joy in jesus Archives

Finding Joy in Thankfulness

Joy. Being joyful, to me, means being thankful for the things God has given me. A few months ago, I had an iPhone 7 that only worked 85% of the time, but I was thankful I had a phone. As aggravating as it was, at least I could communicate with human beings. Then, and now with my iPhone 11, I literally had and have a computer in my hand and that’s what baffles me.

Years ago, when computers first became a thing, long before my time I assure you, they were the size of your car. They filled an eight-foot by ten-foot room, and that’s just one! I don’t know how historically accurate that is but they were huge! Now, our computer is literally our cell phones! You can do your taxes, order Chick-Fil-A and FaceTime someone, all at the same time! So many of us take those things for granted.

Too Many First World Problems

With all of the problems we, and others, face day-to-day, we somehow allow ourselves to let our first world problems get to us and we become bitter. But you can’t be bitter. Bitterness opens the door to anger and anger opens the bedroom window on the second story for the devil to climb through.

It may sound silly but your joy should feel like a revival. You should know, by now, how it feels to be genuinely happy and thankful. You shouldn’t feel like it’s a never-ending battle. If it is, change the situation! Fix the problem. If you are unhappy in your relationship, put in the effort to fix it. You may be thinking, well yeah but it won’t last long. Getting your joy to stick around should NOT feel like open warfare. Do this. Look at everyone and everything in your life and ask yourself if you have ever taken it for granted. Move through the house from this to that.

Joy: Thank God For The Details

Now, thank God for all of those things. If it weren’t for Him you wouldn’t have that. Think about it this way, you have a cell phone. Hold your phone and think about all the things you can do on it. Now think about this. A cell phone is an extremely intricate device. Everything has to line up perfectly for it to work properly. Think of all the wires, the motherboard and everything inside of it. One man created that. That’s like looking at your life.

Look at all of the relationships you have and have had. All the things around you, the air, trees, grass, down to the worms in the ground and clouds in the sky. One man, God, made that. He knew exactly how everything had to fit together so it would work properly. Feeling thankful yet?

What Are You Thankful For?

Most people would answer obvious things like health, my car so I can go to work or school, education, job, financial stability. But have you ever answered with the bad too? God, thank you for making me late for work. I
could’ve been in that head-on collision too, and so on. You see, our hardships are blessings too. Do you consider difficulties blessings in disguise? They are exactly as they sound. Blessings disguised as a problem. It might be hard to see because you’re too busy looking for a solution. Paul once wrote in Romans 5:3-6, “We glory in tribulations also…” Why though?

Tribulations give you patience and experience, experience gives you hope and hope gives you faith. The love of God is falling on our hearts. Through all of that, we are strengthened in the Lord who died for our sins. Sometimes we feel forced to face problems and pressures that we see as too big but God sees it as strength. They are a lesson. They are how God gets our attention. Adversity motivates us to cry out to God and seek His wisdom and they assure us of His love. Have faith in the face of adversity and be joyful. Joy brings out the love we ought to share with other people, with God’s creation.

All too often, many of us have viewed the Christian life as consisting of rules and restrictions that attempt to suppress our desire for happiness and deprive us of the pleasures of life. But nothing could be farther from the truth. God has never denied us anything that is beneficial to our ultimate satisfaction and joy. He has only warned us of those unhealthy pleasures that will lead to our misery, shame, and regret.

Sin is the misguided pursuit of happiness and pleasure in places where only emptiness and disappointment are found. Sin is turning down God’s offer of the pleasure of His presence for the wrong kinds of things that will never fully satisfy the longings of our hearts.

When Paul, in 2 Timothy 3:4, warned about those who would become lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, he was writing to individuals who would pursue pleasure without God. The key words in this verse are “rather than,” and they highlight the stark contrast between the people who seek a sensual, self-indulgent pleasure that is God-less and those who seek their satisfaction in the pleasure of God’s love.

God is the all-satisfying One who made us for Himself.

He invites us to indulge ourselves in all that He has provided in Christ, and He longs to lavish His beauty and goodness on each of us. Remember, God’s greatest glory is demonstrated in our ultimate delight in Him. Therefore, the primary goal of our lives should be the pursuit of pleasure in Him!

When Jesus calls us to deny ourselves and follow Him (see Mark 8:34-37), He’s actually encouraging us to pursue our ultimate happiness and pleasure. While this may be hard for some of us to believe, Jesus never intends for us to view the “denial of self” as an end in itself. He is inviting us to deny ourselves the counterfeit pleasures of this life in order to gain the unending pleasures of being loved by Him.

For us to not follow Jesus is to deny ourselves the greatest joy imaginable!

His call to us is to reject any attempt to satisfy the longings of our hearts through any illegitimate pleasure. Instead, His invitation to us is to follow Him and gain true life, true joy, and true pleasure!

All too often, preachers have challenged believers to deny themselves the unhealthy, phony pleasures of this life while making the mistake of not introducing their listeners to the incomparable worth and beauty of God. Rather than being motivated by the supreme satisfaction that comes from being loved by Him, many Christians have subsequently tried to deny self out of fear or condemnation. But a “denying of self” that is not based on the greater goal of experiencing and enjoying the beauty of the Lord will inevitably lead to legalism and religious pride. It’s only the unfolding discovery of the value of Jesus that truly enables an individual to live free and fulfilled!

In Matthew 13:44, Jesus introduced to His hearers a parable about the kingdom of God. He said, “Again, the Kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and hid; and for joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field.” Notice the phrase “and for joy over it.” It was the joy of discovering the treasure that motivated the man to sell everything he had.

To better appreciate the scope of this parable, I believe we need to look at this verse from two different angles. First of all, it’s highly likely that the “man” referred to in this parable was none other than Jesus Himself, and the treasure that prompted Him to sell everything He owned was the lives of men and women of all generations.

In turn, when we begin to grasp the Lord’s passion for us and we see ourselves as His joy and treasure, we will be motivated to joyfully and extravagantly give ourselves completely to our Treasure.

The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 3:23 that “…all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” But what did he mean by “falling short” of God’s glory? The clearest answer to this question is found in Romans 1:21-23:

“For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God, nor gave thanks to Him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.”

The way anyone “falls short” of God’s glory (beauty, goodness) is to exchange it for something that’s inferior and of lesser value. All sin stems from failing to place supreme value on the glory and goodness of God. We exchange a priceless treasure for the trinkets of this world. We believe the lie of temptation which suggests that sin will make us happier than God ever could. But, in reality, sin is not the gaining of pleasure but, rather, the loss of pleasure!

Sin isn’t just turning our backs on the beauty of who God is; sin is really turning our backs on life. Think about it—so much of our frustration, misery, and shame in life have been the result of giving our hearts to counterfeit joys.

So why do we continue to hold on to the very things that continue to bring us so much pain and disillusionment? Maybe we believe the lies of temptation because we have been so blinded to the beauty of God that He often doesn’t appear as attractive to us as sin. As a result, fornication and adultery seem to be a lot more appealing than being intimate with Jesus; getting “stoned” sounds far more exciting than being filled with the Spirit; and living a self-absorbed, self-indulgent life appears to be a lot more fun than loving the poor and needy.

Maybe we cling to old habits because we think we deserve them. We remind ourselves of all the things we’ve had to endure and the many times people have let us down, and we retreat into the arms of our “counterfeit lovers.” Or, we believe God has disappointed us so much that we allow ourselves the right to indulge in the pleasures of sin.

Maybe we hold on to counterfeit joys because we can’t imagine living without them. We convince ourselves that we can’t face our boredom apart from them. We think that the only way we can cope with our loneliness and rejection is to try to deaden the pain with things that will bring us some measure of comfort.

But, when all is said and done, we continue to cling to our counterfeit joys because our inferior pleasures are enjoyable. Regardless of how temporary they may be, they are still joys. We constantly revert to them because they work, at least for the moment. This is why we have to replace our lesser joys with a more “pleasing” joy—a joy that satisfies forever, not just for the moment. We have to discover a pleasure that never ends (see Psalm 16:11). We have to embrace the promise of superior happiness and joy that can only be found in our Father’s unending love!

This blog is taken from S. J.’s new book, WHAT’S GOD REALLY LIKE?, Unique Insights Into His Fascinating Personality, published by Energion Publications.

joy in jesus

Joy: Love Above All Else