“My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of any kind consider it nothing but joy, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance; and let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing.”
~James 1:2-4 (NRSV)
As with all voyages, we’re steering to a land beyond the present horizon—our gaze is set solely for a destination explicit of the next purpose that drives us by faith.
And though we may be clearly short of joy right now we’re headed there if we wish it so; a bearing has been made and a commitment to travel the full course of the blessed sojourn is resolute.
When we make heading for Joy, we know the destination also as Maturity; the navigation through tremulous waters, the testing of faith, in producing patient stillness resplendent in the Lord, despite trials of any kind.
Joy – The Power In, And For, The Journey
It is hard to pinpoint one single virtue as providing antecedent value on the pilgrimage to joyous lands, but could it be that the destination is found throughout the tumultuous meandering of, and along, the journey?
Here we picture joy as the prevailing energy inflating our sails, giving the craft that is our spiritual-state the ingenious grace to cut through the waves of struggle and even burgeoning despair. No longer are we robbed of the vision of joy because it is too far off. It is part of daily experience—or can be.
Such a thing as hope is buoyed by faith to know that the inward attitude and outward demeanour of joy is proving the serenely majestic way through all seas destined for our bow; whether choppy, heavy at swell, or calm.
Joy is hence characterised in resilience; to keep chiselling through those waves of impending doubt, indifference, frustration, and everything else, as each one is met. This is because it knows that a greater prize stands for the winning at the arrival of that cherished destination: the calm sophisticated
Joy – The Final Frontier Of Spirituality
Now we come to joy—the final frontier and ultimate destination of an essential spirituality; the true Fatherland of faith.
But such a joy we arrive at to a paradox: what promised as a destination was no less than a promise of so many more destinations of joy—and, no less, trial—to come.
Weighing anchor at port, setting sail for the unknown horizons ahead, we have stowed the precious provisions that will carry us to the next ports along the course to Maturity. For we know that such a place is no end in itself—in this lifetime—but a continual pilgrimage and destination to be enjoyed each moment.
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Joy is where life is at. So, climb aboard Joy and weigh anchor with Faith at the helm for the land that promises no opportunity at peril, just resilience of hope to the building of spiritual maturity one sailing moment at a time.
© 2012 S. J. Wickham.
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