Joy at Christmas

Have you ever thought about the fact God never commands a feeling? You never read in the Bible be happy, be nostalgic or be melancholy. A feeling is like a bus, a new one comes every ten minutes. Feelings just happen.

The very first Christmas feelings were going around like the common cold. The teenage mother of Jesus was an ocean of feelings along with her bewildered yet to be husband. Their parents?  Well as a parent, I am sure they had a few feelings of their own. Not the perfect Christmas story in their minds. Finally, there was the overbooked inn, pesky animals, and the itchy hay creating a really awkward Christmas photo.

So where does the joy fit?

In the midst of the crazy was a real raw joy. What was born on Christmas day was joy incarnate. You see, a friend of mine describes joy this way,

“Joy is choosing to embrace a settled confidence that God is in control of every detail of your life.”

Joy is a “think thing” not a “feel thing.” The birth of Jesus is living proof that God is in control of every detail of the Universe. In the chaos of that time when there was more questions than answers God provided the savior of the world. Joy was now a choice.

Maybe your Christmas or your life right now is out of control. Now is the moment to let feelings feel and make a choice. Choose joy in the chaos. Joy is choosing to accept the “all things” in my life have crossed the sovereign desk of God. He is moving your life along with every molecule in the universe towards His excellent plan just as he did that first crazy Christmas. He was in control of every detail of life for Joseph, for Mary, and Jesus. And for you.

Choose joy!