Have you ever heard anyone use the phrase, “Good times. Noodle salad.” (Lots of NOs.) I’m not surprised. I’ve actually used this phrase on and off for nearly 30 years, but it has never really caught on. Now, you might ask why I would use a phrase like this. Where did it come from and what does it mean? Well, I will get to that in a minute, but first I want to tell you what led me to share this with you in the first place.

April shared with me a video this week that was about a 78 year-old man who went to the same diner every day for lunch and dinner. He came in at the same time and always ordered the same thing: a cup of gumbo, light on the rice, and no crackers. Twice a day for 10 years, Charlie Hicks was at the Shrimp Basket for his gumbo. Then suddenly, one day, he wasn’t. He didn’t show up for several days. The chef at the Shrimp Basket, Donnell, grew concerned. He left in the middle of the day to go to Charlie’s apartment. He knocked repeatedly to no answer. As he was turning to go, he heard a quiet call for help coming from inside. Donnell opened the door to find Charlie lying on the ground. Charlie was taken to the hospital where they discovered that he was severely dehydrated and had two broken ribs.

Donnell and the staff at the Shrimp Basket were concerned about Charlie leaving the hospital and going back to his apartment where he was all alone, so they decided to help out. They got him an apartment right next door to the restaurant so they could check on him regularly. They got him new appliances and got the place all ready for him. Pretty soon he was back at the Shrimp Basket for lunch and dinner to get his cup of gumbo. What began as concern and care, turned into a great amount of joy.

In the passage we read from Isaiah 35 this morning, we read about life coming out of barrenness, of joy springing forth like a blossoming desert flower. Isaiah talks about the joy that comes through the saving work of God: the blind will see, the deaf will hear, the lame will walk again, and the speechless will sing. The dry land will become lush and plentiful. And the pinnacle of joy for Isaiah comes when God brings God’s people back to their homeland, back to Zion, back to the temple, to the place where God lives with God’s people. Joy, at its most basic form, is a return to God. It is a return to God’s will and plan, a righting of everything that is wrong. And Isaiah tells us that when joy comes, sorrow and sighing flee away.

When Charlie was able to return to his routine of having lunch and dinner at the Shrimp Basket, joy returned with him. It was the righting of something that was wrong. Unfortunately, not everything that is wrong gets righted, at least not immediately.

In our gospel reading, we heard the text that is called the Magnificat. The word magnificat means “to magnify.” This passage in Luke is the hymn that Mary sings after the angel Gabriel tells her that she will give birth to the son of God. And her hymn begins, “My soul magnifies the Lord,” hence the term Magnificat. Mary heard the words of the angel Gabriel and recognized in them the blessing of God that was upon her and the blessing that God had in store for God’s people.

Now, listen to what that blessing was. “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.” What promises do we hear in there? God promised his mercy for those who fear him. God showed his people strength with his arm and scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. God brought down the powerful and lifted up the lowly. God filled the hungry. Those sound a lot like what Isaiah had written about. God’s promise to Mary is that God has a plan to make everything right.

This week is the Joy week in the season of Advent. This week is a break from the other three weeks for a couple of reasons. First, on this week, we take a break from the penitential waiting of Advent in order to celebrate the joy of what God has, is, and will be doing in and for and through us. And second, the candle we light is a different color than the other weeks. Did you ever wonder why that is? The candles we lit for weeks 1 and 2 were purple. The candle we will light next week for the fourth and final week of Advent will be purple also. But today, on this third Sunday of Advent, we lit the rose candle. The rose candle is believed to have come from a tradition of an ancient Pope who gave the citizens a pink rose in the midst of Lent as a reminder of the joy God brings even in the most painful times. That tradition was then carried over into Advent with the rose candle.

Joy, like that pink candle, stands out as different from the other weeks. Hope and peace are characteristics that tend to come from reflecting upon our lives. And love is an act that we choose to do or it is something we feel when we reflect upon our lives. Joy, on the other hand, is more spontaneous. It will surprise you. Joy will pop up sometimes in the most unlikely of places. We do not seek out and find joy, joy finds us. It comes to us through small acts that take something that is wrong and make it right.

I want to come back to the phrase “Good times, noodle salad.” Does anyone know where that phrase comes from? It is from a scene in the movie “As Good As It Gets” starring Jack Nicholson, Helen Hunt, and Greg Kinnear. In the scene, the three of them are in a car together. They’ve embarked upon a road trip, and Greg Kinnear is telling a very traumatic story of his childhood. Helen Hunt’s character pulls the car off the road so she can give him her full attention as he talks about his father and the break in their relationship when he was younger. When he finishes the story, Hunt’s character says to him, “Hey. We all have these terrible stories to get over.” And Jack Nicholson’s character, who’s been quietly listening in the backseat, interrupts and says, “It’s not true.” The others look at him, confused. “Some of us have great stories, pretty stories, that take place at lakes with boats and friends and noodle salad. Just no one in this car. But a lotta people, that’s their story: Good times, noodle salad.”

That is what we often think of when we think about joy. We think about good times and noodle salad (maybe not actual noodle salad, but metaphorical noodle salad). We think about these arbitrary memories that have come to represent a past joy in our lives. And then we spend our time trying to recreate those in some way. We think that if we could just get back to the good ole days, that joy would be abundant in our lives and in our hearts. But what we find when we try to recreate memories is that they never live up to the hype. The truth is that joy does not come to us through living in the past. Joy is something that we can only experience in the present, and it’s not something we can schedule. There isn’t a perfect formula for creating joy in our lives. Joy comes when God’s plans come to fruition in our lives. When things that are wrong become right. When crooked paths become straight. We can’t make joy happen, but there are two things we CAN do.

First, we can be prepared for when joy comes. Since we can’t make joy happen, and therefore can’t really predict when we will experience it, we must always be prepared to receive it and hang on to it as long as possible. Theologian Karl Barth once said that “Joy is the simplest form of gratitude.” Embracing joy when we experience it is a way of saying thank you to God for making things right.

We can be prepared for when joy comes, and also, we can spread that joy. Joy comes when God’s world is made right, and we have some agency in working toward that reality. We can help God to make things right in the world. We do that through acting with love, through promoting peace, through expressing hope and faith, and through living in the kind, forgiving, accepting way that Jesus lived his life. We can’t make joy come to us, but we can prepare the field so that when it does come, it will produce a great harvest in our hearts and minds, in our lives, and in our communities.

God has promised us joy, just as God promised it to Isaiah and Mary. Let us be ready to receive it when it comes and let us be working to spread that joy to others, in the name of Jesus. Amen.