This short reflection was preached at our final midweek Holy Communion service for the year, held on 17 December 2025, during the season of Advent. Drawing on Luke 2 and insights from C. S. Lewis’s Surprised by Joy, it reflects on the distinctive nature of Christian joy – not as sentiment or optimism, but as a deep, God-given assurance rooted in the coming of Christ. It is shared here so that members of our wider church family may read, reflect, and pray with it during this week of joy as we prepare our hearts for Christmas.
In Luke 2, the angel appears to the shepherds and says,
“Do not be afraid; for see – I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people.”
Joy is the word that rings out at the very heart of the Christmas story. Not comfort. Not sentiment. Not nostalgia. Joy.
And yet, the joy announced here is not the kind of joy the world usually expects. It is not noisy or triumphant. It is spoken into the dark, ordinary night of shepherds keeping watch over their flocks. It comes first to the overlooked and the weary. And it comes not as an idea, but as a person – “to you is born this day a Saviour.”
C. S. Lewis helps us think more deeply about this kind of joy in his spiritual autobiography, Surprised by Joy. Lewis describes joy not as simple happiness or pleasure, but as something deeper, sharper, and more piercing. He speaks of joy as an intense longing – a sudden stab of desire – that points beyond itself.
Lewis writes that joy is always about something else. It awakens a longing for a beauty, a goodness, a fullness that the world itself cannot finally satisfy. Paradoxically, joy often arrives mixed with sadness, because once we experience it, we realise we cannot hold onto it. It slips through our fingers.
Lewis came to see that this longing was not a cruel trick, but a clue. Joy, he concluded, was a signpost pointing him to God. As he famously put it, “If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”
That insight helps us hear Luke 2 more clearly.
The joy announced by the angels is not the absence of hardship. The shepherds will still return to their fields. Mary and Joseph will still face uncertainty and danger. The world will remain broken. But something decisive has happened: God has entered the story.
Christian joy, then, is not optimism. It is not pretending everything is fine. It is the deep, steady assurance that God is with us and for us, even in the darkness.
Notice how the shepherds respond. They go to Bethlehem. They see the child. And then they return – glorifying and praising God. The circumstances of their lives may not have changed, but they have. Joy has reoriented their hearts.
This is the joy Lewis eventually discovered in Christ – not a fleeting emotion, but a settled delight rooted in truth. Joy that does not deny suffering, but transcends it. Joy that does not end in itself, but leads us to worship.
In Advent, we are reminded that joy is not something we manufacture. It is something we receive. It comes as a gift, often when we least expect it. Like the shepherds, we are surprised by joy – surprised by grace.
And this joy is for all people. For the tired. For the doubting. For those in transition. For those who are waiting. Joy does not require that life be neatly resolved; it only requires that we turn our hearts toward Christ.
As we come to the table today, we come not because we are joyful in ourselves, but because Christ is our joy. Here we meet again the God who has drawn near, the Saviour who has come, and the promise that our deepest longings are not in vain.
So in this week of joy, may we learn to recognise joy not merely as a feeling, but as a sign – pointing us to Jesus Christ, who alone can satisfy the longings of the human heart.
To him be glory, now and forever. Amen.
