Sunday, June 23, 2023

Proper 7

Mark 4:35-41

The Rev. Francene Young

Earlier this year in March, I was invited to present at a conference for SENIORS called “Abundant Living.” The conference is a collaboration between our Camp Allen and the John Sealy Center on Aging at the University of Texas Medical Branch (or UTMB) in Galveston. It was started 21 years ago by the Rev. Helen Appleberg. Each year there is a conference theme. This year’s theme was Joyful Living.

In my interactions with the participants, I came to realize that most of them remained JOYFUL and JOYFILLED despite the challenges and stresses they have and in many cases still face.

More than anything else in our lives, stress causes us the most serious hazards to our health, our peace, our relationships, and our ability to live life to the fullest. Stress inhibits our ability to handle the unexpected and closes us off in our interactions with others. It can keep us in a state of “fight or flight,” which means what it sounds like. Instead of engaging in life and loving, we will either “fight” it or we will “flee” from it. In doing so, we will make every situation worse, and will isolate ourselves even more. Stress can close us off from life in ways that make our journey one of terror instead of one of adventure.

In a sermon by Pastor Lori Wagner, she suggests we need to increase our “joy ratio.”

In her sermon, Wagner cites Psychologist Barbara Frederickson says that every negative emotion we experience is best countered by three positive emotional experiences. This is called the “joy ratio.”

This 3:1 ratio can help us to stay healthy, calm, and resilient through life’s challenges and storms.

Now Joy is not the same as happiness. Joy comes from a feeling of satisfaction with life, a feeling of being blessed. The more we live out of a feeling of joy, the more our physical and emotional health, our relationships, and our motivations and ability to deal with life’s unexpected challenges will improve.

But experiencing joy is not the same as having mountaintop moments of happiness, taking vacations, or inserting more “down time” in your day. It doesn’t mean “not working.”

Joy is not all about play. Joy is a frame of mind, or more accurately, a frame of spirit, in which you feel a sense of joy no matter where you are or what you are doing.

When you live out of a place of joy from the depths of your spirit, you feel joy in your work, you feel joy in your time with others, you feel joy in your challenges. You even can feel joy in moments of hardship. Joy comes from a sense of “deep satisfaction and calm” that runs deep below the surface of your psyche.

WHY AM I TALKING ABOUT JOY IN THE MIDST OF A STORM??

Barbara Frederickson, who has done extensive research studies on the effects of living out of a sense of joy, tells us that joy, whether from optimism, positivity, laughter, inspiration, gratitude, or relational engagement can entirely change the way we look at ourselves and the world.

Joy literally changes not only our point of view but our entire physiological, psychological, and spiritual make up.

Joy has the power to shift our minds and hearts in a way that

1) opens us up to see things differently. As our vision or perspective changes and widens, so does our awareness, our ability to see possibilities, to be more creative, and to change our sense of value about difficulties and impediments.

2) Joy can also help us see things in a more unified way, see ourselves as part of a bigger picture, and help increase our trust of ourselves, others, and the world around us.

Whether our joy erupts from gratitude, positivity, feeling at one with our surroundings or with our creator, or a feeling of peacefulness and contentment, the more we experience joy in our lives, the more we will see our lives in terms of a grand, exciting adventure rather than a series of hardships and difficulties.

As Jesus assured us, it’s all in the way we “see.” So, how do you “flip your ratio” from stress to joy? From fear to joy?

That’s where Jesus comes in.

In our scripture for today, Jesus had been speaking and teaching from one of the disciple’s boats. When evening came, he asked them to start rowing to the other side, so they, along with other boats, set out across the Sea (Lake) of Galilee. Meanwhile, exhausted from the day, Jesus lay down on a cushion in the boat’s stern and fell deeply asleep.

When a storm rose up, the disciples began panicking. The wind whisked the boat about and waves beat against it, so that the boat was taking in water. Jesus continued sleeping. I love this, don’t you? I mean sleep at the wheel. I can’t imagine Jesus snoring (but I digress).

Meanwhile, the disciples were becoming more and more distressed. At last, they woke him up, incredulous that he was sleeping through the storm and not equally distressed.

Jesus calmed the wind and sea, and they experienced instant calm. He then said to them, “Why are you afraid?” “Where is your faith?”

The disciples still had not come to a point in which they were sure of who Jesus was, secure in what he could do, and unsurprised at the power of God that flowed from his presence. To them, he was still just their teacher.

Now, this is important for us to understand, just as it was important for Jesus’ disciples to understand.

We don’t gain assurance in our faith from believing that Jesus was merely a talented teacher, a good person, a gifted prophet, or a wise leader.

We gain assurance and experience joy like no other in our lives when we suddenly realize who Jesus is –Son of God, Lord of Lords, imbued with all of the creative power of our Creator God, the Saving Grace of the Son, and the continuing authority and change agency of the Holy Spirit. He is the incarnated King of all creation. And he is present with us in our “boats.”

Storms are frightening. But our peace does not come from an absence of storms. It comes from the presence of Jesus within us and around us as we sail on through. Discipleship is a risky business. When we sail the open seas as a disciple and apostle of Jesus, we will encounter storms. No one lives a stormless life. But Jesus is our calm in the midst of the storm and our joy in the midst of the wind.

Sometimes, in our lives, we fear that Jesus does not hear us, that somehow, he is “asleep” to our experiences, our challenges, and our pain. But he is there, and he does care. What we cannot control, he will help us maneuver through. This is cause for joy.

In one of the prayers for Misson in our Evening Prayer service, there is a request to “shield the joyous.” It reads:

Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch, or weep this night, and give your angels charge over those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love’s sake. Amen

We pray to SHIELD THE JOYOUS… I offer a suggestion on how you might shield your joy through the storm…

Many of you know I like music. And you might be anticipating that I will again break out into an off key song at any moment. Well, I do believe there is a song for just about everything.

I recall as a young girl, I was always humming; humming my way through the ups and downs. I still do it today. I hum so much, I have to tell myself to shut up, be quiet and listen.

BUT I WANT TO OFFER YOU A COUPLE OF SONGS TO HUM WHEN YOU FEEL AS IF YOU ARE LOSING YOUR JOY and you need to Shield your joy

“You’ll Never Walk Alone”, most of you know that one.

“Lean On Me” when you’re not strong. I’ll be your friend..

“You’ve Got a Friend” Call Out my name and you know wherever I am, I’ll come running”.

Bridge Over Troubled Water and in our

Hymnal 370 v6: Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ beside me, Christ to win me, Christ to comfort and restore me.”

Think about Jesus singing these to you.

If you believe that Jesus lives with in you, and you think he is asleep, wake him up. Call out his name! Let him sing a song to shield your joy while you hum along.

That’s what we as disciples of Jesus can do:

Call out his name. Hum or sing ourselves back to joy and assurance.

Today, I wish you all of the joy that your heart can hold, and a sense of peace in your heart that only Christ can give. When storms rise up and the winds start to blow, know that the joy in your heart will always sustain you. AMEN