Where is Our Joy?
Henry David Thoreau, tucked away in his Walden cabin, famously said that most of us lead lives of quiet desperation. That was in 1845. Today, things are not so quiet. Anxiety and depression are regular rites of passage from which millions of Americans never graduate. Civility meanwhile has long been dropped from our national discourse. It’s a sad indictment of a country where so many pride themselves in a Christian heritage. We have the highest levels of church attendance in the world. Almost eighty percent of us say that we believe in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Yet, where is our joy? Where is our vitality? Where is our peace of mind?
The Son comes to complete our happiness in this life, (1) yet it’s clear not many are receiving “the good news“. Instead, we are sold a gospel that forsakes the living hour for a future heavenly reward: a spiritual reckoning that asks for little and receives even less in return. Simply accept Jesus Christ as your savior, we are told, and you’ll be hanging out with the good Lord for eternity. If it were only so easy. (2)
Jesus of Nazareth didn’t teach the idler’s path to God. He said that because much has been given us, much is expected. (3) He described the kingdom of heaven as a place that doesn’t suffer fools. (4) And he asked that his followers become as perfect as their Father in heaven (5), a seemingly impossible task, if it were not for the fact that all things are possible with the help of God. (6)
The first step toward perfection, according to Jesus, is to love God with all our heart, soul, and mind. (7) The mind gets short shrift from many Christians today. We forget that Jesus amazed people with both his miracles and his wits. (8) He was a man, we are told, whose wisdom grew as he grew in years. (9) Only after reaching maturity did his intellect surpass that of the legendary King Solomon. (10)
Clear thinking is essential for Christians because Jesus asks that we decide for ourselves what is right. (11) Making those correct choices requires intelligence and learning, as well as faith and a loving heart. God did not bless us with extraordinary minds, whose complexity dwarfs that of any computer, only to have us park them in storage. Instead, we are called to develop our logic and reason to transform our minds into Christ’s “winnowing fans.” So that the chaff might be removed from the wheat: (12) the dead teachings from the living Word…
Excerpted from the introduction to the book The Living Hour: The Lord’s Prayer for Daily Life (with New Testament Gospels). A faith book especially suited for Progressive Christianity workshops, Bible Study Groups, Unitarian Christians, and all who seek a richer life. The book’s SBNR (Spiritual But Not Religious) meditation is richly supported by over 200 Gospel book citations.
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