Philippians
4:4 (NIV)
4 Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!
It was a long and boring basketball game. The
stands were half empty; the crowd was not even in the game for the most part. I
had planned to spend the evening with my daughter Hannah and thought that going
to a basketball game would be fun, was I ever wrong.
Hannah and I had great seats due to some free
tickets that had been given to us so we settled down to enjoy a very boring
game. The Salukis were ahead of their opponent by almost thirty points at one
time so no one was even interested in the game.
At half time we stood in the Dippin Dots line
for the entire half time only to get to the counter to discover that they had
run out of all of the favorite kinds, so we made our way back to our seats for
another uneventful half of slow moving basketball.
After the game we went to our favorite
restaurant and enjoyed some good food and played some rather silly games on the
table. I am sure we looked rather childish as we played different games and
cheered for our successes as we sought to trash each other in a contest of
quarter foo0tball. (Don't ask me to explain it, it is just something that
Hannah I d when we are at restaurants.)
As we were on our way home, Hannah turned to
me and said, "Dad, this was a great night!"
Rather confused, I replied, "How can you
say that. We went to a boring game and stood in a long line only to be
disappointed and found our joy in playing quarter football on a table at Steak
and Shake?"
Her quick and honest response was, "Dad,
we were together and that is what made it great."
Often life is just routine, nothing
spectacular happening, just going through the motions of life. Some will say
they need some chemical to excite them, to raise their pleasure level. Others
may turn to all sorts of other things for pleasure, but for those who know the
Risen Christ we can rejoice because God is with us even in the boring times and
that changes everything.
So how about a little more rejoicing Church.
Go ahead and throw your head back and laugh a little, it is ok. In fact we are
commanded to rejoice. Paul has to remind us twice in one verse. I guess it is
hard for us to hear that coming from God. Perhaps our concept of God needs a
little reworking as well. Rejoice, what a nice concept, all because of God's
presence.
Taking time out to Rejoice a little,
Pastor Phil