Joy Unspeakable?

"Who, for the Joy that was set before Him, endured the cross".
Hebrews 12:2.

I see it on Facebook every day.
The sheer delight that mums take in their new arrivals or young ones, that lovers take in each other, that friends revel about as they engage in some bold venture together.

It makes one thing very clear.
What makes life fantastic isn't how much material wealth you gather, or how much you can ingratiate yourself on someone else (because they have no choice), or how much sex, drugs and rock and roll you do (we'll come to all that in a minute).
What actually stacks way, way higher in our experience is the absolute gorgeousness of enjoying the beauty, the charm, the brilliance, of those who are significant to us, because we feel profoundly connected to them.

Try to imagine a world for a moment where that kind of care didn't exist. Hard isn't it.
The truth is, we simply wouldn't survive for very long because we'd all literally die for lack (giving, as well as taking) of affection.
Meeting our needs, even meeting our desires or pleasures just isn't enough - we have something much deeper powering the vital core within each of us, and it's a heart which wants to not just know love, it wants to be defined by giving love to another.

It may well be the case that we're often selfish about what we want because that deep need to give has been snubbed or abused when we've tried to reach someone else, so we have this break or fracture inside us that taps into another very rudimentary piece of being a fallen creature - to do what we want and to hell with everything (and often everyone else). We need to be significant, and that need is bridled to becoming whole by loving others. When we encounter nothing but pain or abuse or guilt, we often withdraw to darker modes of activity, where selfishness can scar us deeply.

Christians often talk about the Joy of the Lord being a strength in life, but what is that joy? Are they talking about some manner of transcendent experience or feeling, or is it perhaps derived by a person's assent and acceptance of the vital truths that Christianity gives - that we have a genuine peace with God because of the precious gift given in the salvation He has provided?
Whilst Christians certainly encounter moments where both of these are no doubt true, I don't think that's really what the faith is driving at here - the truth is far more in keeping with the brilliance and radiance I touched on in my opening statement - the delight one person has for another.

When Jesus appeared in public view as a man to start His ministry, we're told that the heavens opened, and as God's Spirit descended upon Him, the voice of His heavenly Father declared "This is my Beloved Son, in whom I delight".

Did you hear it?
The cardinal thing that makes God the Father's universe brilliant is not something obscure or alien or abstract. The character of God may indeed be Almighty and Transcendent, but at the very centre of His nature is something anyone who has genuinely loved someone else can understand - that what's to be treasured above all else is the beauty of another.

At the very centre of our faith, as the verse in Hebrews shows, is the fact that Jesus endured the ugliness and horror of the cross (taking sin and death) because He knew there was a far greater joy to come. He dealt with our ugly and dreadful wickedness, that we might be united to the true source of joy.

His Father would rejoice in Him forever. The very reason the Father sent Jesus is to show what He truly is - a person entirely motivated by love. But it wasn't just some obscure display, some moral example - that giving, that sacrifice would bring a countless number of people into sharing that same joy with Jesus in His Father forever.

This is why the scriptures tell us so clearly to see Jesus. When we begin to really comprehend Him, we see a beauty and a splendour that is simply astonishing. It is this that opens the way into real and lasting joy.

What makes me a Christian isn't what countless mysteries its truth explores and resolves in even bigger mysteries (though it does!) - it's opening the Gospels and encountering a person who is astonishing in His love for us - a man who also is God.
Eternal life, He says, is all about knowing Him and knowing the Father who has sent Him.

That is really what joy creates - an eternal fellowship of God and humanity in the bonds of a love that will be shared by all in the new creation.
That all may sound too good to be true, but think about it. The most valuable thing we have is each other, so if we're truly made for one another, why wouldn't eternal life be all about seeing the significance of that deepened and strengthened... forever. Doesn't that sound like something to be joyful about?

We all know how great it is to enjoy those who are so special to us.
Redemption is all about the very kind of bliss... amplified - forever!

That sounds like a treasure worth pursuing.