We are discovering that celebration is hard work. We are in the middle of a great season of personal and corporate celebrations—graduations from high school, from college, weddings, and so forth. This is a time of great joy, and joy naturally calls us to work so that we might give fuller expression to that joy.
But you are here, on the Lord’s Day, appearing before Him, in order to rest before Him. If you rest in faith on the Lord’s Day, then the work connected to celebration will be work that gives full expression to joy. But if you are not receiving the gifts given to you on this day, which can only be received by faith, then whatever work you are engaged in will become work that frazzles you—and this includes your ordinary work as well as the work of celebration. Work become dark and hard without the glorious work of worshipping God.
Appearing before God in faith, as the weight of glory descends upon you, the ordinary weights and cares and anxieties fall away. You come away from God’s presence blessed, refreshed, nourished, and loved. You have been received—and this means that your works have been received, not as a means of justification, but as the fruit of God’s free grace.
This refreshing from the presence of God does not come as the simple result of sitting for the length of the worship service. It is the result of traveling to heaven and back. What a privilege!