A young preacher in his first pastorate in a small Northern mill town was talking for the first time with the mill owner who said, "Young man, you have not seen me in church and you will not see me until my funeral. I own this town and this mill. It is my pot of gold. When I came here as a young immigrant I heard that in America there was a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. I found the gold, but, young man, I lost the rainbow." He didn't have to, but he did. Life is never a choice between the rainbow and the gold. We can have both.
After speaking to a conference of corporate presidents in Canada, a group of us were discussing personal success and how to define it. One of the presidents engraved his definition in my memory: "I would like to live rich as well as die rich." He had learned how to keep the rainbow and the pot of gold.
The rainbow, from its beginnings, has been the symbol of hope ---- the promise of ultimate victory and the relatedness with the eternal and divine. I hope you will live rich and die rich, but if you have to make a choice --- live rich.
Recently a restless friend said, "I feel a lack of joy in my life. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth it." He seemed passive to life, acted upon by circumstances, pressured by events, absorbing the pessimism of the many who go about their daily life realizing that joy is a result of what we think and do. Most of which we can control if we have the courage to take charge of our lives.
When I speak of "joy for the journey" I am not talking about surface happiness which comes like the wind without knowing where or why. Joy is more than fortuitous circumstances. Who needs joy when everything is going right? We need it when life is out of join. Joy is that deep adequacy --- that determined will to survive --- that faith to believe that "all things work together for good."
Oftentimes I've read of "secrets" of joy but actually there are no secrets to be hunted and found like Easter eggs, or pried out of some mysterious guru, nor found in effervescent books or discovered in esoteric cults. Joy is a result. It is a reward for life's being well spent in hope. It truly is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
Joy is available to any normal, healthy personality. Perhaps there are certain individuals who suffer from a diseased spirit in which melancholia replaces joy, but in most there is the capacity for joyfulness. I am convinced that if we have ever been capable of knowing joy we can develop and control our emotions so that joy can find a comfortable and permanent home with us. Judy Garland in all of her searching never found that place "somewhere over the rainbow" but a true spiritual home can be ours and the rainbow can reflect hope.
