One day a nine-year-old went out to fly his kite.  It was a windy day; overcast, low hanging clouds.  The boy set his kite into the wind and soon enough it was up and away, above the clouds, out of sight.  A woman came along and asked the boy what he was doing. 

“Why, I’m flying a kite.”

             And the woman says, “I don’t see any kite.”

             And the boy says, “I don’t either, but every now and then I feel a tug and I know it’s there.”

Every now and then we need a tug. Every now and then our hearts need a tug. It doesn’t take much, just enough to know we are tethered, enough to know the pull and arc of eternity: “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I say rejoice.”  Joy is our anchor. Rejoicing draws us up higher.

 

The word, rejoice comes from a stem meaning something like “Good Morning.”  Upon meeting one another, first century Romans would have said something like, “Hail” or “Health” or “Greetings,” which is what the angel tells Mary according to Luke: “Greetings, favored one. The Lord is with thee!” 

“Greetings” sounds more saintly, more biblical, more “something.” Good Morning sounds pedestrian, but the sentiment is the same: “Rejoice. . . Greetings . . . Good Morning.” 

I don’t care to be around folks who can’t say Good Morning.  I don’t even want to get out of bed if I’m not going to be greeted with Good Morning. Good Morning says, “It’s time to get up. It’s time to get going.  The time for sleep is over. It’s a new day.” 

It’s terrible when you can’t start your day with Good Morning.  Are you ever around people who can’t say Good Morning?  I don’t understand people like that. Makes you wonder what happened to their cornflakes. 

A bad mood can been seen a million miles away.  Some people are like that—they wear a big sign around their neck, “Don’t mess with me.  I’ve got serious business to do.  I’m very, very busy and very, very important. And I don’t have time for Good Morning.”

“Well, all-righty then.  See you later.”

Good Morning is simple enough.  We mean, “I don’t know what’s going to happen today, but I hope something good happens. I hope you’re going to have a good day.  I hope your day turns out well.  I can’t really say if you’ll go out and get hit by a bus, but if you do I still hope it is a good day. Good not because no harm comes to you. Good not because you get every wish, but good because neither you nor I made this day.  Good because this day is a gift.” 

Now it’s true enough no day is a blank page. There’s stuff written over and into every day. No day comes unscripted. Even our best days are filled with have tos and must dos and leftovers-dos. No day is exactly brand new because we’re never entirely brand new.  When we greet a new day we’ve got all kinds of scripts—the argument we had two days ago, the doctor appointment we’re supposed to keep, the checkbook that’s not balanced, the checkbook that won’t balance, the person who disappointed us thirty years ago, the person who disappointed us three days ago, the boss we cannot please, the boss we have to please. Each day begins with all sorts of walking-around-stuff.  Everybody’s got a boat load of walking-around-stuff.  Add that to our list of have tos, must dos, should dos, gonna dos, gotta dos or nothing to dos and you’ve got yourself a morning. 

So, when I say Good Morning, I’m not exactly talking about you but something much larger than you, something that holds your day and my day and all of days in hope, in promise, and in love.

What makes a Morning Good?  What enables us to rejoice? What gives us the “tug” we need not to just “make it” through another day but to make it a good day?  We “rejoice in the Lord.”  When we “rejoice in the Lord,” Mornings are Good.

 

“In the Lord” is a big category. Paul is fond of saying we are “in” Christ.  Some people sign cards, notes, and letters that way.  “In Christ.”  What does it mean to be “in” Christ?  Can I be “out” of Christ?  What would it look like to be “out” of the Lord?  What would it feel like?  Would I know if I were “out” of the Lord?  Is being “in” the Lord something like being “in” a house versus being “out” of a house?  Is that what Paul means by being “in” Christ or rejoicing “in” the Lord?

“In” is a preposition of location. “In” tells us where we are.  We are “in” the state of Alabama.  We are “in” Mobile.  Currently, we are “in” a church building. How do we rejoice “in” the Lord?

Paul says the Lord is “near.”  “Near” can mean “nearby” as in close physical proximity. “Near” can also mean “nearly” as in “Christmas is nearly here.”  Does the Lord have to be nearby or nearly here for me to be in him?  Or might the Lord be nearby and nearly here and I not be in him?  Based on what Paul writes, it sounds like the Lord may be nearby or nearly here and we’re not “in” him just as I may be nearby or nearly in a house, but not also “in” the house. 

To get “in” a house one of two things must happen: either I must move or I must be moved.  Getting “in” may be an act of my will but it is not exclusively an act of my will.  In fact, I may want to get “in” but my legs are broken. In that case, if I’m going to get “in” somebody must carry me in, which leads me to conclude that being “in” the Lord, whether the Lord is nearby or nearly here, is both something I do as well as something that happens to me.

We’re going to baptize yet another Elliott this morning. (If Brad and Kimberly keep this up, our church growth problems will be solved, which may explain why Brad is chair of Evangelism and Membership and why Kimberly wears such a patient smile.)  Anyway, when we baptize Winston, he will be “in” Christ.  This is how Paul puts it in Romans 6:  “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?  Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.  For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.” 

When we are baptized we are put in-to Christ. We are moved from being out of Christ to being in Christ.  By baptism we are carried into the Lord’s house. Through baptism we are placed in Christ which means in the first place that our former selves have died and in the second that on Judgment Day we will be raised from the dead. 

Baptism changes who we are. Baptism gives us a new identity.  Sin and death are no longer our masters.  Paul is not talking self-discipline or reform here, nor is he simply talking about how we feel when we are reconciled or when our sins are forgiven. He is saying that too, he’s talking about “new life,” but fundamentally he’s talking about a miracle. God makes us new people. Through baptism, God gives us new hearts. We are no longer slaves to sin. That miracle, the miracle of redemption, is followed by a second and equally great miracle, the miracle of resurrection.

So far as I know, nobody has ever recovered from death. Death tends to be pretty fatal, pretty final, but those who are “in” Christ will be raised with Christ.  Paul is talking about real flesh and blood death, cemetery death, death as in dead in the ground and no longer alive death.  Those who die “in” Christ will live again.  To be “in” Christ is to have eternal life.  Resurrection happens because we are “in” Christ.  That location is both something that happens to us and something we do.  To be “in” Christ is both God’s act and our response.  When we are baptized, we are put into Christ. When we accept baptism through faith, we live in Christ. Faithful living is expressed through joy, through rejoicing in the Lord.

 

Paul doesn’t say, “Rejoice when your requirements for happiness are met.”  That can be a long list, can’t it?  “I will be happy when I’m skinny. I will be happy when all my children have straight A’s and straight teeth. I’ll be happy when Alabama wins the national title. I’ll be happy when I can run a 10K in under 50 minutes.  I’ll be happy when my mortgage is paid and I’ve got a gazillion dollars in my IRA.  I’ll be happy when I’ve killed an 8 point deer with my bow at 60 yards.  I'll be happy when the wars end. I’ll be happy when Health Care Reform passes or when it is defeated. I’ll be happy when my children are married and well-fed. I’ll be happy when the economy recovers. I’ll be happy when . . .”

“Rejoice in the Lord always.”

Paul does not make joy conditional.  As a matter of fact, Paul is in prison when he writes this letter.  He’s facing death. And the church at Philippi, while one of his favorites, is not rocking along trouble free. He’s got members who are fighting with each other and others who may have departed from the faith.  Paul has more than enough to worry about, all the same he rejoices, his heart strings are pulled—they are tugged.  The force behind the cloud pulls his heart.  Paul is tethered to Jesus. He is “in” Christ so he rejoices “in the Lord.” 

Joy is not determined by circumstance. We don’t rejoice because things turn out favorably.  Likewise, joy is not sunny, upbeat optimism possessing the uncanny ability to ignore unpleasant facts. Nor again is joy a kind of grim, defiant embrace of life’s vicissitudes.   Joy is a function of providence.   As Calvin once said, we “rejoice in the Lord,” when we live knowing that “we are not exposed to either blind fortune or to the caprice of the wicked, but are under the governance of God’s fatherly care.”  We rejoice because we are “in” Christ. 

That tether is beyond sight. It is beyond reason.  When we declare a Morning Good it is not because everything is right with the world, but because this is our Father’s world.  When we declare a Morning Good it is not because conditions for happiness are met, but because this is our Father’s world.  The Morning is Good not because everything turns out just right or as we wished or thought or planned but because this is our Father’s world. This is our Father’s world, the Morning is Good.  That is the promise of baptism. That is our identity “in” Christ.

“Rejoice in the Lord, always. Again I say, rejoice.”  Amen.