In a Nehemiah passage, the people were weeping from hearing The Word for the first time in generations: "Take heart, the Lord is our strength." So what are the reasons for the Christmas blues? The biblical secret for having joy at Christmas are based on God's promise fulfilled on Christmas morning. When God gives you a promise it is only the beginning. We lose sight of Gods blessings due to personal issues such as: not being thankful for what we have; stress during the holiday season; loneliness; grieving from the loss of a loved one, first holiday without that loved one; family drama around the holidays; an obnoxious family member or holiday guest; going through or having been through a devoice; unreasonable expectations in trying to please someone; Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), due to less daylight.
Jesus is the source and reason for all joy (1 John 1). John is symbolic and imaged based, not to be compared to Paul's writings. John refers to Jesus as: the word of light; "From the beginning"; Made manifest as a human; the light in the midst of darkness, the Life; the hands that have touched; the Son. All these are references to Jesus in the book of 1 John. Life is not measured in the length of time but in the quality. Eternal is the degree quality of life not quantity of time.
We know the truth of Jesus because of the joy we experience through Him. Simply thinking about Jesus does not mean we know Him.
The secret to joy is in helping others to know Him; that we tell others of Jesus so that "our joy may be made complete."
