Rule Number Three: show the joy of the Lord in your life.
I just got home from Mass, and boy was that priest very wordy, went way too long! The singing was terrible, and there was no friendliness at all. Nobody greeted me and said hello or goodbye. My goodness! I wonder why in the world I even go to church!
If you come home and you talked like that, who’s going to want to go with you to church next Sunday? If we show disgruntledness, and anger, and frustration, and grumpiness, who’s going to want to become a Catholic like us? This is why rule number three is to show the joy of the Lord. I’ll give you an example of my father.
My father was a convert to Christianity in 1953 and my dad was so excited about it that the joy just bubbled over him all the time. He always had a pocket full of gospel tracts and wherever he went, he would share with everybody with a smile. My dad had more friends on a Saturday, we had people coming to our house all the time, all hours of the day because everyone loved being around my dad. Why? Because he was so happy and joyful and loving. Jesus had changed his life and he could not get over the happiness of it and the joy of it.
Now that doesn’t mean that we’re going be happy and joyful or that we’re going to have problems in our life. But, when we’re Christians, guess what? We know that all things work together for good for those who love God and are called according to His purpose. So, no matter what’s going on in our life, we can be joyful because God is working in our life for our good. And if people see that joy and that happiness and that love and contentment in our lives, they’re going to say,“What does he have that I don’t have? I want to get what he’s got” and then it opens the door to share with them the fullness of the Faith. People are attracted to happy, to joyful, to beauty, to kindness. And if we’re grouchy and grumpy, we’re going to turn people away. So, if we want to deal with and relate to family and friends and people on the street that were doing evangelism with, let’s show the joy of the Lord. Let’s be happy people.
In fact, who are the happiest people of all? They’re not those out living and sin, and going their own way and doing what they want to do, and fulfilling all of their lusts and desires. The truly happy people are those who put Jesus Christ first, the Saints. If you want to see happy people, read the lives of the Saints, that even though they’re going through troubles and trials in their life, they’re full of joy. Paul says to the Philippines over and over again, and they were going through suffering and persecution, “rejoice in the Lord, again I say rejoice. In everything rejoice.” Part of the fruits of rejoicing is that we will attract people to us. We will bring them to Christ. So, if we’re dealing with family and friends and we’re trying to evangelize, make sure that you’re joyful. Get rid of the grumpiness, get rid of the grouchiness, get rid of the frowns. Smile, love people, be joyful, and remember, that moths are attracted to light not to darkness.