a conversation with a friend, the warmth of the sun on your face, the sound of waves lapping on the beach, laughter around the dinner table, or a time when you sensed God's comfort or presence.

As spiritual formation and brain science intersect, we’re discovering something remarkable: regularly revisiting gratitude memories can help us experience a more joyful and relational way of living. In The Other Half of Church, Jim Wilder and Michel Hendricks write, "Gratitude is the first step to building joy in our lives and helps us experience a more consistent attachment with God."

One practice that has been found to increase joy is simple: spend five minutes reflecting on gratitude memories three times a day for thirty days. This practice doesn't deny difficult circumstances or pretend life is easier than it is. Instead, it trains our minds and bodies to acknowledge what is real while also experiencing God's presence with us. Joy can coexist with painful emotions—it doesn't replace them. Rather, joy helps us stay relationally connected to God even in difficult seasons.

Benedictine monk David Steindl-Rast writes, "It is not joy that makes us grateful; it is gratitude that makes us joyful."

Because we believe in the value of engaging in spiritual practices as a community, beginning this Sunday, you'll have the opportunity to sign up for our Joy Practice to try this simple rhythm together. Those who sign up will receive a text every three or four days for about a month with encouragement and simple prompts to support the practice. Whether you're ready to fully commit or simply curious, we encourage you to join us.

To prepare, begin compiling a gratitude memory list. This is different from simply making a gratitude list. It is a list of memories in which you can recall both a feeling of gratitude in your body and a sense of connection with God. As memories come to mind, write them down and begin building your own gratitude memory list.

Then begin spending a few minutes each day, prayerfully revisiting them with God. This will help you be ready to engage in the Joy Practice.

As always, we invite you to engage in spiritual practices as you can, not as you can't.

God always meets us where we are.

My prayer is that, through this practice, we would experience increasing joy—not because our circumstances become easier, but because we discover that joy can coexist in every circumstance and with any other emotion. May we become more aware of God's loving presence with us in every moment and learn to live more deeply from His joy.