I've been thinking a lot about joy and sorrow lately.

At first, they seem like opposites: Most people don't feel a sense of joy in the midst of sorrow, right? But joy - it's hard to describe joy in a way that isn't tinged by sorrow. Joy is wise - it recognizes where we've come from, what we've been through; it acknowledges the sorrowful parts of our lives.

Someone recently described it like this:

We carry joy in our right hand, sorrow in our left. 

We walk through life with both in front of us, like we walk, one foot in front of the other. We can't have one without the other without losing balance. 

We walk through life knowing that it can't all be joy and it won't all be sorrow. But we recognize the value of both. 

We hold onto our joy in times of sorrow and remember our sorrow in times of joy. And when we come to God in prayer, we bring our hands - our joy and sorrow - together, and we pray.