Blood Stained

My daughter’s van broke this morning…again.  This has happened twice prior…and always on days that hit double digits below zero.  Each time it is the same thing…the power steering line that runs to the power steering cooler explodes and leaves a red hydraulic fluid blood stain in the driveway. 

This did not fill me with joy.

I recently replaced our dishwasher.  I have lost count on the number of dishwashers that I have installed in this home.  Each prior unit was lackluster at best.  In fact, our most recent “dishwasher” actually made the dishes dirtier than when they went into the machine.  How is that even possible?

Dishwashers rarely fill me with joy.

The battery on one of our other vehicles went bad today. 

This also, did not fill me with joy.

Joy is a difficult thing to describe.  Far too often we…I…associate joy with the occurrence of events in my life whether the events happen to be deemed as good…or bad.

I am learning about what God means when he speaks of joy in the scriptures. 

I am finding joy is often best expressed in the realm of relationships.  As a parent I want to be “with” my children.  I want to be with them when they are sad, or when they are excited, or when they are lonely.  I want to be with them when they live out of state. 

When I find times when I can be “with” them, I think I get a foretaste of the joy that God speaks of in the scriptures.  When my son comes home for a brief day and a half of the Minnesota firearm deer season and I get to be “with” him…there is something that stirs in my soul that feels joyful.  When our daughter comes home from Georgia and we get to see her and hug her for the first time in months; that same foretaste of joy flickers as I am “with” her.

Even in times when we ache with our children, the love that permeates our bond expresses a joy in the togetherness despite the shedding of tears.

When we read Luke 2, and find that the angels have promised the shepherds of the arrival of a child that will bring great joy for all the people, I think the fulfillment of that joy is in relationship. I believe that the joy that arrives that night is in the truth that God has come in the form of a man so that the relationship between God and man can be reconciled through the blood stained cross!

We get to be WITH God!

That is a joyous reunion in a joyous restored relationship.