Pursuing Love and Joy, Peace and Hope

            Many of us are making a mad rush toward Christmas Day. We are making our lists and checking them twice. We have diligently searched the malls and specialty stores for that unique gift for someone dearly loved. There are a thousand invitations to share the holiday joy with co-workers, friends, and family. Christmas day will likely find us smiling through our exhaustion.

            Why all of this endless activity during this season? Why is there a spirit of generosity hovering over our lives for these few days? Why does December bring a rebirth of love, joy, peace, and hope in our hearts? How are we able to jettison our cynicism and skepticism to perpetuate the myth of Santa Claus and his eight tiny reindeer bringing packages to all the good little boys and girls? Where do we find the courage each year to deny for a few days the pain and pathos of our world?

            I suspect this desire is primal. Deep within our souls, we yearn for love and joy, peace and hope. The Christmas season grants us an opportunity to seek these things with passion. We hope, by the power of our will to infuse, some love and joy into our lives and the lives of others. We demand that peace and hope be considered in spite of the depressing events reported by news agencies. Perhaps to paraphrase John Lennon, we say at Christmas, "Let's give peace a chance! Let's give hope a chance! Let's give love a chance! Let's give joy a chance!" For a few days, with all our strength and courage, we seek the deeper meanings of life.

            By the waning hours of Christmas day, however, many of us will come face-to-face with our deep disappointments. The love and joy, peace and hope we attempted to capture with our gifts and festive moments will prove to be fleeting. Our children, who were dazzled in the early morning hours by the sight of those long-expected gifts, will be bored by mid-afternoon and cranky by nightfall. When January comes and the bills arrive, we will soberly realize that the god, Materialism, is powerless to bring us what we desire most: love and joy, peace and hope.

            Love and joy, peace and hope do not come through frantic activities over a few weeks of the year. A toy does not satisfy a child's need for love and companionship—neglected over many months. Lavish dinners and holiday decorations do not bring healing to wounds and hurts ignored the rest of the year. Love and joy, peace and hope require a concerted effort the whole year.

            The prophets anticipated God's desire for his world. Isaiah believed that the coming of the child would be the catalyst for the transformation of all of creation. Listen to Micah's vision of the new world that is coming:

            And many nations shall come, and say,

            Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

            and to the house of the God of Jacob;

            and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths.

            And he shall judge among many people,

            and rebuke strong nations from afar off;

            and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,

            and their spears into pruning hooks:

            nation shall not lift up a sword against nation,

            neither shall they learn war any more.

We must not fail to notice Micah's choice of language. He does not say that swords melt into plowshares or that spears magically change into pruning hooks. Micah deliberately says, "they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks."[Emphasis mine] Those powers which resist love and joy, peace and hope are not easily defeated. Swords must be beaten into plowshares. Someone must build a hot fire to soften the forged steel of the sword, and someone must wield the hammer that beats the sword into a plowshare.