Teaching Summary: Defiant Joy

This past week was a dark one in our nation.

High-profile deaths, including the gunning down of a national political figure and two high school students in Colorado.

The truth is, these are just the latest headlines in a long pattern of violence. People in Haiti, Israel, Gaza, Ukraine, Yemen, Iraq, and Libya know this pattern well.

And closer to home, we face personal struggles—illness, fractured relationships, mental battles.

We can’t preach the goodness of life with Jesus without also acknowledging how hard life can be.

There are days when hope feels strong—and days when hope feels thin. We wait with unanswered prayers, struggles, doubts, and questions.

So how is it possible to keep the faith in a fallen world?

Some respond with anger—it’s someone’s fault. Others respond with action—we’ll fix this. Many sink into apathy—this is just how it is.

But Jesus calls us to something different. Not hateful. Not heroic. Not hapless. But hopeful.

Revelation 19 gives us a glimpse of the end of the story:

“Hallelujah! For our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready.”

God’s reign is pictured as a wedding feast.

This week, I was sitting in Coffin Park reflecting on all the darkness. Then I looked up and saw a couple getting married—right there in the middle of town, in the middle of the week, in the middle of all this brokenness.

They dared to push back the darkness with vows of love.

That’s the image of Revelation 19. Defiant joy.

How do we answer the darkness? Defiant joy.

We don’t ignore the pain. We grieve, we struggle, but we don’t despair.

Why? Because history doesn’t end in death. It ends in a wedding. In joy. In dessert.

Think of this moment in history as an engagement.

The promise has been made. Jesus has pledged himself to us. We’ve pledged ourselves to him. The Holy Spirit is the engagement ring—the seal of what’s to come.

Paul says in 2 Corinthians 11 that God’s people are promised to one husband—Christ.

So we wait. The promise is secure, but the waiting is hard.

There’s longing.

Anticipation.

Preparation.

And sometimes impatience and doubt.

That’s the tension of Christian life: already secure, but not yet fulfilled.

Jesus told a story about waiting in Matthew 25.

At midnight the cry rang out: “Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!”

Some were ready—lamps burning. Some weren’t. They had lost focus in the waiting.

That’s the call of our engagement period: to stay faithful, to keep our lamps lit, even when the night feels long.

Because the Bridegroom is coming.

One day, the waiting will end.

Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians 4: “The Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God… and we will be with the Lord forever.”

The promise made will be fulfilled.

And that hope shapes how we live now.

Few things feel more out of place in a dark world than a wedding.

And yet weddings shine as acts of defiant joy.

They’re not just ceremonies. They’re signs—reminders of our future.

And it’s not just weddings. Every moment of delight—

A meal shared with friends,

Songs sung with God’s people,

Laughter with children,

Raising a glass in gratitude,

Dancing at a reception—

These aren’t distractions. They’re defiant acts of joy against the darkness. Signs pointing us to our end in delight.

Remember The Shawshank Redemption? Andy locks himself in the warden’s office and blasts Mozart over the prison speakers. Beauty fills the prison, an act of defiant joy in the unlikeliest place.

Red can’t understand it. Andy says, “You need it so you don’t forget that there are places in the world not made out of stone.”

What sense does a wedding banquet make in a dark world?

Every wedding declares that evil, darkness, and brokenness will not win. Love will.

As the Psalmist says: “Weeping may last for the night, but joy comes in the morning.”