Summer 2020 Sermon Series: Mourning Into Dancing

Photo & Design by Caitlin Normore

“Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice.” Ps. 51:8

For the summer months of July and August, we’re inviting our congregation to a 60 day long experiment in joy. We’ve had many losses and deep griefs in these past months - and we will continue to experience those. There are many reasons for sadness and despair. However, we also participate in God’s Kingdom, of which the hallmark is joy. So how do we experience joy while in the middle of a pandemic? In the midst of persistent racial injustice? What right do we have to joy in a world bent over with sorrow? How dare we enjoy mirth and delight in the face of scandalous misery and injustice?

We choose joy. Scripture is heavy with calls to joy - and to do so always. But surely you can’t be joyful all the time? Why not? (God calls us to love always but we don’t argue about that). If scripture calls us to do so, it must be within our reach to do so. And joy must also then be perfectly compatible with the sadness of our world.

As Wendell Berry notes, “be joyful, even though we’ve considered all the facts.”

We also invite you to pray over this coming exploration of joy through the liturgy below, from Church of the City New York.

A liturgy for those who have not belly laughed lately

O Christ, you have called us not servants but friends,

and is there any true friendship in which laughter is not the glue that binds?

Much has been made of your reputation as a man of sorrows,

acquainted with grief,

but perhaps you are a God who rises from the grave

and eats breakfast on the shore with friends,

your love-scarred side splitting with divine laughter,

sharing your joy.

We confess that we have not obeyed the command

to be joyful always,

and have forgotten that you exhort us

to become like little children,

careless in the care of you.

But like Sarah, we only laugh in our

barrenness

and the cavern of disbelief.

We acknowledge the ever-widening gulf inside us—

the stew of sin

and sorrow

and loneliness,

the pulse of Eden growing faint in our veins.

In the face of all that threatens,

we ask for the impossible:

the loudest, fullest,

belly-deep laugh,

a gift from our scandalously playful Father.

O Lord, we ask that you help us to, as that poet suggests,

“Be joyful though we have considered all the facts.”

Envelop us in divine hilarity.

Take our cynicism and trade it for delight.

Teach us the language of levity.

Grief is but an interlude, a shadow,

and joy is the truest substance for those who know you.

May we laugh deeply with those we love,

and alone, with you, in the secret place.

For in this, we rejoice with the tongues of the redeemed,

and practice resurrection.

There is no shame in laughing with our sorrow;

for to laugh is to trust in you,

to believe that the rug we roll upon will not be pulled out,

to understand that the Author has given us a peek of eternity,

and we know how the story ends.

Amen.

A Liturgy for Those Looking for Joy

When the world expects sadness,

help us, Creator of Light, to look for pockets of joy.

When the world is overwhelmed by darkness,

give us eyes to see little delights.

When the world is caught up in sensationalism,

help us speak of the hidden wonders we’ve discovered,

holding them up for others to see.

The sacred stillness of the early morning,

a quiet moment in the sun,

small children laughing on scooters,

trees bursting into bloom and lillies opening at the corner bodega.

These small joys reveal the truth of the world we live in.

No, there is not peace everywhere

and all pain has not been removed.

But there are still people returning home,

voices that pray,

moments of forgiveness,

signs of hope.

We don’t have to wait until all is well

to celebrate the glimpses of your Kingdom at hand.

Let us not deny sadness,

but transform it into fertile soil for more joy.

Let us not deny the darkness,

but choose to live in the light.

Cynics seek darkness wherever they go,

but joy is the mark of the people of God.

Help us discipline ourselves to choose joy

for the reward is joy itself.

Help us renew our minds until they default to joy and not fear,

for there is so much to frighten us.

Help us believe that the Light can be trusted,

for there is so much darkness to mislead us.

Jesus, you are both the Man of Sorrows and the Man of Complete Joy,

help us to hold both sorrow and joy in the ways you’ve shown us.

Help us to remain in your love

so that your joy may be in us

and our joy may be complete.

Amen.