The Fullness of Joy

The Fullness of Joy

C.S. Lewis described his lifelong search for 'Joy' — his word for a specific quality of longing that appeared in his experience through music, nature, Norse mythology, and literature. It was, he wrote, 'an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction.' His memoir Surprised by Joy describes the long journey from this experience to its source. He discovered that what he had been seeking in all those things was not the things themselves but the One they pointed toward. Psalm 16:11 was, for him, the resolution of everything: the fullness of joy is a Person — the One in whose presence joy is complete because its object is finally reached.

Psalm 16:11 describes three things in ascending order: the path of life (guidance for the journey), fullness of joy (complete satisfaction in presence), and eternal pleasures at God's right hand (the permanent, unending dimension of this joy). The fullness and eternality distinguish this joy from every other kind. Other joys are partial and temporary — genuine pleasures that cannot sustain themselves. The joy of God's presence is described as full and eternal: not limited by the occasion, not subject to the decay of time. This is the joy that sustained David through his wilderness years, through his worst sins and deepest losses. It was available to him because it resided not in circumstances but in the Presence he had learned to dwell in.