The Greatest Joy on Earth

There’s a song we sing sometimes in Christian Students on Campus (CSOC) that calls meeting with other Christians “the greatest joy on earth.” To me, something about the combination of “greatest” with “on earth” immediately signals hyperbole—exciting and impressive, but untrue. I don’t often question whether products labeled the greatest on earth actually achieve their title; I just assume they must be at least pretty good. What the song is saying, however, isn’t a hyperbole in any sense. Being in CSOC has taught me that there is indeed no greater joy on earth than being with other believers, loving the Lord together.

Going off to college

When I left home for college, I expected to miss what everyone said I’d miss—home-cooked meals, my dog, and fighting with my siblings. Instead, I missed football. To be clear, I am the opposite of a sports fanatic, and even calling me a “football fan” is a stretch. But when I came back from lunch after church meeting on Sundays and sat in my dorm room trying to do math, a football-field-sized emptiness filled all 107 square feet. For me, football on the living room TV and a spot on the couch next to my mom meant family. In their absence, I began to dread Sunday afternoons as the worst part of my week, the one day out of seven on which I would still reliably cry even well into the second semester.

Finding my second home

If Sunday afternoons were the worst part of my week because I sensed the absence of home, Saturday nights got me through the week because I had one. The first Saturday of the school year, some students from CSOC brought me to a family’s home near campus for dinner and some singing. This home-meeting quickly became the highlight of my week, the one night I felt at ease and at home.

One night I remarked to a couple that came regularly, “Y’all come to the home-meeting, and then you go home. When I come to the home-meeting, I’m coming home.” I never could consider my dorm room as anything more than a base camp, but, within weeks, the home-meeting felt like the closest thing to home that I had. The people in my home-meeting might not have been football fans, but they had a four year old girl who ran up and hugged me when I came through the door, a seven year old boy who tried to entice me into sword-fights, and a group of people who went far out of their way to bring me a Topo Chico when I needed it. The Saturday night home-meeting ate up, for a few hours, all the loneliness that Sunday afternoons made me so aware I had, because I was surrounded by wonderful people in a home.

The people were more than wonderful, though—they loved Jesus, and I found myself loving Jesus more when I was with them. Most days, the only thing that kept me going my freshman year was being with the believers in CSOC and looking forward to the times that I could enjoy Jesus with them. Whether it was at the home-meeting on Saturday night, debating the quality of sparkling water brands and singing Christian songs, or the Bible study on Friday night, reading Romans and going out for boba afterwards, or even just running into another CSOC member in the student center and grabbing dinner together, being with other Christians was the only time when I wasn’t analyzing whether I was happy or not. There was no need to!

All my delight

As for the saints who are on the earth, they are the excellent; all my delight is in them. –Psalm 16:3

“All my delight is in them”—this was what I was discovering. Later in the same chapter it says that in the Lord’s presence there is “fullness of joy.” When we are with other Christians praising the Lord, we have the Lord’s presence and all the joy and delight that comes with it. It’s then that we can forget about our problems, our loneliness, and our emptiness to just rejoice in the Lord.

When I say that being with other Christians is the greatest joy on earth, this is what I mean—not that you won’t have incredible experiences without other Christians, or that any random church meeting should be better than your wedding day. I mean that I’ve never known all of my worries to fade away as quickly and surely as they do when I’m with believers. Then, it doesn’t matter if I’m not productive, if I think someone might not like me, or if I have twelve assignments due next week, because somewhere beneath my anxiety and my pride, at the bedrock of my being, there is fullness of joy. Sometimes, like when I’m studying in a family’s home, it is a quiet, barely-recognizable assurance. Sometimes, like when I’m singing until I’m hoarse in a room packed with college students, it is the greatest, loudest, purest joy I’ve ever known. Regardless of its volume or quantity, this joy alone has no latent anxiety, and it is stronger than my loneliness and homesickness. It is the greatest joy on earth.

By: Ellie Windsor