Shane Ash

“If cows can have that much joy, something about our lives needs to change.”

Those were Ashley’s words nearly ten years ago as we drove away from a small creamery in Jay, New York. We had stopped there during our sabbatical, and by chance, the young couple who made cheese invited us to walk with them as they brought the dairy cows in for afternoon milking. So there we were—our family of five in a slow procession up a gravel path toward the barn.

What surprised us wasn’t the milking process. It was the joy—both in the farmers and in the cows themselves. They moved together with a peaceful sense of purpose. Not frantic or giddy. Just steady. Alive. Directed. They knew where they were going. They knew work was ahead, but also that there was rest, food, and a rhythm they trusted. Their joy wasn’t rooted in a life of ease; it flowed from a life of direction.

Ashley’s comment as we drove away wasn’t about buying cows or moving to a farm (though we didn’t rule it out). She was naming something deeper. At that point in our lives, we were doing more daily reacting than moving with intention. We were busy, faithful, exhausted—but not directed. We were doing many good, churchy, ministry-shaped things without a clear sense of what was leading us. We had lost our telos.

Telos is a Greek word that means end, goal, or purpose. It’s not just a destination—it’s a vision that gives shape to everything before it. It’s what pulls you forward when the present feels heavy. It’s what makes the journey meaningful because you trust where it leads.

A couple of years later—seven years ago this week—after we had intentionally reshaped our rhythms and priorities, our spiritual guide Walter came to visit our new home, an old house we were slowly restoring. As he was leaving, he said, “Shane, you can measure the fruit of your decisions by the joy in your children.”

That wasn’t parenting advice. It was spiritual insight. Joy shows up when life is aligned—when daily practices move in the same direction as your deepest hopes. Joy isn’t a reward for getting everything right, nor is it manufactured happiness. True joy is evidence that you’re headed somewhere that’s in line with your clearest desire and deepest hope.

That’s the kind of joy that this week of Advent invites us into.

Today, as we begin the third week of Advent and light the candle of joy, many of us may feel a disconnect. Joy probably isn’t the word we’d use to describe our lives right now. We arrive tired. Carrying fear. Living with uncertainty. So when Scripture speaks of singing and everlasting joy, it can sound distant—even unrealistic.

But Advent joy isn’t naïve optimism. It’s joy born in exile. Advent joy belongs to people who know loss and displacement and still they dare to believe the story isn’t over.

The text that has held my attention this week comes from Isaiah 35: “The ransomed of the LORD shall return and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads… and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.”

Isaiah spoke these words to people living in exile—disadvantaged, displaced, worn down by a system that told them, “This is as good as it gets.” The propaganda claimed life was A+++; but reality of the day was bare survival. Isaiah doesn’t deny their pain. But he does something essential: he gives them a picture.

“There is a road,” he tells them. “There is a destination. You are not wandering aimlessly. You are on your way somewhere.” And that vision didn’t seek to erase their suffering—it reframed it. Exile became the middle of the story, not the end. Suffering became part of the movement instead of meaninglessness. And joy became possible—not because life was easy, but because the path was headed somewhere different. 

Notice what Isaiah doesn’t say. He doesn’t tell them to pray for escape, assign blame, or wait passively for rescue. Instead, he gives them something to do while they walk the road: “Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are fearful, ‘Be strong, do not fear.’”

This is what joy looks like on the ground. Joy steadies what is trembling. Joy speaks courage into fear. Joy walks with others when the road is long and uneven. It doesn’t deny reality—it resists despair. It refuses the lie that nothing can change. Joy activates resilience and keeps people moving forward together.

Here’s the challenge we face: we live in a society that keeps us busy but rarely helps us ask what all that busyness is for. We manage calendars, responsibilities, and obligations—but we never quite name our destination. And when there’s no clear telos, joy becomes fragile. Disappointment feels final. Waiting feels wasted. Exhaustion shrinks our imagination to survival mode, and cynicism whispers that hope is naïve.

I suspect part of the problem is that many of us were taught—sometimes explicitly, sometimes quietly—that the point of our faith is escape. That we’re just enduring this world until we can leave it behind. But the biblical hope isn’t that we go to heaven someday. It’s that heaven comes here. That all things are being made new. And that our daily lives are meant to be a preview of that slow unveiling future.

If our telos is escape, joy isn’t genuine. But if we trust that time is unfolding something beautiful—and when we join that work—joy becomes our guide.

This is why I’ve come to see Advent not as a countdown to Christmas, but as a pathway. Hope, peace, joy, love—they aren’t random virtues. They form a road. Each week turns us toward the Christ candle, toward a vision of what it means to be fully human and fully alive.

So the invitation today is simple, while also demanding: recover your sense of direction!

Ask yourself: What am I moving toward? What vision of wholeness, justice, and God’s kingdom come is shaping my choices right now? And then ask: Who around me needs help taking their next step? Whose hands need strengthening? Whose knees need steadying? Whose hope needs encouragement?

The cows knew where they were going, and their joy flowed from that knowing. Our children’s joy reflected a life brought back into alignment. And the exiles in Isaiah dared to sing because someone gave them a picture of what was coming.

Joy is not the absence of suffering. Joy is not escape—it is reorientation. It is the assurance that we are on a path that leads somewhere, and that we are not walking it alone. For even now, as we walk together, we can begin to sing.