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The Birth of Joy

Where does joy come from? Joy is different than happiness. Joy is supernatural. Happiness is temporal. Joy isn’t dependent on circumstances but happiness is.

Our middle son had some money that he saved ready to buy a particular toy. So the day came and I took him to Toys R Us (R.I.P.). It was some ball that he saw on T.V. that he just had to get. I reminded him of our dog at the time which ate everything. This dog ate my leather shoes, part of my leather Bible, our sprinklers, a plethora of toys, you name it! But my son persisted and said I will watch him. I relented (as this was going to be a teaching moment for both of us) and he was so happy on our ride home. He couldn’t wait to play with this ball.

I am sure you can guess what happened. No more than five minutes goes by and I hear, Daddy! The dog ate his new toy. That happiness he had quickly turned to anger and sadness.

Can you relate? How often have we been happy just to turn around and be sad. Maybe you were happy your team got a touchdown but sad because they lost the game. Happy you received some good news but then sad because something else happened. We are fickle creatures.

Joy is deeper and a gift that is given to the believer.

The Book of Philippians is About Joy

15 different references to joy is found in this book. 9 of those 15 references we find the verb “rejoice.” 4 of the 15 the noun “joy” and 2 references to “rejoice with.”

Commentator Steven Lawson defines joy as Steven Lawson defines joy as, “A spiritual grace that we all need to experience in our Christian lives. We live in a world of stress and anxiety that all too easily and subtly can steal the peace of God from our hearts.”

I am reminded that Paul was in chains when he wrote this letter to the church in Philippi (1:12-18). If he didn’t mention his Roman imprisonment we would not have known based on the focus of this letter being one of joy.

Paul was able to have joy because he understood that joy was something that resulted from salvation. It is from the Holy Spirit as the believer is being transformed, we have fruit of that work.

Joy is a Spiritual Fruit

The fruit of the Spirit is described as, “Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law” (Gal. 5:22-23).

This means that the Holy Spirit who is doing a work in and through the believer is working joy in the believer’s life.

Paul was able to have joy even when he was being persecuted for his faith because knew nothing can rob him from the everlasting love that is in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:35-39).

Joy and Salvation are Connected

In King David’s song of repentance and restoration he asks the Lord to restore unto him the “joy of your salvation” (Psalm 51:12). The prophet Habakkuk declares, “yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation” (Hab. 3:18). The Apostle Paul understood that God is the one who saves, it is by his grace alone (Eph. 2:8-9).

No matter what happens in this life, for the believer he has eternity to look forward to. No one and nothing can rob the believer of what Jesus has done. The believer thinks about this and understands that they can have joy in what Jesus has done- conquered sin and death, the only way sin can be forgiven, the wrath of God has been absorbed by him, and it is not based on anything we have done. In fact, if it were we would be so far from God because of our sin. So joy stems from an understanding of God’s great grace and how serious our sin is. Joy comes from salvation because the believer understands that this life may be hard and we will suffer at times but their name is written in the Lamb’s book of Life (Luke 11:20).

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The Overwhelming Love of God

Do you ever wonder why does God love me? As a Christian we hear that phrase a lot, “God loves you!” Have you ever thought why? We may not understand why certain things happen, but we can say God loves me. When suffer and go through trials God still loves (Rom. 8:35-39). The beloved disciple of Jesus, John, writes in 1 John why the love of God is so important. He is answering and defending who Jesus is. He is fully man and fully God. This matters because God loves you!

Tina Turner asked this question in her song “What’s Love God to Do With It?” In regards to God’s love it has everything to do with it. God is love, and He loves us, so we can love one another (1 John 4:7-8). Here are four aspects to God’s love for us to reflect on.

God’s Love Is A Mark Of A Christian.

The born-again believer is made distinct from the world based on what? in 1 John we see that it is by how they love. Christian, there should be something different about you. There should be something that stands out from you, and that is how you love others.

We can love one another because love is from God. This love is perfected in us (1 John 4:12). His love shapes us and defines us as Christians.  Jesus even said, everyone will know that you are my disciples by how you love (John 13:35).

God’s Love Is Manifested Through Christ.

The beloved disciple John writes, “In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 9-10).

God is love! God as his divine attribute and characteristic is love. All of God’s activity is a loving activity. Everything we know about God teaches us that he is love. Every encounter we have with God expresses that He is love.

The highest, greatest example of how God loves is shown in Christ! God who is love and is loving is shows his love through and in Jesus Christ. The Bible reminds us that we know love because Jesus laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers (1 John 3:16).

The famous love passage in the Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, gives us a description of what love looks like. It is a tangible approach to love that is demonstrated by Jesus.

The Apostle Paul writes, “Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;  it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends” (1 Cor. 13:4-8).

We sometimes want to read that and then challenge ourselves by replacing the word love with our names.  The description that Paul is giving is that of Jesus Christ, who perfectly loved.  We need to read this passage as Jesus is patient and kind and so on. You and I will fail to love perfectly but Jesus loves perfectly. We then rest in Jesus who loves perfectly as we can reflect this love to one another.

The Love Of God Is Our Mission And Message Of The Believer To The World.

Because God loves me, I can love God (1 John 4:19). Because God loves me, and can also love others, including those who are hard to love. It has been said, “The unseen God reveals himself through the visible love of believers.” We are a reflection of God who loves! 

How does this happen. There is a word that John uses in 1 John 4, it is abide. He writes, “No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him” (1 John 4:12, 13, 15-16).

The word abide also means to dwell in, remain in, or to live in. I like the term live in because it shows the depth of the relationship. There is a difference between a house and a home. A house can be a temporary dwelling place to keep you safe from the elements. But a home as the saying, “Home is where the heart is.” Home is where you have roots. Home is where you are invested and committed. Whenever I may be out traveling and staying in hotels, I can’t wait to get home. It is because that is where I abide.A

Many may approach their relationship with God like a house. It serves them a purpose but temporary. If we abide in God, He abides in us, because He has given us His Spirit (1 John 4:13). We are committed, in union with, live in with God; we abide!

Jesus was asked what are the two greatest commandments (Matt. 22:36-40)? Jesus responded by the saying the first is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. When we abide in God, we love God with our whole being. It is a result of abiding is loving him. We love Him because He first loves us (1 John 4:19).  

The second command Jesus said is like the first which is to love your neighbor as yourself. Oswald Chambers answered the question of who is my neighbor? He said, “If my heart is right with God, every human being is my neighbor. When we abide in God, we love God and we love others. This is God’s love which is made visible in Christian love for one another.

We Can Love Those That Are Hard To Love!

How do we love other people? Love Jesus more than them. When you love Jesus more than your spouse, you actually love your spouse better. The same is true when you love Jesus more than children you love them better. When you love Jesus more than others you actually care and share the Gospel of love with them. When we love Jesus more, we are able to speak truth in love. Because we love Jesus and love other people. 

When we abide in God and He in us, we can love our enemies. Jesus commands us to love our enemies (Matt. 5:43-48).  We need to remember that we were once an enemy of God, someone hard to love and yet God loved me still. God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us (Rom. 5:8).

To summarize:

  • God loves you! He demonstrated in the most glorious and greatest way through Jesus Christ (John 3:16).
  • How do we love God in return? It is when the believer demonstrates God’s love to one another!

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How To Fight Envy

How To Fight Envy
We all deal with this thing called envy. Maybe we justify it by saying it’s just thinking “the grass is greener on the other side”. We can think everyone deals with it so it’s just a feeling or an emotion. Envy is more than longing for the better thing or wishing life was better for you. It is comparing what other people have or don’t have Pastor Scott Sauls gets to the truth of what envy is and defines it this way,

“Envy is the opposite of love because it does not rejoice with this who rejoice or mourn with those who mourn. Instead, envy, in its sick and sinister way, rejoices when others mourn and mourns when others rejoice.”

Based on that definition, I must ask myself how often have I rejoiced when others mourned or mourned as others rejoice? In Scott Saul’s book From Weakness to Strength, he shares the example of when King Saul had envy over David. The women would sing as Saul went through the streets, “Saul has killed his thousands and David has killed his tens of thousands (1 Samuel 18:7).” One doesn’t have to read much further to see how Saul responded to this, he tries to kill David. Continue reading “How To Fight Envy”