Jeremy Duncan: Sometimes what is good news for you is not necessarily good for someone else. And slowing down long enough to see how this might affect those around you can be an incredible kindness. Look, I'm not saying that you shouldn't celebrate your blessings. Of course, you should. That's part of joy as well.
But being aware of the people around you and how they're affected is really important too. Today though, we are wrapping up a series called Joy. Though hopefully, not at all the end of our conversation about joy in general. Next week we begin a series looking at a very tumultuous time in the history of the Hebrew people, the transition from the judges to the era of the kings. But we are officially now on that final stretch as we make our way toward summer.
Right? That means we're thinking about things like stampede breakfast in July, our 10th anniversary in the fall. Keep your ears open for more information on both of those soon. But all of these are quite joyful moments in our life together as community. Baptism is an incredible joyful moment.
Easter, which we are still basking in the light of, is a joy filled moment. We are surrounded by joy all the time. And yet, I think we know that the significance of a conversation about joy is more than simply naming the reasons we should be joyful. Sometimes that should is the hardest part. Right?
We know we should. What we need are practices that help us to cultivate joy in our lives. And that's why we've tried to talk about these things in this series. We did that by looking at joy in different eras and epochs and genres and traditions throughout the scripture. We talked about Abraham, the joy of a cool breeze on a hot day, laughter over promises that seem too good to be true.
We talked about Ezekiel and low places, dry valleys of burnt out bones and the joy that emerges when hope finally begins to return. We talked about Psalms and creativity and the joy that bubbles up in song and dance. And last week, Bobby talked to us about the joy that is spirit. There's this wonderful phrase at the end of the gospel of Luke. Jesus is resurrected, and he appears to his disciples, and he explains this story of scripture to them, pulling all of the pieces together for them, maybe for the first time.
And then we get this sort of wild ending. Right? While Jesus was blessing them, He left them. He was taken up to heaven. And, they worshipped Him and returned to Jerusalem with great joy.
Now, that's a moment that we call the Ascension. Today is coincidentally Ascension Sunday in the Christian calendar. But the ascension story itself is honestly pretty nondescript. Right? Like, he left them.
He was taken to heaven. What does that mean exactly? Did he float away? Was he beamed up? Did he just fade from view?
I mean, you almost have to assume that the writer is intentionally leaving room for us to wonder about this on purpose. Right? Like, I certainly know if I was telling the story there would be a few more details here. But I wonder if, as Bobby pointed out to us last week, the sparse language isn't meant to point to what comes next. That with great joy, the disciples returned to Jerusalem.
Maybe the story of the ascension isn't about the leaving. Maybe the story is about the arrival of spirit, the divine with us everywhere ahead of us in Jerusalem, behind us in Bethany, guiding us in our creativity, consoling us in our valleys, and laughing with us over divine generosity. There is a very real joy in realizing that God is so much closer than we had thought, even when Jesus disappears from our sight for a time. And so Jesus ascends, and the disciples are filled with joy because they finally realize they will never be alone again. And that leads us quite nicely into our final conversation on joy.
The joy that is cultivated in friendship and unexpected community. But first, let's pray. Our joyful God, who is with us even now, close as our breath, nearer than we can possibly imagine, In those moments where we feel like you have perhaps ascended and we have maybe been left behind. The distance between us feels very real and far. We ask that in those moments you would remind us of Spirit.
Your constant presence, and care, and comfort, your friendship that provides a basis for joy far deeper than the moment we find ourselves in the midst of. Might that joy begin to flow, and then pool, and then fill some hidden reservoir deep in our soul that we can learn to draw from when we need it the most. And then, might we learn to return with great joy from surprising moments, from dark valleys, from creative encounters, from all the times where even just for a second we thought the story was over. May joy always begin anew. In the strong name of the risen Christ we pray.
Amen. Today is our final conversation on joy, at least in this series. Because as I said, hopefully not our final conversation about joy in general. But today we're talking about friendship and community. And we're going to cover sad stories, types of joy, unexpected friends, and the trust recession.
But first a story. And we might as well get this out of the way. My dog died last week. Oh. And if I saw you last Sunday, and I smiled and moved on fairly quickly without engaging, that was because I found myself on the verge of tears almost all day, just one day removed from his passing.
And the truth is it wasn't altogether unexpected. Cedar was 11 years old. And for a large breed like a golden retriever he was, as expected, starting to slow down. But we certainly hoped we had at least another year or 2 with him. But on Sunday morning, for the first time in more than a decade of waking up without my dog at my feet, my 4 year old daughter heard me stir and from her bedroom called out to me.
First thing I heard in the morning, daddy, Cedar is still dead. Yes, baby, I replied. And you are still sad, daddy? Yes, baby, I said. And that strange exchange will probably stick with me for the rest of my life.
The odd juxtaposition of genuine love for my daughter, who clearly did not understand the gravity of the situation, and yet at the same time deeply cared at how her dad was doing. And the fullness of that emotion and the way that it hit me that morning, set against the emptiness of swinging my legs over the bed without my dog there to greet me for the first time was, if I can say, tangible. And I don't want to make everyone sad. I've been sad all week, and not all of us are dog people. I get it.
But there was, and there still is, a very powerful grace in being met that first empty morning with the very naive love of my daughter, a daughter who is in herself not our biological child. She is yet another gift that has been offered into our family. And this is one of the interesting things that I think ties these different conversations of joy that we've had these past 4 weeks together, at least for me. Because there are a number of different Hebrew words that all get translated joy when we move into English. There's at least 5 or 6, depending on how you count them.
There are words that are directly translated as joy, and there are words that are translated as expressions of joy. And the same thing happens again in the New Testament several more words get the joy treatment in English. And maybe that alone should tell us something. I mean, we need more words for joy in our modern world. A 1,000 types of joy deserve a 1,000 different words.
So go nuts with your vocabulary. But the big one, the one that sits behind some of those most famous verses about joy, verses like Galatians 522, The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. Against such things there is no law. That joy is the word khera. And the word kara is related to a group of words, one of which is karen, and that was a type of greeting, a happy way to start a letter.
And that word is related to another word, the word charis, which meant grace. And that creates this wonderful little pun that Paul liked to use at the start of his letters, where instead of saying greetings, he would start with grace. And we have to be careful with all of this. Kera, karen, karis, even the word gift in Greek is the word charisma. And they're all related, but they are different words.
They share the same root, but that doesn't mean they communicate the same thing. However, for Paul, there seems to be a very distinct interplay here. In fact, in Philippians where we want to focus today, he opens the letter grace, charis, and peace to you. I thank God for you. I always pray with joy, chara, for you.
And I think for Paul what this says is that there was a type of joy, a kind of joy that is in some sense, a very real sense, a grace or a gift that is offered to us. It's not a happiness or a lightness. It's not even exuberance or celebration, although all of those things can be called joy in Scripture as well, and you should name them as joy for yourself too. But for Paul there's a kind of joy that comes to find us. It's not manufactured or conjured by our circumstance.
A joy that is as beautifully painful as knowing that your 4 year old daughter cares deeply that you are sad. And sometimes that joy, when it finds you makes you cry just a little bit harder and yet it is still very much a grace and a gift that comes to you. And that brings us back to Philippians. Because I referenced this opening already. Paul says, grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
I thank my God every time I pray for you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy for you. Because all of your partnership in the gospel from the 1st day until now makes me confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Greetings and grace, and then there's this movement into joy and celebration, thanksgiving for these relationships that Paul has with this church here in this city called Philippi. Yet even before the very end of the first chapter, Paul will channel that joy and that grace into speaking about his anxiety, his fears, the fact that he has found himself in prison as he writes and finding himself wondering about whether it might actually be better to, as he says, depart to be with Christ.
And there's no need to mince words here. He's talking about dying. And it's really interesting to me to see the way that Paul writes and the way that he uses the language of joy in this letter and transitions so quickly to unfolding his story in a very vulnerable way, how he can move so quickly from Thanksgiving to confession. And I wonder if that freedom born from friendship isn't part of why he feels so much joy whenever he thinks about this community, That he can say what he needs to say. You see, this reference to the good work that God began, It's not just a generic encouragement here.
It's actually rooted in a very specific history with these friends. And I think we all know this that Paul's letters were not originally written as scripture. They were written as personal letters, a very real person writing to very real people. But still, some 2000 years removed, it's hard at times to recapture the humanity of it all. The friendships that existed behind those words, the relationships that made Paul comfortable to pour out his heart only moments later.
And in some sense at least, I think we find ourselves having to fill in the gaps and imagine the stories, imagine the relationships behind the words. Except here in Philippi, we actually do get a view into the backstory. We actually know who Paul is talking about when he speaks of the good work God began. We actually understand why Paul is so willing to open himself up, because we actually know at least some of the history in Philippi. And for that we have to turn to the book of Acts.
First, though, a bit about Philippi here. Philippi was a major Roman colony in Macedonia. Paul first travels there in Acts 16 that we'll look at today. But we know he makes another visit later in chapter 20. However, given Philippi's placement in the Roman Empire, it's likely that Paul would have traveled through the city pretty regularly on all of his different trips.
And the city got its name from a Greek king, Philip of Macedonia. But when the Romans took over they renamed it Colonia Vitrix Fillipensium, or the colonial victory over Philip. And everyone just called it Philippi. And then Augustus later renamed it again to Colonia Augustaulia Philippensis, or the colony Augustus, son of Julius in Philippi. And everyone still just called it Philippi.
But the point is, this is very much a Roman city populated by Roman citizens at this point. And so, when Paul shows up, his M. O. When he's trying to plant these churches and start these communities across the Roman Empire is to start by looking for the synagogue in town. Dialogue with the Jewish community there, and try to convince them of the lordship of Jesus.
And over Philippi is so Roman that there's really no synagogue to be found. And so plan B, Paul goes outside the city looking for a mignon. Now a minyan is the quorum that's needed to formally gather and study Torah together in the Jewish culture. Even if you don't have a synagogue to meet in, you can gather as a minyan to study and pray together, except you need 10 adult men to constitute a minyan. And Paul can't even find that in Philippi.
In fact, in Acts 16:13, we read that on the Sabbath, Paul went outside the city gate to the river where he expected to find a place of prayer, but he couldn't. So finding none, he sat down and began to speak to some women who had gathered. And on its surface, you can imagine if you're a Jewish man trying to start a Jewish community to follow a Jewish Messiah, And you can't find a synagogue in town. That's a little disappointing. But then you can't even find 10 men praying together, and that's got to be a little more discouraging.
And yet, here in Philippi Paul runs into Lydia. Now, we're told a bit about her. We're told her she was a worshipper of God. Now, it's worth noting here that the text doesn't say anything about the particular God that Lydia worships. For the record there were a lot of Gentile people, non Jewish people that followed the Jewish God around this time.
So many, in fact, that there was a term for that. They were called God fearers. But that's not the term that's used to describe Lydia in the book of Acts. So our best assumption is that she is simply, for lack of a better term here, spiritual, but not particularly religious. Lydia, though, happens to be a dealer in purple cloth.
And that gives us some indication about who she was, that she was probably quite wealthy and connected. Dyes were incredibly important and sought after in Rome. Probably in our minds we all have this picture of Rome being very brown. Archaeologists tell us that ancient cities like Philippi were actually quite colorful and vibrant, though. All those ancient Roman statues you see, most of them probably would have been painted in very bright colors when they were on display in the cities.
It's just that paint wears off over time, and that leaves a lot of stone. So in the time, these colors were a big deal, and so were dyes. But specifically, Lydia's focus on purple probably put her in touch with a lot of the socialites of the city, let's say. Purple dyes were often associated with royalty and wealth, and they were so sought after, purple was regulated by Rome, which, like an event Lydia had some connections to. So here's Paul, coming to town looking for the synagogue, switching to plan B and trying to find some faithful men, and instead he runs across Lydia.
And look, Paul is a product of the 1st century, a culture dominated by patriarchy. His instincts are shaped by that. That's why he looks for the men, and yet he's also not so numb to spirit that he can't see where God is at work here. So he begins to speak to these women. And in Acts 16:14, we read that the Lord opened Lydia's heart to respond to Paul's message.
Then she and the members of her household were baptized, and she invited us to her home. If you consider me a believer in the Lord, she said, come and stay at my house. And she persuaded us. This is the beginning of the church in Philippi, Lydia's living room. She is the benefactor of the church in Philippi that Paul would later write to.
But, next verse. Once we were going out to the place of prayer, and we were met by a slave girl who had a spirit by which she predicted the future, She earned a great deal of money for her owners by fortune telling. And she followed Paul and the rest of us shouting, 'These men are servants of the Most high God. They are telling you the way to be saved. And that sounds great.
Except that she kept us up for many days. And finally, Paul became so annoyed that he turned around and said to the spirit, in the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to come out of her. And at that moment the spirit left her, which is kind of weird. Right? First of all, are there really spirits that can predict the future?
Well, that one's a bit of a mistranslation, to be honest. The word there is 'puthon', and it refers to the priestesses of the temple of Pithon at the Oracle of Delphi. By the way, spelled Python, pronounced Pithon in Greek. But Pithon was the great serpent dragon who battled the god Apollos, and his devotees were known for two things, divination and ventriloquism. Bottom line is that this word refers to something more like fortune telling than it does to actually future predicting.
Now, there were certainly people, just like today, that believed in this kind of thing and paid for it. But there were also a great many people in the ancient world who were very skeptical of the whole affectation. Ability to predict the future. It's about the affectation. That said, the whole story hinges around this girl following Paul around and telling people to listen to him and him getting annoyed with that, which is also kind of amusing.
I think there's something there, maybe, to pay attention to about intention and perhaps even saying the right things for all of the wrong reasons. I don't know. Maybe she's telling people to listen to Paul and Silas, but she's doing it with that fortune telling affectation that she's now assumed into her identity, and Paul tells her to knock it off. But that ultimately creates the opportunity for her full freedom, not just from the spirit of Pithon, but also from these men who have enslaved her. Because in the next verse we read that when her owners realized that their hope of making money off her was gone, they seized Paul and Silas.
There's a lot going on in the subtext here. Verse 20 records their specific accusation. They say, These men are Jews. They're throwing our city into an uproar. They're all kind of xenophobic.
Foreigners coming into town, liberating slaves, putting upstanding entrepreneurs like ourselves business. What happens is Paul and Silas are thrown into jail. That evening they decide to sing, even in that predicament. And something like a violent earthquake shakes the ground, and the door is flung off its hinges. When the jailer wakes up and realizes that the prison is wide open, and he is distraught, he draws his sword to end his own life, because he knows he's ultimately responsible for what happens to his prisoners.
But Paul sees what's about to happen, and he shouts out, don't harm yourself. We're all still here. By the way, something worth thinking about, reflecting on here. Sometimes what is good news for you is not necessarily good for someone else. And slowing down long enough to see how this might affect those around you can be an incredible kindness.
Look, I'm not saying that you shouldn't celebrate your blessings. Of course, you should. That's part of joy as well. But being aware of the people around you and how they're affected is really important too. Anyway, the jailer calls for the lights and rushes in and falls trembling before Paul and Silas.
And then he brought them out and he asked, sirs, what must I do to be saved? And so from there, Paul and Silas go with them to his house, and they speak to his family. And that evening, he and his entire household are also baptized into the story of Jesus. And he was, quote, filled with joy because he had come to believe verse 34. But this is the church in Philippi.
This is the good work that God began that Paul is speaking about when he starts his letter much later. Purple dealers, fortune tellers, anxious jailers, Friendships that were completely unexpected. But also, let's be honest here had no business forming the basis for a community in ancient Rome, certainly not in a city with the pedigree of Philippi. Except, I think that unexpectedness is perhaps precisely why Paul seems to take such joy in the beauty of these friendships. In particular, I think it might be why Paul is so willing to open up about his struggles later on so freely to these friendships because they are for him a surprising reflection of the power of the Jesus story to bring us together when we least expect.
See, right now I think we're going through what we might call a trust recession. We are more distrustful of politicians, And we are more distrustful of media and expertise in general than perhaps ever before. And not all of that is unwarranted. But I do fear it has also unfortunately perhaps filtered down into our personal encounters with each other as well. Like, we don't trust each other.
And, look, I understand that trust, deep trust is earned just like it was here in Philippi. Right? Paul opens up his heart in this letter precisely because the safety to do that has been demonstrated time and time again in these relationships. But I worry about this idea that we lose the ability to trust each other enough to even try because when that happens, then I don't end up with Lydia's in my life. And I don't end up with former fortune tellers that now tell me the truth about myself.
And I don't give something of myself away to see if the person that I thought was going to be my jailer might actually become my friend. And I'm not asking you or I or anyone to subject yourself to someone that has demonstrated that they don't deserve your trust. That's a different thing. What I'm saying is that there is a profound joy in uncovering the friendships that come from very unexpected places. And they offer you new perspectives on yourself that you couldn't have seen for yourself, friendships that are, in the final analysis, only grace and only gift because nothing else about them makes sense.
They come to find you. And I'll be honest here, I'm not the kind of person that has a lot of friends. It's just not easy for me. It's much easier for me to come to work on a Sunday morning and put my grief out of my mind than it is to sit down and talk about someone with what I've lost. But I also know that I have been blessed with extraordinary relationships with a very small handful of friends that I absolutely could not have engineered for myself.
People that have come into my life from surprising places, People have found their way back into my life in ways that I never expected. And the only common denominator in all of those relationships is that at some point I found the courage to be willing to see what would happen if I opened the door just a crack. And the truth is, when you do that, sometimes you get burned. But sometimes sometimes you discover joy on the other side of a friendship that feels like nothing but grace. The kind that you couldn't engineer and you wouldn't have expected, the kind that takes a very long story to explain or an inside joke to properly understand, but the kind of joy that comes from a friendship that has room for us to simply be present and ourselves.
Even if you're sad, or scared, or anxious, or joyful, or unsure, or even if you've just lost your dog and you need your daughter to check-in on how you're doing. But to know that we can be exactly who we are and still know that we are just as loved as Paul was in Philippi there's a joy in that grace that is hard to put words to Let's pray. God, for all the incredible experiences of joy that have been offered to each of us in a 1,000 different ways, in celebration and excitement and in exuberance, Today, we center ourselves in the joy of being known, known by people who have unexpectedly appeared in our lives as a gift. And we found the courage to open our hearts to them and been met by acceptance that is nothing but grace. God, might we push back against that instinct that tells us to shut down and close doors to protect ourselves and instead find the courage in the right moments to open things just a crack to see what might be possible trusting that on the other side there can be a joy that is very hard to explain in our laughter, in our friendships, in our inside jokes, but in our knowing that we are loved.
And we know we have this from you. We pray that love would translate in the ways that we relate to each other. In the strong name of the risen Christ, we pray. Amen. Hey, Jeremy here and thanks for listening to our podcast.
If you're intrigued by the work that we're doing here at commons, you can head to our website commons.church for more information. You can find us on all of the socials at commonschurch. You can subscribe to our YouTube channel where we are posting content regularly for the community. You can also join our Discord server. Head to commons.church/discord for the invite and there you will find the community having all kinds of conversations about how we can encourage each other to follow the way of Jesus.
We would love to hear from you. Anyway, thanks for tuning in. Have a great week. We'll talk to you soon.