Deep, Lasting Joy
For hundreds of years before Jesus came, Greek philosophers debated all kinds of philosophical questions. They rarely agreed on anything. But there was one thing many of them were united on: the highest goal in life, the greatest good, is happiness. But the tragedy was that they couldn’t agree on what happiness is or how to get it.
Today 2000 years later, the situation hasn’t changed. People want to be happy, but they don’t know what real happiness is or how to have it.
In this lesson, we come to one of the most memorable things Paul said about joy. “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, Rejoice!”
Read about this subject
- Scripture: Philippians 4:4; Matthew 5:10-12; II Cor. 7:4; Prov. 17:22
- “Bright Expectations”
Listen to more on this subject
Transcript
Kerry Duke: Hi, I’m Kerry Duke, host of My God and My Neighbor podcast from Tennessee Bible College, where we see the Bible as not just another book, but the Book. Join us in a study of the inspired Word to strengthen your faith and to share what you’ve learned with others.
“Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice!” (Philippians chapter 4 verse four). The Bible tells Christians to rejoice. God doesn’t merely allow us to rejoice. He wants us to rejoice. And notice that Paul repeats those words. “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I will say rejoice!” When the Bible tells us twice in one verse to do something, you know it’s important. But why would it be necessary for God to tell us to rejoice? Shouldn’t that be natural?
Of course, we know all too well what happens. When we’re young, we laugh and have fun. But as we age, things like grief and fear and guilt rob us of that childhood feeling. And that can and does happen to Christians. Of all people on earth, Christians ought to be the most happy people. We are the ones who are saved from sin. We are the ones who have the promise and hope of heaven. Paul said in First Corinthians chapter 15 verse 19 that if you take away the hope of the hereafter from Christians, we would be the most miserable people on earth. But that means with the hope of everlasting life in heaven, we are the most blessed people on earth and we should be the happiest people on earth.
But what happens to us in our physical life often happens in our spiritual life. When we’re baptized, we are born again (John 3 verse 5). We’re like newborn babies. And for the first few months, we’re like little children in the faith. We are excited and enjoy going to church and talking to other people about the Bible and serving in the church. But as we grow older in the faith, we can lose that sense of joy.
Then, when that happens, we have to relearn how to be happy as Christians. There will still be times when it comes naturally. But most of us have to work on it. We have to make up our mind to be happy. Abraham Lincoln once said that a man is about as happy as he makes up his mind to be. There’s a lot of truth in what he said. We have to train ourselves to be happy. We have to find reasons to enjoy our lives. We have to be taught. We have to develop the habit of Christian joy. And it can be a habit if we pray and trust God and put our hearts into it.
That’s where the Bible comes in. The Bible teaches us why and when and how to be happy and what it means to be truly happy. So let’s look at a few things about the feeling of joy in the Bible. First of all, God made us. He created our souls as well as our bodies. God gave us the feeling of joy. It’s a gift from God. And we decide what we do with it. Sometimes it just happens. Somebody says something unexpected or something hilarious happens and you can’t keep from laughing. At other times, you get so consumed with the cares and burdens of this life that you hardly feel any joy, and when you do finally have a good laugh, you say, “I needed that.” But, either way, the feeling of joy is a blessing from God. Can you imagine what life would be like without it?
The Bible says that joy in the heart is medicine for the soul. Solomon said, “A merry heart does good, like medicine, But a broken spirit dries the bones” (Proverbs 17 verse 22). In Reader’s Digest, there used to be a section of funny stories called “Laughter—The Best Medicine.” That really is true. There’s something healing about it. It’s good for your mind. It’s good for your body. It relaxes you and relieves stress. If you learn to have a good sense of humor, you can take the heartaches and trials of life better. If you look for humor, you’ll usually find it. You won’t get mad so quickly and when you do get angry, you won’t stay mad as long. And, you’ll be a blessing to people around you. I’m not talking about making a joke out of everything. I don’t mean we should ignore something serious and just have fun. But I am saying, and I think you’ll agree, that most of us could use more of the right kind of joy in our lives.
The Scriptures also say that joy is one of the fruits of the Spirit. Paul said that “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Galatians 5 verses 22 and 23). Joy should be as natural as love and peace and goodness and all the other fruits he mentioned. And, God does help us. He gave the Bible to teach us about it. Joy can be an answer to prayer. It’s right to pray for it. Paul prayed for joy. He prayed for joy in his life and joy in the lives of fellow Christians. In Romans 15 verse 30 and 32 he asked the Christians in Rome to “strive together with me in prayers to God for me…that I may come to you with joy by the will of God.” In verse 13 of that same chapter he prayed that God would give them joy. He said, “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing.” It’s a good thing to pray for peace and joy. I wonder how many times we ask God for it?
But there are a lot of things that make it hard to be happy. One of the main ones is sin. David said to God in Psalm 51 verse 12, “Restore to me the joy of Your salvation.” David had lost his joy in Psalm 51. Do you know why? It was because of sin. His sin. An ancient tradition of the Hebrews says that David wrote this psalm after his sin with Bathsheba. You can tell as you read it that the guilt of his sin was crushing his soul. That’s why he cried out to God to restore the joy of his salvation. A person who has been saved from sin can lose the joy of salvation. And nothing will do that quicker than sin.
Sin takes away a lot of the joy we had when we were younger. Think about it. Before you really understood sin, you were innocent. You may have been selfish and neglectful as a child, but you didn’t really know sin like you did when you reached an age we call the age of accountability or the age of discrimination or discernment. That’s when we rebel against God in some way or another. That’s what sin is. And with that sin comes guilt. And the more we sin, the more our conscience bothers us. That’s why we lose the joy we had as children. That’s why it’s so hard to get it back.
Sin makes us feel good for a while. But then it fades. The Bible talks about the “passing pleasures of sin” in Hebrews chapter 11 verse 25. Sure, there is pleasure in sin. Earthly pleasure. Temporary fun. But it never lasts long. It never does. Sin always has consequences. It always brings more grief than it does pleasure. Do you recall these words? “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Galatians 6 verse 7). Most people ignore this simple law of right and wrong. They live in defiance of what God warns. They tell themselves they can do whatever they want without having to deal with the consequences. It’s like so many today who fool themselves about money. They spend money they don’t have and think they won’t have to pay for it.
And, speaking of money, that’s a big reason why people are not happy. It’s a reason why some Christians are not as happy as they should be. They have their mind on money. But money cannot bring satisfaction. The richest man in history said that. Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 5 verse 10, “He who loves silver will not be satisfied with silver; nor he who loves abundance, with increase. This also is vanity.” Solomon wrote that by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. He said that from experience. He had more money than anyone today can imagine. And, at one point he decided to spend it on all the pleasures and enjoyments of life he could—the best food, luxurious palaces, land, music, silver and gold. But after he got all the enjoyment out of those things he could, here’s what he said about it all: “Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, For my heart rejoiced in all my labor; And this was my reward from all my labor. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done And on the labor in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 2 verses 10 and 11). The King James Version says all this was “vanity and vexation of spirit.” Here’s something else he said about having money. “The sleep of a laboring man is sweet, whether he eats little or much; But the abundance of the rich will not permit him to sleep” (Ecclesiastes 5 verse 12). Solomon said a rich man doesn’t sleep well. He’s thinking about how to make more. He’s worried about losing it. It consumes his life and chokes his soul.
Here’s a case of what it does. A man in New York named Cornelius Vanderbilt borrowed one hundred dollars from his mother and began running a passenger boat on Staten Island in 1810. He eventually founded the New York railroad system called New York Central. When he died in 1877, he was worth over 100 million dollars—in 1877! Try putting that into today’s currency. That was more money than the United States Treasury held at that time! He left his inheritance to his son William, and William Vanderbilt, in a few years, doubled that fortune into 200 million dollars! He died in 1885. Here’s what he is reported to have said about money like this: “Inherited wealth is a real handicap to happiness… It has left me with nothing to hope for, with nothing definite to seek or strive for.”
But America is full of people who will never be that rich, but they’re trying hard to get every dime they can. I can’t help but think about what Paul said in First Timothy 6 verses 9 and 10: “But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.”
The lesson is clear. It’s right there in the Bible. If you want to be happy, get your mind off money. Get your mind off things. They will only bring you stress and grief in the end. Learn to enjoy the simple things of life. That’s what Solomon said. He said the simple enjoyments of life are better than the expensive things in life. He said, “Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor” (Ecclesiastes 2 verse 24). If you have enough money to eat a good meal, your a rich person. If you’re healthy, you are wealthy. If you work hard and feel good about what you’ve gotten done, you’re more wealthy inside than a person who is so rich he’s never had to work. That’s financial advice from the top authority in history on the subject.
There are other things that keep us from being happy that are not so easy to fix. One of them is people problems, especially family problems. It’s funny that the same thing that gives us so much joy in life can also give us so much pain: people. People can make life worth living or they can make life miserable. And when families have trouble, it’s hard to be happy. When that happens, don’t feel alone. Families have had trouble form the start. Adam and Eve had two sons and one of them killed the other out of pure spite. Isaac and Rebekah had two daughters-in-law that worried them to death. The Bible says in Proverbs 17 verse 21 that “the father of a fool has no joy.”
So if you’re a Christian and you’re facing people problems and especially family issues, how can you do what Paul says in Philippians chapter 4 verse four? How can you rejoice when somebody is turning your life up upside down? One thing you can do is read Philippians chapter 4 verse six. That’s where Paul said instead of worrying, pray. And as you pray, remember to thank God for the good things you have. We’ll talk about that more in the next episode. But after you have prayed and prayed, and the problem is still there, you have to do something that is not easy at all: wait. There are many hardships in life we have to endure a lot longer than we prefer. But remember this. Whatever the hardship is, the time you spend bearing a heavy burden, makes you stronger. It makes you wiser. It helps you to see things you never would have otherwise. The Bible says in Isaiah chapter 40 verse 31, “But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”
Health problems can also take the joy out of life. It’s hard to be happy when you’re in pain. And when you have emotional pain and heartache, it’s really hard. When you read the book of Job, you don’t see him having fun. He was under greater stress, he was in more pain than we can imagine. You’ve not suffered like he did, but I’m sure you know the feeling. When you’re sick and suffering, it’s hard to be positive and enjoy anything.
But here’s a thought. Think about the Christians Paul is writing to in the book of Philippians. Do you think maybe some of them had problems in their families? Do you think that some of them had health problems? There were people just like you and me. And yet Paul said to them like he says to us: rejoice. That will be harder at some times than others. And, as we’ll see in a few minutes, it may not even be possible sometimes. But as a rule, rejoice.
Let’s look at Paul again. In the book of Second Corinthians he talked a lot about the hard times he’d been through. In chapter one he wrote about the “trouble which came to us in Asia: that we were burdened beyond measure, above strength, so that we despaired even of life. Yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves” (verses 8 and 9). In chapter four he said, “We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed—always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus” (verses 6 through 8). But he said a few verses later, “Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory” (verses 16 and 17). Then in chapter eleven he wrote, “From the Jews five times I received forty stripes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I have been in the deep; in journeys often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils of my own countrymen, in perils of the Gentiles, in perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren; in weariness and toil, in sleeplessness often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness—besides the other things, what comes upon me daily: my deep concern for all the churches” (verses 24 through 28).
Now a lot of Christians don’t suffer any thing like what Paul suffered, but they give up. And some, even if they don’t lose their faith, they lose their joy. But not Paul. Listen to this amazing verse in chapter seven of the same book where he talked about all the bad things that happened to him. “I am exceedingly joyful in all our tribulation” (Second Corinthians chapter 7 verse 4). Now that’s faith. And if Paul endured all that, then there’s no reason for us to be down and out when things don’t go like we thought they would. Have faith in God. Keep your eye on the goal. Remember that the pain will end. Rejoice in the Lord always.
We may have the wrong idea when we hear the word “rejoice.” That word in the Bible is not synonymous with laughter. Rejoicing in the Lord includes laughter, but it means something more, something deeper. It can range all the way from peaceful contentment to a warm smile to side-splitting laugh. It can be an appreciation, a feeling of gladness that we’re doing right in God’s sight. Here’s an example. In Acts chapter 5, the Jewish council beat the apostles for preaching the gospel. But they didn’t cry and complain. The Bible says, “So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name” (Acts 5 verse 41). They rejoiced after they were beaten! And that beating was not a slap on the wrist. They beat them severely. Sometimes the Jews would use a whip and sometimes they used rods to beat the back of the accused person. But the apostles rejoiced after they left from that beating. That certainly doesn’t mean they laughed it off. It cannot mean they enjoyed it. It means they were glad to suffer for Jesus. They felt pain in their backs, but they felt a deep satisfaction in their hearts because they knew they did the right thing. If they had been beaten because they committed a crime, they would have felt bad on the outside with no relief on the inside. But they turned a bad situation into rejoicing. They did the very thing we’ve been looking at in the book of Philippians. The looked at the upside, not the downside.
Jesus said, “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you” (Matthew 5 verses 11 and 12). How can we have any consolation when the world is against us? Jesus said to rejoice. Be glad inspire of how you’re mistreated as a Christian. And He gave two reasons. First, He said you have a great reward waiting for you in heaven. What difference will it make a hundred years from now how people treat us? What difference will it make a thousand years from now? The way to have joy inside, even when you can’t laugh about it, is to remember that this world is not your home. You won’t be here long. There won’t be any persecution of Christians in heaven. No beatings, no executions—not even a cold shoulder or a mean remark. The second reason to rejoice when you’re persecuted is to realize that, when that happens, you’re in good company. You’re in the same boat the prophets of God in the Old Testament were in! They were persecuted for the same reason that Christians today are persecuted: because they loved God and stood against evil. So don’t question your faith when there’s a backlash to your stand for the truth. Don’t think you need to be soft on sin. Live for God and speak the truth. And when people make fun of you or lie about you or hate you because of your faith, just remember that you’re in good company. So, Jesus said: Rejoice!
So Christian joy includes laughter, but it’s not just laughter. It includes being happy and merry, but it’s not just being merry. It includes a calm feeling of appreciation at times without any outward expression, but it’s not only that kind of feeling. It can include having good clean fun, but it’s not always about entertaining ourselves. When Paul says to rejoice, he means all these things and more. True joy is much deeper. As a matter of fact, it’s hard to put into words. That’s what Peter said. Listen very carefully to what he said about joy in the midst of adversity. In First Peter chapter 1 verses 6 through 8, he said, “In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ, whom having not seen you love. Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.” Peter said the joy we have as Christians is “inexpressible.” We just cannot find the words to describe it.
Paul says to rejoice. He’s telling you to rejoice. He says we should rejoice “in the Lord.” He’s the reason you can have joy. He’s the One that teaches us how to have joy – true joy. He even had a feeling of joy about dying on the cross. I don’t mean He enjoyed the pain. I mean He had a feeling of satisfaction about His death. How? How could He think that way when He knew it was a horrible, agonizing death? We know He dreaded the cross. He said in John 12 verse 27, “My soul is troubled.” He said His time to die was near. So, Jesus didn’t jump for joy as that time drew near. But the Bible says He did have joy. How could that be? Here’s a verse that tells us. And this verse teaches us that joy is something deeper and quite different from what many people think today. Hebrews chapter 12 verse 2 says that Jesus “for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Jesus didn’t laugh at death. He couldn’t ignore it and say it didn’t bother Him. It did. But at the same time He felt excruciating pain in His body and torment in His soul, He had a peaceful thought. His death will save many people. Jesus looked beyond the pain. That’s what you and I must tell ourselves to do. The pain will still be there. The anxiety and grief won’t go away completely. But as a Christian you can do what others cannot do. You can lift your heart above the hardships of life. You can have a peaceful, satisfying feeling inside. That’s joy in the Christian sense. No matter how bad things get, you can still have the hope of heaven inside, and that will give you a little sunshine to get you through.
This helps us to understand what Paul means, because you might be thinking, “Why does Paul say rejoice in the Lord always?” He sure doesn’t mean we should be happy and have fun all the time. That’s not even possible. It’s not what God wants us to do. Do you remember where the Bible talks about there being a time for everything? We sometimes say it this way: There’s a time and place for everything. Well, in Ecclesiastes chapter 3 verses 1 through 8, Solomon teaches that very thing. Here’s what he said in Ecclesiastes verse 1 through 4: “To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven: A time to be born, And a time to die; A time to plant, And a time to pluck what is planted; A time to kill, And a time to heal; A time to break down, And a time to build up; A time to weep, And a time to laugh.” These cycles of life come and go just like seasons of the year. And this is good for us. If we laughed all the time, we wouldn’t be able to get our work done. If we cried all the time, grief would overwhelm us. Life is a delicate balance of good times and bad times, of laughter and tears.
There are times when it’s not appropriate to laugh. We learn that as we grow up. And there are times when it’s not good to grieve. There are limits as to how much sorrow we can take. I know you can’t avoid hardships and trials of life altogether, but sometimes we have to pull ourselves out of despair before it kills us.
Here’s a verse that has helped me. An older sister who is no longer with us shared it with me when I was going through a painful experience in life. It comes from the story of King Saul and the prophet Samuel in the book of First Samuel. Samuel had anointed Saul as the first king of Israel. But Saul was not a stable fellow. He was rash and could be very harsh. He was very stubborn. He was a tall man with a little man complex. And he did what he wanted to do instead of doing what God plainly told him to do. Finally God had had enough and said it was time for another king. All this while the prophet Samuel was disappointed because of the way Saul acted. He was sad and depressed. Here was the first king of Israel, and he’s not the kind of man they needed.
God spoke to Samuel and asked him a question we need to consider sometimes. We need to think about the lesson in this verse when someone in our lives is causing us great pain. It’s First Samuel chapter 16 verse one. “Now the Lord said to Samuel, ‘How long will you mourn for Saul, seeing I have rejected him from reigning over Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and go; I am sending you to Jesse the Bethlehemite. For I have provided Myself a king among his sons.” God talked to the prophet about his grief. Now remember that prophets were human too. I think we forget that sometimes. Just because God spoke to them and did miracles through them doesn’t mean they they never felt down or sad. They did. Moses did. Elijah did. John the Baptist did. And, according to what God said in Jeremiah 15 verse 1, Samuel was one of the greatest men of the Old Testament. So here in First Samuel, after God is through with Saul, Samuel is down and out. And God didn’t tell him he shouldn’t grieve. He didn’t tell him it was wrong to be sad for Saul. But he did say there’s a time to move on. There’s a time when you have to accept the fact that a person you thought highly of is not what he or she ought to be. That person may be a friend. It may be a close family member. It may be a son or daughter, a father or mother, a brother or sister, or even a husband or wife. Sometimes we have to accept the fact that this person has no intention of changing. That doesn’t mean you quit caring. It doesn’t mean you stop loving or praying. It means that you have to put yourself in Samuel’s shoes and think about what God asked him: “How long will you mourn for this person?” I know that can sound cold and harsh. And I agree that we all handle grief in different ways in our own time. What I’m saying is that God told Samuel: when a person in sin is so stubborn and rebellious that he or she will not listen and will not change, then it’s time to take that load of grief off your shoulders.
Sometimes we punish ourselves with grief over someone else’s sin. Again, I don’t want to be misunderstood about this. It’s a good thing to grieve over sin in the lives of people. Jesus did. Paul did. But the lesson we learn from what God told Samuel is that we shouldn’t let that grief consume us. We shouldn’t feel guilty for enjoying our lives when we’ve done everything we can to get that person to repent.
These are just a few thoughts about Paul’s words, “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice”! I hope these words have helped.
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