic) note we are left hanging, waiting for resolution. Without “coming home” to hope our hearts are unresolved.

Scripture

¹O God, you are my God; earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you; my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. ²So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. ³Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you.

⁴So, I will bless you as long as I live; in your name I will lift up my hands. ⁵My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips, ⁶when I remember you upon my bed, and meditate on you in the watches of the night; ⁷for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. ⁸My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me.

Psalm 63:1-8



Prayers

“O God, you have prepared for those who love you such good things as surpass our understanding: Pour into our hearts such love towards you, that we, loving you in all things and above all things, may obtain your promises, which exceed all that we can desire; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.”

Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 613.

“O God whose power and glory is mediated to your children through your steadfast love, give us grace to meditate on you in the watches of the night when our souls thirst and our flesh faints for you. As we remember you on our beds, let us be so satisfied in your presence that our mouths are filled with joyful praise. All this we ask through Jesus who promised that anything we ask in his name would be given to us. Amen.”

Reflection

10 years ago, Gordon, our four-month-old grandson, died. For seven months I spent the watches of the night trying to understand, trying to let go, trying to sleep, trying to breathe, and trying to hold on to God. Over and over, I recited David’s words, “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit” (Psalm 32:18).
In Psalm 63, the “watches of the night” lead David to such a profound encounter with God that joyful praise spontaneously erupts from deep in his heart. But let’s not miss the fact that David is up in the night because of an intense longing for God. He is dying of spiritual thirst and fainting for God. The spring of his effervescent joy bubbles out of the hard ground of sleepless longing.
After eight months of broken-heartedness, I sensed the Lord prompting me (while I was mowing the grass one morning in May) to visit Gordon’s grave, something I hadn’t done since his burial. Sitting by his grave, I wept. After that, I started seeing a counselor – and sleeping through the night. The Lord had been faithful to his promise to save “the crushed in spirit.”
All of us have seasons when we experience the watches of the night, when we desperately thirst for God, when our hearts are broken and our spirits crushed. None of us walks through life unscathed, especially leaders. But even in the night we remember God on our beds and meditate on Him. We breathe. We beg. We hold on. And all while we believe that He will meet us and that we will once again find joy and gladness.

Scripture

“May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope” (Romans 15:14).

“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:3,4).



Prayers

O God of the living, your Son our Savior after his crucifixion descended to the place of the dead: Look with kindness on all of us who wait in hope for liberation from the corruption of sin and death and give us a share in the glory of the children of God; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord. Amen.”

Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 578

O God, who by the glorious resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light: Grant that we, who have been raised with him, may abide in his presence and rejoice in the hope of eternal glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory, now and forever. Amen.”

Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 610.

Reflection

10 years ago, Gordon, our four-month-old grandson, died. For seven months I spent the watches of the night trying to understand, trying to let go, trying to sleep, trying to breathe, and trying to hold on to God. Over and over, I recited David’s words, “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit” (Psalm 32:18).

In Psalm 63, the “watches of the night” lead David to such a profound encounter with God that joyful praise spontaneously erupts from deep in his heart. But let’s not miss the fact that David is up in the night because of an intense longing for God. He is dying of spiritual thirst and fainting for God. The spring of his effervescent joy bubbles out of the hard ground of sleepless longing.

After eight months of broken-heartedness, I sensed the Lord prompting me (while I was mowing the grass one morning in May) to visit Gordon’s grave, something I hadn’t done since his burial. Sitting by his grave, I wept.  After that, I started seeing a counselor – and sleeping through the night. The Lord had been faithful to his promise to save “the crushed in spirit.”

All of us have seasons when we experience the watches of the night, when we desperately thirst for God, when our hearts are broken and our spirits crushed. None of us walks through life unscathed, especially leaders. But even in the night we remember God on our beds and meditate on Him. We breathe. We beg. We hold on. And all while we believe that He will meet us and that we will once again find joy and gladness.

Scripture
“Make your face shine on your servant; save me in your steadfast love” (Psalm 31:16).

“The Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace” (Numbers 6:24-26).

“They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads” (Revelation 22:4).



Prayers
“O God, of your goodness, give me yourself, for you are enough for me. I can ask for nothing less that is completely to your honor, and if I do ask anything less, I shall always be in want. Only in you I have all. Amen.” Julian of Norwich

Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 673

“Thanks be to thee, my Lord Jesus Christ, for all the pains and insults thou hast borne for me, and all the benefits thou hast given me. O most merciful redeemer, Friend, and Brother: Grant that I may see thee more clearly, love thee more dearly, and follow thee more nearly, day by day. Amen.” Richard of Chichester.

Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 672.

Reflection

As David wrote Psalm 31, he was experiencing a season, as he describes it, of affliction, distress, grief, sorrow, iniquity, reproach, isolation, strife, and persecution. Most of us have been in (or are in) a similar season. We can feel hopeless in these seasons. But David wants to find hope amid dire circumstances in the loving presence of God. He prays that God’s face would “shine on” him.

This image of God’s face shining on His people hearkens back to the blessing that the Lord commanded Aaron to pronounce over Israel (see Numbers 6:24-26). It seems likely that the priestly blessing, recited at the conclusion of the morning and evening sacrifice (according to tradition), was in David’s mind. “The Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you.” David wants to see the practical fulfillment of this blessing in his life. So do we!

Adding to the foundation of our hope is John’s vision of the fulfillment of God’s plan in the Book of Revelation. At one point, John hears a loud voice announcing, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself with be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Revelation 21:3,4). Later John says that the Lord’s servants will worship him and “see his face” (22:4). Someday all will be set right.

While John’s vision is our “someday” hope, we also have a “right now” promise. Before he ascended into heaven, Jesus promised to be with us “to the end of the age” (i.e., until the “someday” hope is fulfilled). So, we can borrow joy from the future because Jesus is with us now.

While we desperately want to hope, however, our tendency in hard seasons (especially if they    include iniquity) is to avoid God’s presence, like Adam and Eve in the Garden. We forego our prayer time. Instead, what we need most is to “with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Hebrews 5:16). We need to seek God’s face; to pray, like David, that God’s face would shine on us.

Scripture
“Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer” (Romans 12:12).



Prayers
“O God, who by the glorious resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ destroyed death and brought life and immortality to light: Grant that we, who have been raised with him, may abide in his presence and rejoice in the hope of eternal glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory, now and for ever. Amen.”
Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 610

Lord Jesus, the turbulence of our lives tempts us to hopelessness. Give us grace to be constant in prayer so that we can be patient, hopeful, and joyful. As we pray, assure us of the Father’s love, fill us with the Holy Spirit, and transform us through your work on the cross. We pray this in your name. Amen.

Reflection
Emotions often confuse me. I expect them to function like arithmetic, or maybe algebra, with limited variables, simple rules, and clear outcomes. If my life is going well, then I should feel joy. Not getting what I expected or hoped for equates to disappointment. Losing someone or something to which I had deep attachment produces grief and sadness.

But emotions operate in some mysterious form of advanced calculus. Variables collide, or dance, or run around like dogs with the “zoomies.” Paul tells us to rejoice in hope…while we are being patient with intensely challenging circumstances…by staying constant in prayer. Challenging circumstances don’t cancel out joy. They create a context in which joy looks through and beyond them in hope (based on faith in the God with whom we are having regular conversations).

Our lives are filled with all sorts of variables: challenges, disappointments, conflict, confusion, weariness, and so much more. But from a faith in a sovereign, loving God that is nurtured by prayer (private and corporate) springs up hope (a confidence in a future that is in God’s hands) which gives us the audacity to rejoice; to sing hymns in a Roman jail like Paul and Silas, to declare the gospel while being burned at the stake like Polycarp, to see fleas as a gift from God in a Nazi prison camp like Corrie ten Boom.

What are you facing that robs your joy and tempts you to despair? How can you put that into the hands of the Creator of the universe who loves and delights in you and who knows your need? Where and when can you next meet with Him who is seated on the throne of grace?

Joy is a gift that springs from a hope planted in our trust in a trustworthy God; and it’s a command. So, let’s choose joy today.

Scripture
“Sing praises to the Lord, O you saints, and give thanks to his holy name. For his anger is but for a moment and his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.”
(Psalm 30: 4,5).

Prayer
“Go before us, O Lord, in all our doings with your most gracious favor, and further us with your continual help; that in all our works begun, continued and ended in you, we may glorify your holy Name and finally, through your mercy, obtain everlasting life; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”
Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 669.

“Almighty and eternal God, so draw our hearts to you, so guide our minds, so fill our imaginations, so control our wills, that we may be wholly yours, utterly dedicated to you; and then use us , we pray, as you will, and always to your glory and the welfare of your people; through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.”
Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 668.

Reflection
“Joy comes with the morning!” What a lovely thought!

Amid all our praises sung to the Lord, we come to realize the need we have to continue to trust in Him. We give thanks for the Lord’s care for us and for those we love. We delight in his joy for us as it pours into our minds and hearts like a waterfall. We glory in the Lord and in his care for us.

Some of us, however, may be in a place in our lives where it would be helpful to find a “Joy Friend,” a person who can walk alongside of us until we get to the place of singing a new song to the Lord.

I have been in situations where I needed a “Joy friend” as well. My friend carried my joy, so to speak, while the Lord was doing a hard work in my life. It was very powerful to have that kind of friend who I knew was praying and caring for me. And, oh the delight in being asked to help someone else along their journey towards Joy.

I am grateful that the Lord goes before us and helps us continuously, even though we may need others to tend to us, from time to time.

We glorify your name, Lord Jesus. We are grateful for your continual help and tending of us. How wonderful to know that Joy does come with the morning!

May the Lord bless and keep us, each one.

Scripture

“One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.”

Psalm 27:4

Prayer
“O God, grant that I may seek you, and seeking you find you, and finding you be satisfied in you forever. Amen.” Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 668.

__________

“O God, we want your beauty, beyond our comprehending, to be our deepest desire. But we confess that our desires are unruly and incoherent. By the power of your in-dwelling Spirit, please shepherd all of our desires into the one true desire, to dwell in your presence all the days of our lives to gaze upon your beauty.”

Reflection
We have all been captivated by beauty at some point; in a painting, in a sunset, in music that evokes emotion, in the smoothness of a piece of pottery, or in wonderfully aromatic food. We want to linger and absorb all the beauty before us. So, we can understand David’s focused and deep desire (“one thing...will I seek after”) to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord.

But what is beauty? Beauty invites and then defies explanation. Every appeal to ideas (such us symmetry, colors, shapes, movement, invoked memories, etc.) ends with, “Well, yeah, that’s part of it, I guess.” And, if defining beauty stumps us, how are we to think of the beauty of the Lord?

When David speaks of the beauty of the Lord, He is speaking more poetically than theologically. He is less picturing a Bible study than imagining being transfixed by the Lord’s presence, enthralled in joy, awe, and wonder.

Let’s join David in desiring the one thing that he asked for and sought wholeheartedly, to dwell in the house of the Lord in order to gaze upon His beauty. Let’s allow the truth of God’s Word, the glory of His creation, the power of His gospel, and the indwelling of His Spirit to lead us into the beauty of His presence.

Scripture
“Count it all joy, my brothers and sisters, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

James 1:2-4

Prayer
"Sovereign, Good, and Faithful Lord, we groan because we believe that our painful circumstances somehow reveal those three of your attributes. We cry out, “How long, O Lord?”

We also offer to you our deepest heart longings (to be loved, to be wanted, to know who we are, to belong, to matter, to make a difference, etc.).

Finally, we choose hope because we have seen your faithfulness and we trust your promises. We choose to rejoice in our trials because we believe that you are sovereign, good, and faithful.

We offer our prayer to you in the name of Jesus, our Mediator, and in the power of the Spirit, our Intercessor. Amen.

Reflection
Unlike “losing” our keys or glasses, losing joy in ministry usually happens because of “trials of various kinds” (trials coming from outside the Church, from inside the Church, and from within our own hearts). These are the trials that are leaving pastors weary and discouraged. James tells us to “count it all joy,” like Peter and the apostles in Acts 5, when we encounter these trials.

In our experience, though, the path to joy amid trials goes through groaning. Paul points out in Romans 8 that creation groans, we groan, and the Spirit groans because of the effects of the Fall. Groaning itself is a form of prayer; a part of the process of lament.

Psalm 13 provides a good template for lament. In verses 1 and 2 David groans under the burden of feeling ignored or forgotten by the Lord. The “trials of various kinds” that James alludes to usually stir in us groaning before we discover joy. Like David we cry out, “How long, O Lord?”

In Psalm 13:3,4 David prays the desire of his heart, a desire that goes deeper than mere relief of the trial. To move from groaning to joy, we likewise need to lay our deepest desires on the altar before the Lord.

By the end of Psalm 13 (verses 5 and 6), David chooses hope and praise; in a word, joy. His joy is based on His experience of the Lord’s faithfulness in the past and on His promises for the future. For James the promise is that our trials will make us “perfect and complete.”

In the midst of “various trials” we can discover joy by walking David’s path of lament. We groan. We pray. We choose praise and hope. We rejoice (long before the circumstances change!). Rather than trying to skip straight to a false joy based on suppressing our actual pain, we start with groaning, which Paul tells us is actually the language the Spirit uses when He intercedes for us (Romans 8:26).

Scripture
“You make known to me the path of life;
in your presence there is fullness of joy;
at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”
 Psalm 16:11

Prayers
“O Lord, we stumble about grasping for joy, careening from one pleasure to the next, finding only fleeting satisfaction. Give us grace to know that all true joy is found in you, to desire that true joy, and then to orient our lives to you; through Christ our Lord. Amen.”

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“O God, the light of the minds that know you, the life of the souls that love you, and the strength of the wills that serve you: Help us so to know you that we may truly love you, and so to love you that we may fully serve you, whom to serve is perfect freedom; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

Book of Common Prayer 2019, p. 668

Reflection
When raising children, it can seem like 20-80% of one’s day is spent finding lost items: shoes, cups, coats, socks, books, papers, tablets...anything and everything. After the tragedy of the lost treasure is announced (because every lost item is always, by definition, “my favorite!”) the parental mantra is, “Where did you last have it?”

That question is a great starting point for pastors and lay leaders who have lost their joy in ministry. “Where did you last have it?” To remember a time of joy, many of us would need to go back before COVID-19 threw our worlds into turmoil.

When you do remember a time when you were serving the Lord with gladness, where did the joy come from? Quite likely, your joy bubbled up from some blend of satisfying accomplishments, supportive relationships, a clear purpose, and consistent prayer times. If you are looking for lost joy, starting with those four sources is wise. The most critical one is time with the Lord because, when the other three wells of joy dry up, there is fullness of joy in the Lord’s presence.

Before you toss this aside as an admonition from a person standing on the beach to someone caught in a rip current to “swim harder,” let me assure you that praying harder (at least in my experience) rarely increases joy. Guilt, shame, frustration, yes., rarely joy. Instead, I’m inviting you to rediscover the presence of the Lord. You may encounter the Lord on your knees at set times of formal prayer (which the Church from the beginning has declared important). But you might also experience His presence while walking, or conversing with a friend, or reading, or painting, or bird watching, or lying in a hammock.

We will pick up this theme in the next newsletter. But, for now, it is important to note that until the fulness of the kingdom comes, while we experience joy in the Lord’s presence, we also experience groaning. Stay tuned!