"SURPRISED BY JOY": JOY IN THE CHRISTIAN LIFE AND IN CHRISTIAN SCHOLARSHIP

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Mar 2004 by Howard, David M Jr

to the house of Israel.

All the ends of the earth have seen

the salvation of our God.

4Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth;

break forth into joyous song and sing praises!

5Sing praises to the LORD with the lyre,

with the lyre and the sound of melody!

6With trumpets and the sound of the horn

make a joyful noise before the King, the LORD!

7Let the sea roar, and all that fills it;

the world and those who dwell in it!

8Let the rivers clap their hands;

let the hills sing for joy together

9before the LORD, for he comes

to judge the earth.

He will judge the world with righteousness,

and the peoples with equity.

Psalm 100:

1Make a joyful noise to the LORD, all the earth!

2Serve the LORD with gladness!

Come into his presence with singing!

4Enter his gates with thanksgiving,

and his courts with praise!

Give thanks to him; bless his name!

5For the LORD is good;

his steadfast love endures forever,

and his faithfulness to all generations.

How can we hear this and not have a great sense of joy? How can we hear this and not want to fall prostrate before the King, or to dance before him, joyfully offering whatever praises we are capable of, however miserable they might be compared to the praises offered by all of creation itself?

In another one of his books, Reflections on the Psalms, C. S. Lewis ponders the question of why people should praise God.49 Before his conversion, he "found a stumbling block in the demand so clamorously made by all religious people that we should 'praise' God; still more in the suggestion that God Himself demanded it."50 But, as he pondered it, he came to realize that all enjoyment eventually overflows into praise: "The world rings with praise-lovers praising their mistresses, readers their favorite poet, walkers praising the countryside, players praising their favorite game-praise of weather, wines, dishes, actors, motors, horses, colleges, countries, historical personages, children, flowers, mountains, rare stamps, beetles, even sometimes politicians or scholars. I had not noticed how the humblest, and at the same time most balanced and capacious, minds, praised most, while the cranks, misfits and malcontents praised least."51

And, concerning that awkward trait of the Psalms-wherein there are incessant urgings to praise, causing a cynic possibly to ask, "Why don't they stop talking about it and just get around to doing the praising?!"-Lewis realized something else, very profound. he writes, "I had not noticed either that just as men spontaneously praise whatever they value, so they spontaneously urge us to join them in praising it: 'Isn't she lovely? Wasn't it glorious? Don't you think that magnificent?' The Psalmists in telling everyone to praise God are doing what all men do when they speak of what they care about."52

The connection between praise-which is not in the title of my address-and joy-which is in my title-comes in that praising the Object of our affections brings us joy. Praise is something that is almost pulled out of us, in spite of ourselves, by the inherent qualities of its Object. We see something of the inherent quality of a thing in Psalm 1, where the object of affection is the law: