I'm convinced that joy is a spiritual practice, that joy is essential to experiencing life at its fullest, to living as God always intended us to live. Researcher Matthew Kuan Johnson says that when we experience joy, we become more fully ourselves. In the early days, advent was really taught and seen as a penitential season where we prepare for the coming of Christ by confessing our sins. But the church also realized that we need to prepare our hearts for the joy of Christmas, too. We need to prepare for joy because all too often we experience what Brené Brown calls foreboding joy. For instead of leaning into joy, we wait for that other shoe to drop. We brace ourselves for the moment that it'll all unravel. But at Christians, we know that there is true joy to be had, a joy that we do not need to protect ourselves from or brace ourselves for, a j ...