“Are you happy?” How would you answer that honestly?
My suspicion is that, for most of us, this would be a painful question which, given our fantasy of what happiness should be, we would tend to answer in the negative: “no, I don’t think I’m happy. I would like to be, but there are too many frustrations in my life which block happiness.”
For a Christian, there is a better question. The essential question should not be, “Am I happy”? but rather, “is my life meaningful?” That is a different question, one which can help our perspective on things.
What God has promised us in Christ is not, as is unfortunately so often preached and believed, a life free from pain, sickness, loneliness, oppression, and death. The preacher who tells you that you will have less pain in life if you take Jesus seriously is not in touch with the gospel. What the incarnation promises is not that Christ will do away with our pain, but that God will be with us in that pain.
Faith in God does not, in this world, save one from pain, misunderstanding, loneliness, and death. Faith does not offer a life free of pain. What God does promise is to be with us in that pain. That is why our Savior’s name is Emmanuel, a name which means God-is-with-us.
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The Incarnation does not provide us with a ladder by which to escape from the ambiguities of this life and scale the heights of heaven. Rather it enables us to burrow deep into the heart of the planet earth and find it shimmering with divinity.
For the Christian, then, the important question is not: “Am I happy?” but “Is my life meaningful?” By asking the latter question rather than the former one, I do not torture myself with some unattainable romantic ideal and, more importantly, I do not ask God to exempt me from the human condition. My life is meaningful precisely when I sense God’s presence in the midst of my suffering, sicknesses, loneliness, and pain.
Lord, I pray for all my Sonshine Friends that we realize our happiness no longer depends upon never getting sick, or never getting lonely, or never being misunderstood, or never making wrong choices, or being exempt from death. Life can be frustrating and still be very meaningful. We can be lonely, sick, sorrowful about wrong choices, over-worked and unappreciated, staring old age and death in the face and still experience deep meaning. Happiness will be a by-product of that.
Today’s photo was a “happy moment” for me when I met a couple from London Ontario taking pictures on the shoreline and they pointed out this sunset photo taken in Coos Bay, Oregon.
