Don’t Let Anyone Mess with Your Joy: Homily on John 10:27-30

One day St. Peter was standing at the pearly gates when a group of three men came up to him and wanted to get in to heaven.  There was a teacher, a businessman and a lawyer.
          St. Peter told them that to get in to heaven, each one would have to answer a question.  St. Peter started with the teacher, who seemed like a nice-enough guy, so St. Peter threw him a softball question.
          “Tell me,” St. Peter said, “the name of the ship that hit an iceberg on its maiden voyage and sank, with lots of people drowning.  There was a movie made about it a few years ago.”
          The teacher thought a bit and said: “The Titanic.”
          “Right,” St. Peter said, and directed him into heaven.
          Then St. Peter turned to the businessman,  about whom he wasn’t quite so sure, so he asked a bit harder question.
          “Tell me,” he said, ‘about how many people drowned when the ship sank.”
          Fortunately the business man had seen the movie recently, and said: “About 1250.”
          “Close enough,” St. Peter said, and welcomed him in to heaven as well.
          Then St. Peter turned to the lawyer, looked him up and down, and finally said: “What were their names….”
          This time of the year, the Easter season, is one of particular joy for us, because we remember week after week the fact that we have eternal life, not because of some question that we answer, but because of Jesus’ saving work, His death and resurrection.
          And we see that idea of joy throughout the readings today.  In the first reading, Paul and Barnabas leave Antioch in Pisidia “filled with joy and the Holy Spirit.”
          In the responsorial psalm we are told to “sing joyfully to the Lord,” and to “come before him with joyful song.”
          In the Gospel John quotes Jesus as saying: “My sheep hear my voice; I know them and they follow me. I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand.”
          Jesus is telling us that we have eternal life, and will never die, and that no one can take us out of his loving hands.
          Of course, we’re joyful
          As the ancient greeting of the Church goes: “Christ is Risen!  Alleluia!”
          To which we respond: “He is Risen indeed! Alleluia! Alleluia!”
          But do we really mean that “Alleluia”? Do we really experience the joy that is so much the point of the Gospel?
          Do we have that fundamental sense of peace, of happiness, or well-being that Pope Francis has in mind in his Apostolic Exhortations—the one he entitled “The Joy of the Gospel” two years ago and the one he just issued a week or so ago called “The Joy of Love”?
          Or has our Easter joy faded?
          It is easy for that to happen. Maybe we have let the troubles of this life get us down—those things that go wrong from time to time. Maybe we’ve had a bad day at the office, like Paul and Barnabas had when they got thrown out of Antioch in our first reading.
          Or maybe we forget the immense importance of the Easter events—forget that the Gospel is really “Good News”—because we’ve heard the stories before and they aren’t “News” any more, so they don’t really stick with us.
          Or maybe we don’t really believe that wheat Jesus says today is true—that we have been given “eternal life” and will “never perish.”
          So what to do to recover that “joy” we hear so much about today?
          First of all, we might remind ourselves over and over what Jesus tells us, not just here but throughout the Gospels—that he came to give us eternal life, that He died for us while we were still sinners,  that He is the Good Shepherd who gives up His life for us.
          Jesus today tells us that He has our back,  that we can rely on Him.
          It is the consistent message of the Gospel, and we can believe it because we know what He did.
          But the other thing that Jesus did—the thing that we might reflect on particularly today when 19 young people will receive the Eucharist for the first time here- -is institute the Eucharist.
          Pope Francis likes to say that the Eucharist is “not a prize for the perfect, but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak.”
          And that medicine, that nourishment, is powerful as a way to recharge our joy.
          You know, it is interesting—the Pew Research folks came out with a study this week on happiness in which they compared happiness of highly religious people—by which they meant people who went to church once a week and prayed daily—to the happiness of those who weren’t. 
          The highly –religious people were statistically, demonstrably more happy.
          Of course, that study just talked about going to church.  I bet if they studied people who received the Eucharist at least once a week they’d find an even greater difference in the joy in their lives compared to the joy of those who didn’t.
          We all know the right “medicine,” the right ”nourishment”—especially when it is “powerful”—can make a huge difference.
          Finally, I’m reminded of the words on my favorite skyway preacher, who sings and greets people sometimes in the skyways downtown.  One of his favorite sayings is: “Don’t let anyone mess with your joy today.”
          And it is true.  People will want to mess with your joy.  They’ll want to bring you down, to tell you how terrible things are now compared to how they used to be, how we’re going to “hell in a handbasket,” how this is a “crooked and perverse generation.”
          That last phrase might ring a bell, because it is what Paul said about folks 2000 years ago in his letter to the Philippians.
          There are, and always have been, forces in the world that want to mess with our joy, because joy is contagious, because joy builds on joy, joy makes people want to see where it came from and get some themselves.
          Joy brings people to the Church, to Christ, and ultimately to eternal life.  Joy is how the Gospel is spread.
          So, recognize all the efforts to interfere with your joy for what they are—a tool of those forces in the world that oppose the “Good News” and resist them those efforts—don’t let anyone mess with your joy.
          Because---
          “Christ is Risen!  Alleluia!!”
          “He is Risen indeed!! Alleluia!! Alleluia!!”