You teach me the way of life.
In your presence is total celebration.
Beautiful things are always in your right hand.
Reflection
Total celebration – fullness of joy – abundance of joy. This is what it means to be in God’s presence. Do you remember the last time you experienced that level of joy?
Maybe you’re thinking about your wedding day. Or the birth of your child, a graduation, an amazing vacation to a place you always wanted to see. We often tie joy to once-in-a-lifetime experiences. But, spiritually speaking, is that correct?
On Sunday, I spoke about the fragility of joy, and how we seek to protect it by exercising control. I proposed that if we want more joy, we need to stop waiting until the conditions are perfect and instead embrace awe, beauty, and connection wherever we find them.
This verse from Psalm 16 suggests that cultivating this kind of awareness is a “way of life.” It’s a learned skill, a spiritual practice. But it takes awareness of God’s presence in order to experience it. Today, I want to suggest three concrete ways to be more aware of God’s presence:
- Sit down – Setting aside even 5 minutes to do devotions, or, even better, to sit quietly in prayer, can make a huge difference in how we experience the day.
- Slow down – When we are rushing through life, we will miss moments of beauty that give joy. Almost every night, there is a family of deer who bed down in the woods just behind our house. In the morning, it is such a joy to take time to watch them wake up and begin their day.
- Phone down – If you don’t want to miss moments of connection with other people, learn to put the phone down, make eye contact, and give them your full attention.
Experiencing joy isn’t a matter of good fortune or once-in-a-lifetime experiences. It’s about making room for moments of awe, beauty, and connection in the everyday. And giving God thanks for it all.
by Joe Monahan
For Pondering and Prayer
As we enter into 2026, does anything you read above suggest a resolution you may want to embrace?
Prayer: God, help us to recognize that you are the source of all awe, wonder, truth, beauty, and connection. Whenever we feel any of these things, help us to pause and give thanks. Let us embrace these tiny moments of joy as our way of life. Amen.
