Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy”
June 21, 2026
Rev. Emily Wilmesherr
Decatur Presbyterian Church, Decatur, GA
Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 1 God of joy, open our ears to hear your Word, our minds to understand it, and our hearts to receive it with gladness. May your Spirit fill us with joy and guide us in faithful living. Amen. SCRIPTURE Today’s scripture comes from the First Nations Version of the New Testament. This translation follows the tradition of Indigenous storytellers’ oral cultures while also remaining faithful to the original language of the New Testament. In John 16:20-24, Jesus is speaking with his disciples before His arrest, trial, crucifixion, and death. The disciples do not yet fully understand what is coming, but Jesus does. He knows the pain they are about to endure. He knows the confusion, fear, and grief that will overwhelm them. Listen to the Word of God. 20 “I speak from my heart. Your tears will be many, and your hearts will fall to the ground, because of what will happen to me, but the world around you will have glad hearts. 21 All of you will be filled with sorrow, but your sorrow will turn into dancing! When a woman is giving birth, she has sorrow, for her time of pain has come. But when she gives birth to her child, she forgets her pain, for a new human being has been born into the world. 22 It will be the same for you. You will have sorrow for now, but when I see you again, you will dance for joy. And no one will be able to take your joy from you. 23-24 When that time comes, your questions will be answered, not by asking me but by asking the Father himself. You will then ask the Father in my name, fully representing me. I know you have never asked in this way before, but it is now time. I speak from my heart. When you ask in this new way, the Father will answer, and your hearts will know the full meaning of joy.” The Word of God, for the people of God. Thanks be to God. SERMON One of the things I appreciate about the Indigenous translation of the New Testament is that it often reminds us that faith is not simply about ideas; it is about walking a path. We are travelers on a road. Sometimes it is a beautiful road. Sometimes it is a difficult road. And often it is both at the same time. When Jesus tells his followers that their sorrow will turn to joy, he is speaking to people standing on the edge of heartbreak. The cross is only hours away. Their world is about to come apart. Jesus does not sugarcoat what is coming. He does not tell them everything will be fine. He does not promise they will avoid suffering. He does not offer clichés or easy answers. Instead, he says plainly: “You will weep and mourn.” The Christian faith has never been a denial of suffering. Jesus never asks us to pretend that pain isn’t painful. He never asks us to call tragedy a blessing or grief a gift. Pain is real. And in this broken world, pain is inevitable. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 2 Many of us have been taught to think of joy as the reward for surviving suffering. We imagine joy waiting for us at the finish line—after the diagnosis is gone, after the grief subsides, after the conflict resolves. But life rarely works that way. As author, theologian, and seminary professor, Kate Bowler writes, “experiencing joy does not depend on everything getting better.” Joy is not something we earn when all the pieces finally fall into place. Joy can appear right in the middle of the mess. It can meet us in the waiting room, at the graveside, in the uncertainty, and in the unanswered questions. Every person here carries some kind of wound. Some are visible. Some are hidden. Some are recent. Some have been carried for decades. We know the pain of broken relationships, of illness, of disappointment, of injustice and the pain of burying those we love. Jesus does not dismiss any of it. He says, “You have pain now.” And that simple acknowledgment matters. Because sometimes the most faithful thing we can do is tell the truth about what hurts. We are experiencing pain now. On a recent trip to the playground, I witnessed a little girl get hurt. Her friend helped her limp over to her dad to get checked out as she sobbed in the pain. The parent determined she would survive but the pain was still there. The little girl’s dad told her to take a break for a little bit before returning to play. Instead of abandoning her friend in pain, the girl sat down with her on the ground and just put her arm around her. She didn’t make the pain go away and she didn’t leave. She was just present in her pain. The pain is not the end of the story. Jesus continues by saying: “Your pain will turn into joy.” Notice what he does NOT say. He does NOT say pain will simply be replaced by joy or that the suffering will disappear and joy will arrive. He says that sorrow itself will somehow be transformed. To explain this mystery, Jesus uses the image of childbirth. A woman in labor experiences real pain. The pain is not imaginary. The pain is not minimized. Yet the pain becomes part of a larger story. The suffering is caught up into the miracle of new life. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 3 Jesus is saying that God has a way of bringing life from places that look like death. Resurrection is God’s specialty. The cross became resurrection. The tomb became new life. The place of deepest sorrow becomes the place where joy is born. That is the pattern of the gospel itself. On Friday, all the disciples could see was loss.Their hopes had died. Their future seemed shattered. Everything they believed about Jesus appeared to have come to an end.But Easter morning revealed that God had been at work even in the darkest moments. Not absent. Not defeated. Working redemption through what appeared to be failure.The cross was not the end of the story. And because of Christ, neither is any sorrow we carry. That truth is not only for the first disciples. It is for us too. It is reflected, in a different way, in the story we remember during Juneteenth. When we celebrate Juneteenth, we celebrate freedom delayed but not denied. We remember generations of enslaved people who endured unimaginable suffering under a system that violated the dignity God had given them. Their suffering was not good. Their oppression was not God’s will. Their pain was not justified by the freedom that eventually came. And yet evil did not have the final word. Many lived and died without seeing the freedom they longed for. They planted seeds whose harvest they would never gather. They prayed prayers whose answers would come after they were gone. They worked for a future they themselves would never inhabit. And somehow, they continued to sing. They worshiped. They hoped. They raised children. They built communities. They testified to God’s faithfulness. How? How do people endure suffering without surrendering to despair? Because they understood something profound. Joy is not the absence of pain. Joy is the conviction that pain is not the whole story. Joy is trusting that God is still writing chapters we cannot yet see. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 4 Many who longed for freedom never experienced it personally. Yet they believed their children might. Their grandchildren might. Future generations might. They understood that life can have meaning beyond what we ourselves will witness. That is holy hope. That is sacred joy. It reminds us that joy is larger than happiness. While we often use happiness and joy interchangeably, they are not the same thing. Happiness depends on circumstances. Joy runs deeper than any situation. Happiness says, “Things are going well.” Joy says, “God is still here.” Happiness comes and goes. Joy endures. Happiness is tied to outcomes. Joy is tied to presence. That matters because there are seasons when happiness simply is not possible. Joy is not forced positivity. Joy is not pretending. Joy is not denial. Joy is the deep confidence that God remains present and that life remains held in God’s hands. Kate Bowler also writes that joy reminds us that “no matter what, life is still worth loving.” Life is worth loving even when it is fragile. Life is worth loving even when it is unfair. Life is worth loving even when our hearts are breaking. That does not mean we pretend everything is fine. It means we refuse to let suffering have the final word. I think about our sweet four-year-old friend, Hattie, who is fighting leukemia. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 5 No one would call that good. No one would say God wanted that. No one would look at a child enduring treatments and say, “At least there’s a lesson in it.” The pain is real. The fear is real. The tears are real. But somehow, so is the joy. There are moments of tender joy. There is the kindness of nurses and doctors. There is delight over snacks from the vending machine for the first time only to discover the joy is greater when you get the prized treats to share with hospital staff. There is laughter with family and friends. There is wonder in hospital tours, bracelet-making, and shared chick-fil-a hash browns. There are moments when a child laughs, plays, and reminds everyone around her that life is still a gift. Some of you are carrying burdens too heavy for happiness. Some of you are grieving. Some of you are frightened. Some of you are exhausted. Some of you are walking through situations with no easy answers. And yet joy remains possible. Not because the pain isn’t real. But because God is real and still working. One of the most important truths of the Christian faith is that God knows what pain feels like. Our faith is not built around an unapproachable God who watches suffering from a safe distance. Our faith is built around Jesus Christ. A Savior who wept, suffered, was betrayed and who cried out from the cross. God knows pain from the inside. And because God knows pain, we never suffer alone. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 6 Nowhere does Jesus promise that every hurt will immediately disappear. Sometimes God brings healing. Sometimes miracles happen. Sometimes doors open. Sometimes burdens are lifted. But sometimes the diagnosis remains. The grief remains. The struggle remains. Even there, Christ comes alongside us. I have lost count of the number of times I have begged God to remove my present suffering. The promise of Scripture is not always rescue from suffering. Often it is companionship within suffering. God with us. Emmanuel. What I have experienced is that with each new painful experience, I realize God has not abandoned me. With each challenging situation my trust for God deepens because I remember God’s faithfulness in each moment of my life, the beautiful and terrible moments. Joy is not the cure. Joy is not the explanation. Joy is not the solution. Joy is the song beneath it all. The song that tells us our lives matter. The song that reminds us that love is still present. The song that assures us God is still near. The song that whispers that death will not have the final word. Perhaps that is what Jesus means when he speaks of joy. He is not offering a strategy for avoiding pain, he is offering a promise that pain does not get the final word. There is a deeper reality beneath the suffering. A deeper hope beneath the tears. A deeper song beneath the sorrow. And because Christ rose from the dead, we know that every pain we carry exists within the larger story of God’s redemption. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 7 Most of us are living somewhere between Friday and Sunday. We cannot yet see the ending. We cannot yet understand everything God is doing. We cannot yet glimpse the fullness of resurrection. But God is still at work. Jesus goes on to say that no one can take away your joy. They can take our comfort, our certainty, our plans and they can even break our hearts. But they cannot take away the risen Christ who has promised never to leave us nor forsake us. The gospel never promises a pain-free life.It promises a Savior who entered our pain, carried our sorrows, died our death, and rose again. The resurrection does not erase the wounds of Jesus. The risen Christ appeared to his friends, still bearing the scars. The wounds remain, but they are no longer signs of defeat. They have become signs of redeeming love. And that is our hope. Pain is inevitable. But because Christ is risen, sorrow is never ultimate. Because Christ is risen, death is never final. Because Christ is risen, joy is always possible. So on this Juneteenth weekend, we remember those who suffered while believing in a future they would never see. We honor their faith. We honor their perseverance. We honor their witness. And we remember that we are called to the same kind of hope. To plant seeds we may never harvest. To love people whose futures we may never witness. To build a world our grandchildren may enjoy more fully than we ever will. To trust that God’s work extends beyond our own lifetimes. Fruit of the Spirit: “Anticipating Joy” 8 Life is beautiful and terrible. Heartbreaking and holy. Fragile and precious. And through it all, the God who knows suffering walks beside us. The God who conquered death goes before us. The God who gives eternal life holds us fast. Pain is inevitable. But so is joy. Because Christ is risen. And because Christ is risen, the song continues. Thanks be to God. Amen.
