Time To Party!

I took a walk around Lake Dora with my friend Steve recently who has been married for twenty years longer than I have. Always curious about the wisdom I can glean from someone a little further in their journey, I asked Steve what advice he would give a younger guy about marriage. He stopped, thought about it for a few moments, and then uttered two simple words.

“Have fun.”

And then we started walking again.

There’s a book in the middle of the Hebrew Scriptures called Ecclesiastes that has several observations about life. The most famous part of the book is from the third chapter, and became the lyrics a few thousand years later to a hit song by the Byrds. The writer reminds his audience that there are times for everything, not just times to weep and mourn, but also times laugh and even dance.

The writer of Ecclesiastes wanted to remind you that you need to celebrate.

My friend Kailey graduated from Seminary this spring after what seemed like an endless entourage of classes and books and papers and exams and typing. (Someone should really do a study on the correlation between online courses and carpel tunnel, just saying). Kailey was unable to attend her graduation ceremony in Pasadena, but her friends and family insisted that Kailey and her accomplishments simply had to be celebrated; they threw her the most glorious and satirical commencement celebration ever…for one single person.

A full program. A processional played on recorder. A video montage of her online seminary experience (basically just a few pics of her laptop). A keynote speech and speaker (yours truly, ahem). Cap and gown. A section of the auditorium reserved for the graduates. Walking across the platform, handing over the diploma, and pausing for a picture.

We even encouraged the crowd to hold their applause until “all” the graduates had received their names called. (Ha!)

All for one, single, amazing person…because her family and friends believed that this person and this day should be celebrated.

A guy named Harvey Cox once said that most people today are pressed “so hard towards useful work and rational calculation he has all but forgotten the joy of ecstatic celebration.” (Oh, and he was a professor at Harvard, so he just might know a thing or two.)

Basically…some of us forget to have fun. We forget to celebrate.

I know I do. Some days the stress and routines and diapers and appointments and deadlines and diapers and meetings and studying and diapers and illnesses and exhaustion wear us down and we forget the simple truth that this day is a gift, and we have a choice in how we will live it. Did I mention diapers? (Yes, I have a two year old.)

It is said in 118th psalm that God gave us this incredible gift we call today. So what does the psalmist say we should do with it? “Celebrate…and be glad in it.”

Or as my friend Steve would say, “Have fun.”

Conversational thought: Look around your life and tell us what you can celebrate!

Jeremy Bell is pastor of Grace City Church in Sorrento, Florida. Website: WeAreGrace.City