Music to Our Ears
The
Yorktown United
Pastor Roy Grubbs
June 22, 2008
Philippians 4:4-7
6th Sunday after Pentecost
Colossians 3:12-17
Two women went to a well to draw water.
One complained as she dipped her bucket into the water, “Life is
terrible. Every time I fill this
bucket up, it is empty within minutes.” The
other woman replied, “I think life is wonderful.
Every time my bucket is empty, I get to come and fill it up again.”
Is the bucket always being emptied or always
being filled? It’s a variation on
the old question, “Is the glass half full or half empty?”
Does it really make any difference how you view the glass, how you see
the bucket?
Actually, it does.
Think of it this way: Do we look at life as a gift to be enjoyed or as a
problem to be solved?
It’s easy to get into the problem-solving
mode during this time of year. With
all the activities the end of the school year brings, the lists get longer, the
time grows shorter and the anxiety grows greater.
The kids are getting hyped-up by the day.
But it’s not just our children. The
energy level among adults is ratcheting up, too.
It’s like folks are mainlining caffeine to buzz through the season.
Why all the nervous activity?
Why do we give ourselves so much to do?
We want to get it all done perfectly, don’t we?
The trouble is that by doing so much and making things good for everyone
else, we can miss the true joys of this time.
Do
you go for joy, or is it hard for you to let yourself experience it?
It’s a challenge for us all. Maybe
it was the recognition we didn’t receive or the love who broke our heart---or
a thousand other disappointments or letdowns---but we learned to defend
ourselves against setting our hopes too high or our dreams too big.
We learn to hold back, to restrain ourselves.
And so we rarely know deep, lasting joy.
Today, though, is our day for joy.
At the beginning of summer, the sunlight is at its peak.
The darkness is at its lowest. That
is how it is living in the joy and love of God.
God’s promise to us of everlasting love is fulfilled.
And so our joy is full and large because it is joy not of our own making.
It is a joy that comes when we dare to hope that the God who came into
this world lives on through the Spirit in our lives.
It is a joy that comes as a gift.
This is not a joy that pretends that everything is all right when it is not. God does not take away our pain or ask us to live in denial about our problems. God asks us instead to look at our anguish and heartache and to say, “Yes, but…Yes, this anxiety, this depression, this disease is terrible. It may cripple me. It may even take my life. But there is more than this. There is love. There is grace. There is God.” And in that faith we find our joy.
Music is so important to me.
I am sure music is important to many of us.
On this day, it seems fitting that we celebrate music.
So many different groups and people have shared their gifts with us.
Music speaks to our souls in a way nothing else can.
And it can truly bring us joy.
That is why we sing this day.
We sing songs and hymns and anthems like those angels did on Christmas
night. Songs bursting from heaven
with good news for all people---which includes us, too.
And we sing quiet, gentle melodies of the rose that blooms in the
wilderness of our lives, a spray of color in a barren, wintry landscape.
Though it is less obvious than an angel host, its joy is just as real.
And maybe because it is so small and delicate, it is even more so.
We sing because nature is alive with songs
from the morning birds and the wind making music in the trees and the fields.
Even when all is not well, we are urged to sing.
Why? Paul, while in prison, urges the Philippians to have joy in
everything. We too sing in the face
of large challenges. As Herbert Driscoll writes, “We will continue to sing
joyous songs when we could so easily have sung sadly in the shadows that
surrounded our small islands of fragile personal joy.” And the reason that we
will risk singing is that we believe what those who sang before us believed --
we are a people of God, a God who can be trusted.
That sort of trust is rare these days, and
it goes a long way towards making joy possible. Amelia Burr wrote a poem about a
friend of hers that expresses the joy of having someone we can depend on, even
when there is very little else we are sure about.
It’s entitled, “Certainly Enough.”
Nor that the sky
is really blue.
May or may not
be true.
I do not know
what makes the tides
Nor what
tomorrow’s world may do,
But I have
certainly enough
For I am sure of
you.
Is it enough to be sure of one thing?
Is it enough to be sure that God cares about us?
I believe it is. Enough to
give us the joy of knowing that the one who came and took on a human face, our
face, lives on with us. Amen.
***From a sermon titled “Instruments of
Joy”