Ode to Joy (and how to save room for it)

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Rev. Erin Walter
April 13, 2025
First UU Church of Austin
4700 Grover Ave., Austin, TX 78756
www.austinuu.org

Who has time or energy for joy these days? Scholars, activists, artists, and theologians offer us paths to seek that spark of life, even in seasons of struggle. Rev. Erin Walter explores this month’s spiritual theme – joy – and how it can enliven our daily lives.

Chalice Lighting

This is the flame we hold in our hearts as we strive for justice for everyone. This is the light we shine upon systems of oppression until they are no more. This is the warmth that we share with one another as our struggle becomes our salvation.

Intonation: T A Tailor called Sorrow (Brent Baldwin)

Call to Worship

JOY IS HARD
Rev. Joe Cherry

Joy is hard.
Joy requires us to feel safe enough,
to be safe enough,
to open to vulnerability.
To feel joy, you must be brave.

Joy walks into a room after the space has been cleared.
Cleared of shame,
Cleared of doubt,
Cleared of self-recrimination.
Joy is hard.

Joy is hard
and joy is worth the hard work of preparation.
Preparing oneself and setting down all the defenses
all the shoulds and could’ves,
all the should not haves and might haves.

Joy is worth the work.
You are worth the work.
You can start small:
the simple pleasure of your favorite tea,
the grand freedom of a full belly laugh.
Invite joy to be your companion.

Affirming Our Mission

Together we nourish souls, transform lives, and do justice to build the Beloved Community.

Prelude: Te Deum, pt. 1 (Arvo Part)

Reading

INVITATION
Mary Oliver
Oh do you have time
to linger
for just a little while
out of your busy
and very important day

for the goldfinches
that have gathered
in a field of thistles
for a musical battle,
to see who can sing
the highest note,
or the lowest,
or the most expressive of mirth,
or the most tender

Their strong, blunt beaks
drink the air
as they strive
melodiously
not for your sake
and not for mine
and not for the sake of winning
but for sheer delight and gratitude-

believe us, they say,
it is a serious thing
just to be alive
on this fresh morning
in the broken world.

I beg of you,
do not walk by
without pausing
to attend to this
rather ridiculous performance.

It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant,
when he wrote:
You must change your life.

Anthem: Te Deum, pts. 2, 3, 4 (Arvo Part)

Sermon

NOTE: This is an edited ai generated transcript.
Please forgive any omissions or errors.

An excerpt from Ross Gay’s The Book of Delights.

It astonishes me sometimes, Know often how every person I get to know Everyone regardless of everything by which I mean everything Lives with some profound personal sorrow – Brother addicted – mother murdered – dad died in surgery – rejected by their family – Cancer came back – evicted – fetus not okay, – everyone, regardless, always, of everything. Not to mention the existential sorrow we all might be afflicted with, which is that we, and what we love, will soon be annihilated. Which sounds more dramatic than it might. Let me just say dead. Is sorrow the true wild, and if it is, and if we join them, your wild, to mine, what’s that? For joining, too, is a kind of annihilation. What If we joined our sorrows, I’m saying, I’m saying, “What if that is joy?”

I heard somebody out there go, “Ooh.” And that is what I said. That is heavy. Joining is annihilation, and that is joy. I thought to myself, “Okay, Ross gay and the little book of delights.” Woo! I had to squint at it a little bit, but here’s what I think he means by joining as annihilation.

When you join with another, you must let go of the myth of bootstraps or that we can live this life well alone, we join ourselves in community, in love, in making music, in being friends or family for the chance at greater joy than we can ever have in isolation. I feel that in church, in Zumba, in my band, in justice activism, none of which is easy, but all of which brings me the greatest joy. So like many spiritual traditions, for joy, for collective liberation, we are being asked to let go of some of the self and individualism.

I don’t use Facebook as much as I used to for obvious political reasons, but you’re there a lot of you and I love the community that I’ve built with people so I like to ask when I do go there for your input on a subject. And I asked what’s bringing you joy right now and what’s holding you back from joy.

First, just in case I get struck by lightning in the next 60 seconds, I want to tell you my favorite answer first. My seminary classmate and colleague, the Reverend Misha Sanders said, “Middle-aged flirting. It’s hilarious. Our all-night phone conversations go on until, like, 9 PM.” I feel that deeply, Misha. Thank you.

And then we got all the music answers. And I don’t think that’s just because I’m friends with a lot of musicians. I think music is a Universal language of joy for folks. I’ll give you our board president Gretchen Riehl who wrote “Singing always brings me joy and worry holds me back. One of the reasons I like singing in the choir is that I simply cannot think about anything but the music during rehearsals and performances My focus is solely on the music and harmonizing with my friends.” Amen. Amen.

This feels like a good time to tell you that I read in the Friday email that Brent Baldwin is welcoming you to come up and talk to him or email him about getting involved with the adult choir, the youth choir, all the musical programs of the church. So if you would like more joy in your life, you have been invited.

I have some science to go with that. A 2010 depression study from the University of Oaxaca said, “Feeling blah, try some Bach.” The implication of this new, at the time, depression research out of Oaxaca found that folks who did a study between talk therapy, which I am not disparaging, also really helpful, and music therapy. The folks who did the music therapy had 2 .5 times the positive results in addressing their depression and their mental health challenges. Interestingly, this was classical music. Imagine if you chose the genre, but it was classical music and even though not all of the participants were classical music fans at the outset, by the end of the study, many of them were asking where they could find good classical music. Pretty cool.

So I invite you in this moment, just maybe 30 seconds of quiet to think about what is a piece of music that you could turn to when you’re having a hard day? I mean that one song, I was having a good day, but then it took my day way up there. And when I’m having not such a great day, that one song better when I’m dancing goes so far for me. So I’m going to be silent for a second and let you think about might there be a piece of music or art that does that for you and I want you to take it from your brain and put it in your pocket.

Later on when we’re out in a coffee or feel free to take that song out of your pocket and tell somebody about it There were other answers that you gave that we’ve heard before. Reminders to resist the urge to reinvent the wheel and to lean into the spiritual practices and joys that are timeless for a good reason. Nature, animals, babies, good food, community building, honoring our ancestors. Sometimes you combine them.

Michelle Baines, who may be here today, said that her mom’s garden brings her joy. She planted it when she was caring for her, and even though it’s been five years since her mother passed, the growing of the garden, the blooming and especially the flowers this time of year bring her joy and she says each a love note in honor of my mom.

We also have some ancient wisdom that when I was looking back on one of my first services with you in interim ministry back in 2022, I felt it was time to share, again, in this Passover season, this time of contemplation and reverence as Holy Week leads toward Easter’s spirit of miracles. We talked about an excerpt of the Poverty and Justice Bible, which is the one that I’ve come to use in my role as the Executive Director of the Texas UU Justice Ministry. And we talked about in Exodus when the Israelites are on a long, hard journey from slavery to the Promised Land. They’re in the wilderness.

And in this piece, chapter 16, verse 20 through 24, we find out that after the Israelites had walked safely through on dry ground in the desert, Miriam, the sister of Aaron, who was a prophet, took her tambourine and led the other women out to play their tambourines and to dance, then she sang to them. And we talked about the chapter ahead for this church. Some of you are new, but if you would imagine going back with me into a time of great transition and uncertainty, and it was 2022. So COVID was also really fresh in our experience.

There were a lot of unknowns and so the joyful audacity of this sacred text to remind us that when you are going into the wilderness Things are unknown. You don’t know where food or water would even be coming from. Your female prophet brings a tambourine and invites everyone to sing and dance. That joy, that never dancing alone, is an important part of the journey. And Miriam does not wait. She does not wait to get to the other side of that 40 -year journey. She’s prepared with that tambourine and she trusts that the Holy or the community will provide water, food, sustenance, enough to have room in that pack for the tambourine. Please keep that with you.

I know Reverend Carrie is going to bring all kinds of tambourines to this ministry. I’ve been so grateful for the tambourines that Reverend Michelle Le Grave and Reverend Chris Jimmerson and the staff and everyone have brought over these years of transition. And I have one more service with you later this month, so this is not my goodbye.

So in the interest of time, I’m not going to give you all the things. But I do in this service where we’re kicking off a month of joy focus want to leave you with this that I told you in 2022. I said, as your interim minister, I get to ask you to be patient and bring a spirit of abundance and ask myself to do that too. I get to invite you to make room for joy and don’t hoard it till the end. We will ask hard questions and try to be patient, especially when a sense of urgency bubbles up that might not be so truly urgent.

Today I celebrate that you all have done that. I talked to the other ministers, I talked to the staff, we talked about what has it been like, and you all have done that. It’s amazing. I asked you to be curious and patient and willing to try new things, and you did, and we have.

So I’ll leave with you today before we sing ourselves to the end of the service and into coffee hour with the top five things I hope we remember about joy for this year. And I said, I’m telling you so I can remind myself. And now here they are.

One, save room for joy and do it on purpose.
Number two, don’t wait until everything is complete or perfect to dance.
Invite others in. That was number three.
Number four, be open to new ways of joy, never shaming others for theirs.
And number five, and we have been doing this, joy accompanies us on the journey toward justice.

Thank you for the ways that you have been living joy all this time, not just this month, but we’re gonna celebrate it and amplify it together.

Extinguishing the Chalice

We extinguish this flame, but not the light of truth, the warmth of community, or the fire of commitment. These we hold in our hearts until we are together again.

Benediction

Where you are feeling joy. May you share it. May you invite others in.

Where joy feels impossible may you open your heart even the tiniest bit to bear witness to the joy of another.

May we live our lives like this is the one we’ve got because we’re not sure but we know, we know we have today and it is hours to live fully, joyfully and in beloved community.

Amen, Ashe, blessed be and may we go in peace.

Postlude: Te Deum, pt. 5 (Arvo Part)

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