As I have said, the urgency of the command indicates both its importance
and its difficulty. It is important that professing Christians should be
glad Christians (with the joy that is drawn from Jesus Christ, of
course, I mean), because they thereby become walking advertisements and
living witnesses for Him. A gloomy, melancholy, professing Christian is
a poor recommendation of his faith. If you want to 'adorn the doctrine
of Christ' you will do it a great deal more by a bright face, that
speaks of a calm heart, calm because filled with Christ, than by many
more ambitious efforts. This gladness is important because, without it,
there will be little good work done, and little progress made. It is
important, surely, for ourselves, for it can be no small matter that we
should be able to have travelling with us all through the desert that
mystical rock which follows with its streams of water, and ever provides
for us the joys that we need. In every aspect, whether as regards men
who take their notions of Christ and of Christianity, a great deal more
from the concrete examples of both in human lives than from books and
sermons, or from the Bible itself--or as regards the work which we have
to do, or as regards our own inward life, it is all-important that we
should have that close union with Jesus Christ which cannot but result
in pure and holy gladness.
But the difficulty, as well as the importance, of the obligation, are
expressed by the stringent repetition of the commandment, 'And again I
say, Rejoice.' When objections arise, when difficulties present
themselves, I repeat the commandment again, in the teeth of them all;
and I know what I mean when I am saying it. Thus, thought Paul, we need
to make a definite effort to keep ourselves in touch with Jesus Christ,
or else gladness, and a great deal besides, will fade away from our
grasp.
And there are two things that you have to do if you would obey the
commandment. The one is the direct effort at fostering and making
continuous your fellowship with Jesus Christ, through your life; and the
other is looking out for the bright bits in your life, and making sure
that you do not sullenly and foolishly, perhaps with vain regrets after
vanished blessings, or perhaps with vain murmurings about unattained
good, obscure to your sight the mercies that you have, and so cheat
yourselves of the occasions for thankfulness and joy. There are people
who, if there be ever such a little bit of a fleecy film of cloud low
down on their horizon, can see nothing of the sparkling blue arch above
them for looking at that, and who behave as if the whole sky was one
roof of doleful grey. Do not you do that! There is always enough to be
thankful for. Lay hold of Christ, and be sure that you open your eyes
to His gifts.
Surely, dear friends, if there be offered to us, as there is, a gladness
which is perfect in the two points in which all other gladness fails, it
is wise for us to take it. The commonplace which all men believe, and
most men neglect, is that nothing short of an infinite Person can fill a
finite soul. And if we look for our joys anywhere but to Jesus Christ,
there will always be some bit of our nature which, like the sulky elder
brother in the parable, will scowl at the music and dancing, and refuse
to come in. All earthly joys are transient as well as partial. Is it not
better that we should have gladness that will last as long as we do,
that we can hold in our dying hands, like a flower clasped in some cold
palm laid in the coffin, that we shall find again when we have crossed
the bar, that will grow and brighten and broaden for evermore? My joy
shall remain . . . full.