Episode Details

The Church is a Place of Genuine JoyEphesians 5:15-21Worldly and Christian JoyI’m calling this sermon today ‘The Church is a Place of Genuine Happiness’ and I’ll come to what I mean by that in a moment. But I’d like to tell a story to begin with.Some years ago, as part of my training for ministry, I had to attend a particularly tragic funeral. This was of a young man who had taken his own life much to the shock of those around him, including his own family members. It remains the most grief-saturated funeral that I have experienced. Many of his friends were there and gave warm and loving tributes to him. But the service itself was beset with a sense of hopelessness and despair. It was obvious that nobody who spoke had any tangible faith in Christ or a life beyond this one. And so all that could be shared were vague hopes of reunion and happy memories.None of this is to criticise these people in any way. I felt, and continue to feel, deeply grieved myself when I consider this event.As I say, I was at the beginning of my training and I had not encountered anything like this funeral. What surprised me was what I heard the following day. The friends and family had rented out a local facility for the wake and reports from the surrounding area were of loud music, singing, laughing, and drinking that lasted into the very early hours of the morning. I discussed this with the vicar of the church and with other people and various words were used to describe it. Among the words that stand out in my memory: deep denial, torpor, and oblivion.And all of this was facilitated by the consumption of large quantities of alcohol.What does alcohol do to the human body? I’m sure you might know that it acts as a depressant. It has the physiological effect of slowing down bodily processes, thereby making people more forgetful of their sorrows and therefore reducing anxiety. In the scenario described above, the role of alcohol was to help the people (for that night) to feel slightly less grief and despair at the death of their friend and family member.But, of course, the trouble is that we always have to wake up the next morning and face reality. And this fact brings us to the central contrast in our passage today: ‘Do not get drunk with wine for that is debauchery,’ writes the Apostle Paul, ‘but be filled with the Spirit’ (Ephesians 5:11).As with all of the commands of God, this one is steeped in great wisdom and insight. Becoming drunk with wine may bring relief from anxiety or sorrow for a time, but this is only because one is escaping from reality. It produces a fleeting and superficial joy that cannot possibly be sustained.Would you believe me if I told you that a much greater joy and more lasting joy is offered to us through knowing Jesus Christ and experiencing his presence and guidance in our lives?This Christian joy is quite different to that offered by the consumption of alcohol. Firstly, it is far more challenging. This is because it is a joy that is not rooted in escape from life’s problems but in honesty as to what those problems are. I’ve heard it said that, when a person becomes a Christian, he or she becomes simultaneously more happy and more sad. How can this be? Because becoming a Christian entails living as far as we possibly can in the real world: we have to be honest about ourselves, about our own sin, our own shortcomings, our own failure. And we have to be honest about how things really are: the state of our families, of our nations, of the Church, of the world. We are not to hide from reality but we are to confront it in the knowledge of God’s love for us and in his promises. These things can give us a joy that endures even the most terrible sorrow.How are we to find this genuine joy?How are we to find this joy? The Apostle Paul has already given us the answer: ‘Be filled with the Spirit’ – that is the Holy Spirit.Before I go any further let me just say that this is not a flippant answer. This is an ongoing process within the f