Happiness Sunday: Opt for the Joy of the Lord!
Zephaniah 3:14-18a; Philippians 4:4-7; Luke 3:10-18
A young girl went to her mother to ask her about the origin of human beings. Her mother said to her, “My daughter, we are all descended from Adam and Eve: they were our first parents.” Not very satisfied with the response she got, she went over to her father to ask him the same question: Dad, where did human beings originate from, she said. Her father responded: “we are a production of evolution, we evolved from apes and monkeys, they were our first parents”. More confused than ever, the little girl returned to her mother to say: mom, I asked you about the origin of human beings and you said we are descended from Adam and Eve; I asked Dad the same question and he said we evolved from apes and monkeys: who is telling the truth between the two of you? Her mother replied: “My daughter, I told you where my family descended from, and your father told you where his family descended from!”
One thing today is sure – happiness is in short supply, no thanks to fundamentalisms of all kinds, and killings of all proportions. Our television sets are the theaters where these violence reach us. Unfortunately, some of us are affected by the ripple effects of violence, not to mention collateral damages; these days, not even the Vatican City is spared extra security measures, as she celebrates the begin of the year of Jubilee.
It might appear that the elimination of ISIS, Boko Haram, etc. will guarantee peace upon earth. But what about gun violence, gangsters’ killings, substance additions, pornography and prostitutions of children or organ trades and slavery? Added to the list is the rise in the number of suicide cases, when individuals and groups believe that life is meaningless, so it is not worth living!
Surely, the list of woes plaguing our times are endless; listing them is sufficiently nauseating, but one good comes from this enterprise – humanity needs help! This help goes beyond politics and human legal systems – America has not succeeded in curbing gun violence despite its laws and massive weapons; NATO has not stamped out Islamic radicalism and intra-European wars; the Catholic Church has not obliterated child abusers from its ranks; narco-trafficking continues unabated in South America; cancerous abuse of human rights eats deep into Asia; underdevelopment and humanly created sufferings have become cherished virtues in Africa.
Just like in our story above, where evolution replaces Christian account of human origin, all the different humanly contrived solutions to human problems are doomed to fail. However, there is a way out of human misery and the total failure of human enterprises to salvage humanity from its entrenched mess – God! God is the answer to the problem of a failing humanity, not to say humanity on the edge of a precipice. The first stage of human happiness comes from the knowledge that a solution exists in Jesus, the Savior of humanity.
Zephaniah 3:14-18a bases the joy of the returnee Jews on two reasons: firstly, what the Lord had done and, secondly, on the Lord’s presence among his people: “The Lord has taken away the judgments against you, he has turned away your enemies. The king of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst; you shall fear disaster no more” (Zephaniah 3:15). The presence of God is in tandem with his intervention to bring happiness. This happiness is in two ways: firstly, the human person is happy because the sources of sadness and unhappiness are taken away by God, but God too is happy: “he [God] will exult over you with loud singing as on a day of festival” (Zephaniah 3:17). Secondly, fidelity to God is the source of human happiness, and human sadness and sorrow come from a divorce from God – sin!
The source of unhappiness, which is the vision of life contrary to God’s desire for human beings, that is, the elimination of God from human enterprise by sinful acts, is remediable by prayer. This is the point Paul makes, when he says: “Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God” (Philippians 4:6). The power of prayer is essential because God only gives good gifts to his children. When we pray for anything and do not receive it, it simply means that God judges it unnecessary for our lives.
Another dimension to prayer is that it serves as a means to invite God into our lives and situations. The separation which our sins continue to cause experiences an overhaul through prayers because God returns to us when we invite him back into our lives. A sincere prayer is a determination to change for the better as today’s gospel shows: a change that returns happiness to those who have lost it and gives happiness to those who lack it.
John the Baptist gives pieces of advice today in order to ensure human happiness – corporal works of mercy (sharing with the needy); justice – no extortion. These pieces of advice come on the heels of the request/prayer of the soldiers and tax collectors to John – their desire to change their lives for the better, and to invite God into their lives and society. “So, with many other exhortations, he proclaimed the good news to the people” (Luke 3:18). Basically, every preacher’s job is to proclaim the “good news,” not bad news. Christianity is good news; and, it remains good news only with the presence of God in our lives and society.
Whatever our health, family, financial, racial, religious and political conditions may be, if we find reasons to be happy in God’s blessings to us and bring happiness to others, God will dwell among us, and his presence will bring us joy. Remember that every good action, like joy, is contagious; let us contaminate and infect others with the virus of happiness and goodness for an eventual creation of a happy world!
Assignment for the Week
Could you be an emissary of joy this week: spreading only good news, not bad news, by offering something nice to a needy person for Christmas?