Joy, the Heart of God

JOY is the heart of God, especially in our liminal in-between spaces of the now-but-not-yet.  Those places where our hopes and dreams and purposes are sown deep in our hearts but are not yet fulfilled.  Those places that frustrate us and threaten to break our spirit.

There is a truth about this reality that prevails:

We ALL live in the in-between;

It is a time where Christ has come as our Saviour, to be our Lord and King, but the final scenes of God’s creation (the new heavens and the new earth) have not yet commenced.  And this reality is amplified in our own now-but-not-yet liminal in-between spaces.

The nature of this life is now-but-not-yet.
The nature of each of our lives is now-but-not-yet.

God’s joy is complete when we rest 
in the fact that we are already complete in Christ 
even though we may feel incomplete.

It takes faith to choose joy when 
our joy has not yet been made complete.

When God sees our faith suchlike,
HIS joy is made complete.

~

Joy is possible when we accept the now-but-not-yet. 

Rather than imagining that ‘something’ 
exceptionally wonderful is coming, 
it is more about living as if that 
exceptional thing was already here.

... even though we know it isn’t.

This is the eternal tension 
of invitation in this life.

~

Even as we linger in our now-but-not-yet liminal spaces—much of the time against our will—God responds to the broken spirit in us as we pray the immortal words of David:

“My sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; 
a broken and contrite heart you, God, 
will not despise” (Psalm 51:17)

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted 
and saves those who are crushed of spirit” (Psalm 34:18).

~

Our God was, is, and ALWAYS will be
the LORD of those 
in the now-but-not-yet liminal in-between spaces.

~

A THORN IN THE FLESH

There were sections of Paul’s writings that validated our human experience of being in the now-but-not-yet liminal space.  Like when Paul says, “I do not understand what I do.  For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do” (Romans 7:15) and “Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take [the thorn in the flesh] away from me” (2 Corinthians 12:8).

In many ways we can all relate to these very human experiences of Paul—his sin and his desire to have the thorn in his side removed.

But God’s grace is sufficient 
for us IN our weakness.
In our desire to have life 
a certain way different to how it is.

Not that this is a neat solution,
on the contrary, it isn’t.

Each of us does what we don’t want to do. 
Each of us does at times what we hate to do. 
Each of us has dreams, hopes, and 
purposes that remain unfulfilled. 
Each of us can relate to the thorn in the flesh.

None of us is uniquely ill-equipped 
to deal with these challenges of life, 
though it can sometimes feel like we are.

None of us is estranged 
to these feelings of lostness.

The truth is we are ALL in positions of the now-but-not-yet liminal in-between space in certain places in our lives, if not for prolonged seasons, sometimes lasting twenty years and more.  But life has us thinking that we, ourselves, are the ONLY ones missing out on our dreams.  There is comfort in knowing we are not alone.

Somehow the heart of God, which is His joy, needs to become ours.  “The joy of the Lord” is the ONLY way we maintain the strength of our hope in these times (Nehemiah 8:10).

Grief is expected along the journey of life,
but it is not our eternal destination— 
not in this life nor the next.

~

THE HEART OF A HUMAN’S ‘BEING’

I wrote these words below around 15-years ago and I still think they are right.  

“Have you ever thought much about the purpose of your life?  It is to reconcile the inner discord within every single one of us.  Most of us are somewhat blind to this.  We search for peace almost everywhere but often miss the actual source. 

“It is about God.  It is about relationship.  It is about growing passionately toward God, worshipping Him via the things we think, say, and do—a commitment for the rest of our lives.  At its essence, this involves a continual process of learning.”

God is intensely interested in WHO we are 
and WHO we are becoming, 
more than what we do.

God’s most intense interest, however, is targeted in our transformation.  It is only in our transformation that we see—through heartfelt ongoing conversional experience—the length, height, breadth, and depth of His love possible to experience in this life.

What God desires most of all, 
in our personal lives, 
is transformation:

from greedy to generous
from argumentative to amenable
from licentious to loving
from self-centred to selfless
from carousing to caring
from horrible to humble
from entitled to empathetic
from haughty to honest
from vainglorious to vulnerable

You get the idea...

THESE miracles are the GREATEST miracles:

WHERE THE HEART, 
MOST OF ALL, 
IS HEALED.

Life itself is all about the heart.  It is all about living out of a place of solemness of life.  Life is all about appreciation, determination, purpose, and perspective.  All the cherished things of life emerge out of the wellspring of life, the HEART—indeed, Proverbs 4:23 suggests that we must guard it, which is to nurture it, to give it room to flourish, all the while keeping it free from toxins.  The heart is in simply understanding WHAT we have received.  That is, salvation, which is God’s merciful forgiveness, love, unconditional acceptance, and freedom.

The heart itself leads us to joy, 
and in THAT is God.

The key to the heart is where it is at in the 
now-but-not-yet liminal in-between space.

Through suffering we learn to hold on.
Through suffering we learn a deeper joy.

~

WHERE IS GOD IN THE IN-BETWEEN?

Notwithstanding the foregoing, life threatens to, and does, disrupt our hearts.  In everyone’s journey there is a time where we find ourselves pressed into the now-but-not-yet liminal space of the in-between time.

Where we are stuck. 
Where we despair of life itself. 
This is no idealising of petty concerns.

There was that time for Paul, where he and his company were “under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself” (2 Corinthians 1:8).

If it could happen to Paul, it will happen to us.  And let us not become drawn into the temptation of comparing his despairing with ours.  As Paul and his companions were human and limited in their own capacities, so are we in ours.

We can take comfort in this: 

God’s best PRESENCE is in the time of trial, 
when we are despairing of life itself.

There are many manifestations of such despairing: poverty, physical threat, jadedness, compassion fatigue, burnout, all manner of insecurity, tragedy, spiritual attack and desolation, and yes, real and mortal threat to life itself.

Allow me to finish with this ode:

It is when we are down 
that we reach out to God.

It is when we are down that 
we are receptive to His Spirit.

It is when we are down 
that God scoops us up.

It is when we are down 
that God becomes real.

When life leads us to lonely places, THERE we find God, even in His apparent absence, for He never leaves us nor forsakes us.  We know this by His presence even in His absence during a dark night of the soul.  For we know that we who are IN Christ are already complete even though we bear the now-but-not-yet experience of feeling utterly incomplete.  We understand and accept that irresolvable tension.

Joy is the Lord’s heart, especially 
in the now-but-not-yet liminal spaces.

We know it is God’s heart because we know joy is what our hearts continually crave, especially in bleak places, and we are made in God’s image.  For joy is goodness, and goodness is OF God.

Go in peace as you rejoice in the Lord!