Calvin's Train of Thought

Joy in the Basics - August 21, 2022

A reflection.

I was listening to “Angels in the Architecture” today, and it was discussing how often - in the name of holiness - we reject joy and beauty in the Christian life, when doing so is really antithetical to the Christian life. As C.S. Lewis once said, “Joy is the serious business of heaven”. Yet, too often we take the disciplines of the Christian life and treat them as a drudgery, “looking sidelong at the things of this world”, as if in THOSE twisted things lay true joy rather than “drudgery”.

As I was contemplating this, it occured to me that I do much the same thing in my day-to-day activities on a smaller scale. I view things like cooking and cleaning for myself as absolute drudgery, and so I avoid them like the plague. Yet, as I found yet again tonight, when I actually do the thing, I find that enjoy the rhythm and routine of puttering about the kitchen, making supper, tidying up and putting things in order, and then preparing for the following morning. There is something life-giving in that routine (apart from the painfully obvious “food to feed the body” side of things).

If the enemy is content to decieve us in thinking that our day-to-day tasks are dreary and will suck the life out of us, how much more will he delight in decieving us to take the same outlook towards spending time with our beloved Jesus and meditating upon His word? Like a thick fog, this delusion will envelop us - cutting off our sight beyond the nose in front of our face such that we cannot see beyond the lie which claimes these things are entirely dreary and devoid of joy. And so we have a choice: we can sit down and hope the fog will pass, or we can proceed forward in faith, by the grace of God eventually outpacing the fog, “[tasting] and [seeing] that the LORD is good”, and delighting in the joy that is to be found in Him.

And how can we not delight in Him, when we understand the truth of what dire straits we were in before He saved us? How can we help but to delight in Him when we remember that He had no obligation to save us, but chose to do so anyway out of His great love for us? Can we be filled with anything except for joy on account of Christ having rescued us from death and damnation, imputing His righteousness to us so that we can stand unashamed before the Father as His children? “Behold what manner of love the Father hath given unto us, that we should be called the sons of God.” “Therefore, let us fix our eyes on things above, where Christ Jesus is seated at the right hand of the father”. Let us gaze upon His loving face, allowing His joy to fill us abundantly.