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We have done a lot of music today and
I’m going to do a little bit more. I’m going to teach you a song you
may already know. It’s a kind of a vacation bible school song and it
goes like this.
Hallelu, hallelu, hallelu,
hallelujah:
Praise ye the Lord!
Hallelu, hallelu, hallelu,
hallelujah:
Praise ye the Lord!
Praise ye the Lord, Hallelujah;
Praise ye the Lord, Hallelujah;
Praise ye the Lord, Hallelujah;
Praise ye the Lord.
You know it. Good. Good. O.K. We
are going to play the game of half and half. You’re the “Hallelujah”
side and you’re the “Praise ye the Lord” side. Now, you’re going to
have to stand up and sit down in this one. I know that some of you are
a little stiff, I won’t say why, but I have the same problem as I get
more chronologically blessed. So if you can’t stand up, just raise your
hand, O.K. But this side is going to be the “Hallelujah” side and so
when it is your turn to sing, you stand up. When it isn’t, you sit
down. So divide that as you wish, right here. You guys stand up
because you’re the “Hallelujah” side. So go ahead. Alright. So it’s
going to start out “Hallelu, hallelu, hallelu, hallelujah” and then
you’re going to stand up and sing “Praise ye the Lord” and then sit
down. O.K. So here we go.
Hallelu, hallelu, hallelu,
hallelujah:
Praise ye the Lord!
Hallelu, hallelu, hallelu,
hallelujah:
Praise ye the Lord!
Praise ye the Lord, Hallelujah;
Praise ye the Lord, Hallelujah;
Praise ye the Lord, Hallelujah;
Praise ye the Lord.
Just sit down.
Now why did I do that? Well I
contend that it fits with my sermon today which is about Joy. I have
discovered that joy really makes life feel better. It makes us
healthier. I even read that it actually makes us smarter. I read that
some psychologists did a study. They took two groups and both groups
were given puzzles to finish but one group was allowed to watch
America’s Funniest Home Videos first. They were seventy-five percent
better than the ones who didn’t. So their happiness, joy and laughter
made them smarter; maybe that’s why I made you do it. You get to listen
better. O.K. I’m only kidding. Actually even deeper than that, it is
part of who we are as human beings. God, I believe, the bible says,
that “God has made us to be joyful creatures.” That is our default
mode, to use computer language. That’s who we are, who we were made to
be. The reason I believe that is because of who God is. If you read
the bible, you find joy everywhere, everywhere. I know that comes as a
surprise to some folks because, as I’ve said many times before, people
tend to have the view of God, that He’s kind of like a cosmic killjoy;
that He runs around looking for where people are having fun and tries to
put a stop to it. But that’s not who God is. Just reading the first
page where God creates the world, after every day, it says, “It was
good!” Now we tend to read that and go “It was good.” No, the language
was “It was GOOD!” and God had FUN making creation, every day and at the
end “It is very good.” Very good! Throughout the bible,” the joy of
the Lord is my strength” says Nehemiah. Buck read part of a Psalm, and
many Psalms say the same thing. “Shout for joy.” Jesus was a man of
joy. He went to parties. He said to the disciples, “My joy is now in
you. When you pray, your joy will be complete.” Think about heaven, my
friends. Is heaven supposed to be a place of sadness? The dominant
emotion is joy. You know, I have come to believe that this Presbyterian
emphasis on decency and order is a little bit overblown. It’s who God
is. That’s what I want to talk about today. I want to talk about how
we, we can have more joy in our lives right now. There are so many
scriptures I could read to you but I’m just going to read a short
passage from Philippians, chapter 4 where Paul says: (Philippians
4:4:8)
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will
say it again: Rejoice! Let your evidence be known to everyone. The
Lord is at hand. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything,
by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be
known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,
will guard your hearts and your minds n Christ Jesus!
Finally, brothers, whatever is true,
whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is
lovely, whatever is commendable—if there is any excellence, if there is
anything worthy of praise—think about these things.
This is the word of the Lord.
Thanks be to God!
Would you pray with me?
Father, there is so many things in
our lives that kill our joy. We ask that you would help us to know you
better and therefore know joy better. Help us in this moment now as we
hear some things that might help us be more joyful, that we take them
and use them and appropriate them in our lives. And that we may shout
our praises to you, in our hearts, with our lips, and in our minds. In
Jesus’ name. Amen.
What is the greatest barrier to joy
in our lives? I’ll spell it for you. MYSELF. Myself, ourselves, it’s
us. We choose ourselves whether to be joyful or not, very often. Oh
yes, there are circumstances, lots of things that happen; but in the end
we choose how we want to be. So some of the things I want to say to you
today, hopefully, will help you as you live your lives to have more
joy. So how can we do this? If you want to follow along in the notes,
you can or you can just listen; but I am kind of spelling out a word
called JOYFUL. The first thing I would suggest to you is to Jettison
the disappointments that you have from your past, to jettison the
regrets that you have. Our lives are full of regrets. I don’t know
about you but sometimes I’m just minding my own business, enjoying a
sunset or doing something and some thought kind of zips into my head
about what somebody did to me when I was five, or when I was twelve, or
twenty-two, or whatever; and it takes over my mind and I wonder, “where
did that come from? Go away.” But it doesn’t want to. A lot of joy
stealers out there. We have to jettison those regrets as best we can.
That means to throw away; that means to throw overboard. It means to
get rid of and it really isn’t an easy thing to do. We can start with
just plain logic. You know there is nothing you and I can do; we’re
powerless to do anything about the past. We can’t change it. What’s
done is done! It’s happened! You can’t go back and change that; but we
can remember that God can deal with it. That God has decisively dealt
with your past and my past, on the cross. That’s what the cross is all
about. At the cross we have forgiveness for our sins and our failures
and our hurts. The bible says, “Therefore, there is now no
condemnation, no condemnation, for those who are in Christ Jesus.” God
has dealt decisively with your past and we can live It doesn’t mean
that we won’t have problems or we might not sin again, but God has dealt
with this; and we can have joy because of it. Now, that doesn’t mean we
don’t do anything. We do. We have to have commitment to this too; but
even with all these truths sometimes they still come and we still have
to work at it. Cindy and I bought our first house in Greensboro, North
Carolina. It was really a nice little house It was kind of older and
it was big enough for a family of three small girls and newly wed
people, pretty much. We got into the house and we lived there a little
while and we heard this little scratching behind the kitchen sink. We
thought we had a little mouse. So we put a trap right behind one of the
drawers and, sure enough the next morning, it had gone off but no
mouse. Well, after a while, we caught a glimpse of what was really
there. It wasn’t a little mouse, it was a big mouse. We had rats.
Naturally, we were a little bit upset about that, with three small girls
and ourselves. So we got some poison, you know, the kind that is
supposed to make them really thirsty and make them go outside. Hmmmm.
It doesn’t work. Some of them did, right through the kitchen. But I
had to go downstairs into the basement, go through the crawl space and
find all the rat holes. The stench was incredible. It filled the
house. I had to go through that crawl space and fill them all up. You
know, my friends, I think this in an analogy for us sometimes as we live
in the past. You know, the past should be learned from. It should be
celebrated sometimes, but to live in it is a stench. It smells bad. We
have to go through sometimes and go through counseling; sometimes we
have to talk to friends; sometimes we have to deal with those rat holes,
those memories, those tapes that we play in our hearts, our minds, those
regrets, with the power of God.
The second thing we need to do is to
Omit our worrying about the future. We talked about the past;
now we go to the future and maybe worrying is the biggest joy killer of
them all. After all, where is God when you are worrying? You might
say, “Well, He’s right next to me because I’m crying out ‘Oh God, help
me. I’m worried.’” But worrying is really in the context of not
trusting in God. Think about the obsessions we go through, you know,
when we are worrying whether something is really going to happen. “Is
God really there?” Or if He’s there, do you really think He’s powerful
enough to help you? That’s what happens to us. We forget that God is
powerful enough, that God owns the future, owns our future. There is a
huge difference between concern and worrying. We are all concerned
about things. Concern is the responsibility that we have in the context
of trusting in God but worrying is a Godless thing. We have to remember
that God is the Lord of the past and the future.
The third thing we can do is Yield
ourselves to God’s purpose. When we have a purpose we have a greater
chance of having joy. When we don’t have a purpose, we are in despair.
Most of us have seen the movie ‘Castaways’, about a man who’s lost on an
island. After he is there for a while, you have to flash forward to
he’s been there four years, and the first scene you see is Tom Hanks
kind of staring out into space with a kind of oblivious look, gnawing on
a raw fish because the only purpose he has is in staying alive and even
that was bad for him. He tried to kill himself and was a failure at
that. Without purpose we have no reason to be joyful, but particularly
if we don’t have a purpose for God. You see life is more than just
living and making a living. Real life is having something for God; and,
my friends, there are really only two choices, to sit on the sidelines
or get in the game. Most people sit on the sidelines I received an
email from a friend of mine I knew from a former church. While I was at
this church I must have met with my friend for what seemed like every
other month for four years. My friend was searching. Let me read to you
the email he sent me this past week. “Just saying ‘Hello, Chris’. I
leave for Argentina this coming Friday for a one-week music ministry
tour. It is going to be fun, rewarding and grueling, for sure. Most
days we have two concerts on one day and one day we have three at
different locations in Buenos Aires. Your prayers are always
appreciated. Things on the personal front are going better as time
passes. I’m spending more time listening and reflecting on God than
ever before. I finally figured out that nothing I can do could screw up
God’s plans for me. I have two choices, to be part of what God is doing
or to sit on the sidelines. I don’t like much sitting around.” When I
read something like that, I go “Yes!” Here’s a man who’s getting it.
That’s where we all are really, we may not always get it; but hopefully,
we’re getting it.
So we yield ourselves to God’s
purpose, and fourthly we Focus on what is good. Paul says to
“fix our thoughts on what is honorable, what’s excellent, what’s good,
what’s beautiful.” I don’t know about you but I find that hard to do in
our world. The news media is paid to focus on negative things.
Everything seems to be negative. It’s easy to be negative. It’s easy
to forget to be thankful. That’s what Paul says. He says, “Rejoice in
the Lord always in everything, with your prayers and petitions with
thanksgiving.” In other words, even before you have an answer to your
prayers, be thankful because God is in control of your life. Whatever
happens to you, God will always be in control of your life. I would
like to take a two minute side road just on prayer for a second, just
for a second. You know, if you are a believer, God always answers your
prayers, always, always, always. There is no time when God does not
answer your prayers if you are a child of God. Jesus says God will
answer your prayers and the joy is in the answering. “God will answer
and there you will find joy.” Now there are three kinds of answers,
only three. You might get a “yes” and, if you know that you get a yes
to your prayers, go have an apple pie a la mode and just go “great”.
Some of you may want something a little stronger than that, but go
“Yeah.” Now sometimes they’re “no’s” and all of us can think of times
we got a no and we’re glad we did. But God may be leading you in a
different direction. I like the term ‘open and closed door theology’.
God opens doors and closes doors; but he may have some other way to
bless you and He is saying “no” to this at this time. The third thing,
of course, is “wait” and waiting is difficult. God is trying to teach
us something about trusting Him. Maybe God is trying to arrange
things. You know, I believe God is omnipotent and can do anything He
wants to, just like that. But when He deals with us most of the time
it’s a process. I have experience times when I’ve asked for something.
It didn’t happen for a while; but I came to find out several other
things had to happen before the prayer could be answered. That’s the
way God works. You have to wait.
The next thing we need to do is
Use our lives to help others. We’ve all probably, whether we wanted
to or not, have been subjected to reading Hamlet in high school or
someplace. We all remember the great soliloquy of Hamlet, “to be or not
to be”. You know what he’s talking about there. He’s talking about
suicide. His father has been murdered; his mother has married the
probable murderer; and he’s wondering whether it would be more painful
to live or to die. Well Paul goes through a similar thing only from a
totally different perspective. He wonders whether it would be better to
live or die. He says to the Philippians, “I don’t know what’s better to
die and go be with the Lord, or be with you; but either way it will be
great. But I’m going to choose to be with you because I know it’s best
for you.” That was the grid in which the apostle thought in, what’s
best for others; and that’s the way we need to be. You know there is no
greater joy than when you have made a difference in somebody else’s life
for Jesus Christ. You don’t always get to see that; but when you find
out, you go “Yeah! That’s what it’s about.”
Last but not least, we need to
Learn to be content, to learn to be content. You know it seems like
everything is conspiring against us being content. First there is the
world, all the advertising that is out there is designed to make you
discontented with what you already have. How many commercials do we see
everyday? But then there is our own nature. Part of the central ness
of our nature is that we are just insatiable; so that, even if we won
the lottery, after while we wouldn’t be satisfied with that. We find
that nothing in the end brings contentment except the Lord Himself, and
there is no joy without thanksgiving and contentment. But if we have
those things, Paul says “and the peace of God which passes all
understanding will be yours in Christ Jesus.” Joy and contentment go
together like peas and carrots.
In the end, let me read you a
definition that I came across that I think is a very good definition of
joy It goes something like this. Joy is the unshakeable assurance that
God is in control. Joy is the unshakeable assurance that God is in
control of all the details of your life, in control of all the details
of your life. It is the quiet confidence that ultimately everything
will be alright and the determined purpose to pray as God in all
things. Isn’t that good? If you want it, I’ll email it to you. It’s
the unshakeable assurance that God is in control. Let us pray.
Oh Father, we find it hard to have
joy in you and in life. We pray that you would help us, help us to get
to know you better and so get to know joy better because you are joy.
To know you is joy. To love you is joy. To follow you is joy. To see
you ultimately is joy. We pray in our joyful Lord’s name, Jesus. Amen.
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