March 11th Datchworth 9:30 and Welwyn Evensong: Catherine Jupp

Isaiah 55 'You shall go out with joy' – link to Lent course

A song from my youth, sung by the Mamas and the Papas had a line that went, ‘and the darkest hour is just before dawn’. I wonder if you are old enough to remember it. The song is called ‘This is dedicated to the one I love’
And of course it is true. About three or four o’clock in the morning things can look really bad, and completely out of proportion. There is no hope and no point in going to sleep, because we will only have to wake up to a dreadful day.

In our reading, the Israelites felt like this. They were in the middle of the worst time in their history. They had believed that God would defend them; that he had made an agreement with them. He had given them their own land.
But what had happened? The Babylonians had come and taken their land, smashed up their Temple [which God had said he lived in] and taken them to a strange land. Everything that made them a nation had gone. God had let them down.

Their captors taunted them. ‘ Go on, then, sing one of your religious songs’ they said. ‘How can we?’ they said, ‘we cannot sing a song to God in a strange land’  Their future looked hopeless.  Along came a prophet – one of God’s spokesmen.  And what does he say?

He does not tell them that one day, if the Babylonians change their mind, they will be able to straggle back to their land if they want to. He does not give them sugar coated answers. No, when everything was as black as black could be, and when there was absolutely no prospect of the Babylonians ever changing their minds, he tells them that they will ‘go out with joy’ – in other words that they will eventually leave Babylon with confidence .

I can imagine the reception that got. Yeah, right. That is just not going to happen.  But Isaiah insists. "You shall go out with joy and be led forth with peace, and the mountains and hills will break forth before you, there will be shouts of joy and the trees of the field will clap their hands."

Now was he mad, or had he grasped a truth? And what is this ‘joy’ all about?   In our Lent groups this week we are looking at joy. In the course we read. ‘Joy is a distinctly Christian word. It has its springs deep down inside, and that spring never runs dry, no matter what happens. Only Jesus gives that joy. He had joy, singing its music deep within, even under the shadow of the cross.’

So joy does not mean being happy – Isaiah was clearly not happy in captivity. But it does mean knowing deep down that God is with you and that he is in control. Christian joy is a deep well that never runs dry. It tells us not to give up. It is the anchor on the seabed that keeps the boat safe when the surface of the sea is stormy and the boat is being tossed about. And yes, we can be joyful in that sense as Christians.

I once read of a widow who found life very hard without her husband. She had difficulty sleeping and was often awake just before the dawn chorus. The darkest hour is just before dawn. And then one night it struck her that the birds started singing when it was still dark. They heralded a dawn that had not happened. And she thought that if they could do that, so could she. Even though all seemed hopeless, she understood the passage we have read. ‘You shall go out with joy…’

Joy – the understanding that everything is all right because God is in control. It is a deep sense of peace despite the storms that are going on around us. We can live our lives with purpose and confidence.   At times this joy will well up inside us and we will feel deeply joyful, and this can happen even when things are bad. But as Christians we never lose that joy. We are never without God and we are never without hope.  ‘Now may God the spring of hope, fill you completely with joy and peace in believing, so that hope may flourish within you, through the power of the Holy Spirit.’