Interrupting Joy

Sometimes all I have are little pieces, shards, of joy that pierce otherwise too full days. 

Some days, the ones filled with hurt and loneliness, days when it’s easier to burrow into the down comforter than it is to engage, these are the days when joy seems to be ever dancing around the edges.  Peeping in through the cracks.  Distant, not daring to intrude on self-imposed solitude.

See the original, by artist Julie MacMilon, on her website here

But it’s still there.  I just have to open up.  Give it some space.  Let it take just the smallest bit of my time.

Joy is always waiting to be let in.

An e-mail, from an acquaintance-turned-heart-hewn-friend, because that’s what months of daily prayers will do, of thanks.  One that reminds me my God is a God of wonders and miracles.  One that simply says, the pajamas finally fit.  And like that, awe erupts, singing; like a flock of birds set to soar on dawn’s breaking. 

Joy

Or an article, sent by hands more recently stilled by illness and too much alone-ness.  To remind me, that in spite of my propensity to wound and fail, there is a God-time that outweighs my daily paces.  I laugh; lightness enters my grave-rut of failures.  And I can climb back out again.

A journal of volleyed queries and ink whispered i-love-you’s etched on hearts too tiny to know real breaking.  Space to capture what washes on the shores of my soul.  And the gospel, tucked so neatly into it all.  A reminder that I have not yet arrived.  That the tender mercies will be new again on the morrow.

Falling snow, telling me that I am heard.  I am listened to, even when my sins overcome me, and evil has won yet again.  I am still beloved. 

I can still inhabit joy. 

Because the intimacy I ache for, that we all ache for, is waiting to be found in Jesus.  Joy is found in knowing, and the being known by, Christ.  He is the author of these moments, these eternities shrouded in temporal pursuits. 

Pause.  Breathe him in.  Soak up his presence.  And let joy surprise, interrupt the paces of your heart. 

Another original work by Julie McMillon, found at her esty shop here.