Devotional Christian » joy

Leaping To Conclusions

Hariette Petersen — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 14:39:23 +0000

The receiver stretches and reaches the goal-line. The referee raises his arms straight up. “Touchdown!” Everyone on the team leaps in the air for joy. Oh, but wait. The play must be reviewed. In seconds, excitement evaporates. Adrenaline dissolves.

It’s not all that hard to get excited when your football team scores a touchdown, your ball-team hits a homerun, or your basketball team sinks a 3-pointer in the final second of a tie ballgame. It’s not a struggle to celebrate with like-minded enthusiasts. They are loyalists– loyal to their team–just like you.

Yet, it makes me wonder. Every time I see the celebration, the frivolity, the joy, I muse. Why do Christians exhibit so little joy when their Savior is praised in Sunday worship? Shouldn’t we be just as excited, and happy, as thrilled when we see a lost person come to Jesus? When we hear a soloist sing a powerful song of praise extolling the amazing grace we have in Jesus, why do we know raised our hands in praise and joy; our sins are washed away! We have victory in Jesus! We’ve overcome the world through Him! Are we not on His team?

“The LORD is my strength and my shield;

my heart trusts in Him, and I am helped.

My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to Him in song.” Psalm 28:7

I thought I was going to come apart last week when a soloist sang of God’s amazing grace and how He’d covered his sin and forgave him despite his rebellion. My mind jumped up and down with joy! God so loves us. He’s won the war with Satan. He’s overcome the world. He’s wiped out death. He forgives my sin. His grace is abundant! I get to spend an eternity in His glory and presence! Then, I shared that joy outloud. I clapped my hands and said, “Amen! Amen! Praise God!” Another lady in front of me turned to see me. She clapped her hands, in a moment, she wiped tears from her eyes. She knew. She grasped the import of the praise and glory due the LORD. Our hearts joined in exultation, as most sat in ho-hum silence. How do we sit silent during a clarion call to praise to His holy name?

Oh, I know we all have problems. I know there are difficulties in lives I am unaware of. I know that some people just are not emotionally demonstrative. Yet, I am not talking emotion. I am talking knowingly giving God glory for what He is and what He’s done, and what He’s doing in our lives.

Fans leap to conclusions with enthusiasm at the prospect of a silly score, yet barely crack a smile when they know, without a doubt, the conclusion of our mighty God. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to sit on the sidelines waiting for the referee to review my faith. I don’t want to sit idly by and walk out of the stadium the same way I came in. I want to leap for joy! After all, “leaping to conclusions” is a sure thing…when it comes to Jesus.

Hariette Petersen, SelahV Today, 2011

Joy

Dionna Sanchez — Thu, 12 May 2011 20:08:20 +0000

“I’ve got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart” (Where?) Down in my heart (Where?) Down in my heart to stay!”

I sang that song in Sunday School. I grew up in the church. So many classic Sunday School songs come back to me now and minister to my heart – just when I need them.

Some things are just timeless. Their lessons –albeit simple – are resounding.

I’ve been thinking about joy lately. How it seems to escape so many of us. And this simple Sunday School song came flooding back to my mind and to my lips.

Oh, how confidently a child can sing out that they have joy! They don’t shoulder the cares and burdens of a life filled with responsibility, hurt, and hard decisions that need to be made.

But deep inside this adult heart – still lives that child. And still lives that joy. That joy may just have been pushed deeper, but it’s still there. For I don’t believe God can exist in a heart aside from joy. For it is a part of who He is.

Joy. Joy gives us our strength. It helps us laugh through pain. It brings us hope. Love. Peace. Perspective. Focus. That’s joy. It reminds us who we’re living for.

I’m on a journey. A journey to dig deep and grab hold of that joy that has been pushed down underneath all the other “stuff” of life. I’m ready to set it up on top of everything and let it lead me in life. Let it fill me.

How about you? Where is your joy? Has it been pushed down too deep inside of you? Is it time to bring it up out into the open again?

The LORD is my strength and my shield; my heart trusts in him, and I am helped. My heart leaps for joy and I will give thanks to him in song. Psalm 28:7

~ Dionna Sanchez

http://beautyinthestorm.blogspot.com

The Most Effective Witness

The Will of God: Your Rejoicing

Chris Roberts — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 13:10:45 +0000

Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

Do circumstances get the best of you? Is your response to God dictated by events in the world rather than his unfailing promises? Paul tells us to rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances. We call him unreasonable but he is being quite reasonable.

No matter how much our immediate circumstances may disappoint or cause hardship, we are able to rejoice. Our hope is not rooted in the things offered by this world but in the unfailing promises of our unchanging God.

If God were to let us down, we might be disappointed. If God were to fail us, we might be devastated. But God will never leave us, never forsake us, and never allow anything to happen to us unless he plans to use it for good. So we rejoice every day. We pray without ceasing. We give thanks no matter what is going on around us. We are not surprised when the world lets us down – did you really think the circumstances of this world would make you truly happy? Instead, we rejoice in the knowledge that our true joy is rooted in the One who promises unending joy.

So rejoice. Pray. Give thanks. After all, this is not just a suggestion. It is not good advice that Christians be people of joy. It is God’s will in Christ Jesus that you find your joy, your hope, your thanksgiving in him.

Do Christians Know How to Party?

Jody Sneed — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:21:31 +0000

“But you walked away from your first love – why? What’s going on with you, anyway?” Revelation 2:4 (The Message)

Mike Yaconelli once observed, “It doesn’t take much to make most of us realize that we have become too serious, too tense, too stressful. The result is that we have forgotten how to live life…What happened to the gleam in our eye? What happened to that joyful, crazy, spontaneous, fun-loving spirit we once had? The childlikeness in all of us gets snuffed out over the years…the sign that Jesus is in our hearts, the evidence of the truth of the Gospel is that we still have a light on in our souls.”

How can someone walk away from their first love, lose that gleam in their eye? Could I walk away from my wife of 28 years? By all accounts, my love for her is not same as that August day in 1981 when she walked down the aisle at our wedding. Since then we have had two sons, careers, personal successes and tragedies and a growing walk with the Lord. If nothing else, today my love for her is stronger and more intimate than in those precious and heady days as newlyweds.

Yet as I claim a stronger relationship with the Lord during this time, I honestly know that I have been living in Ephesus when it comes to my walk with God. Just as human relationships have plateaus, I must confess that I have not sought out the depth of God, pursuing the love and fellowship I knew in my early days as a believer. This is what is going on: I have walked away from my first love and forgotten how to live life!

Regaining the life I seek with Him, returning to a childlikeness, requires intimacy. I know full well the intimacy I seek with Him will benefit from improved spiritual disciplines (such as more time in His Word and in prayer). But I cannot rely on these activities alone, otherwise I have fallen under the Law and am practicing faith by works. Relationships grow out of intention and communication as well as in following through with responsibilities. Any life with Him begins and ends with making God the priority, not just one of many pressing concerns in my everyday living.

Living this life means adopting a willingness to live His life, not my own. Returning to my first love means saying “no” to all the competing interests and consistently putting the needs of my Beloved before my own. My marriage is no different and it suffers when attention and intention give way to selfish living. When my priorities are restored, the joy returns to the relationship.

I find hope and direction in Yaconelli’s concluding thought: “Christians are not just people who live godly lives; we are people who know how to live period. Christians are not just examples of moral purity, we are also people filled with a bold mischievousness. Christians not only know how to practice piety, we also know how to party. I believe it’s time for the party to begin.”

With the reminder of from Ephesus and hopefully a gleam in my eye, I know it is party time!

Delight, Desire and Joy in God

Jody Sneed — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 11:20:53 +0000

Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Psalm 37:4

Some days, I wonder if God feels about my faith the same way I feel about food while on a diet: if it tastes good, spit it out. In the ministries we have, the common mindset seems to be if I want to do it, then it’s probably selfish and not of God. So I just do what is commanded without thought, letting obedience become duty and obligation…a joyless ritual that must be observed or we have failed to be holy.

Based on the verse above, am I justifying myself in religious busyness or am I delighting myself in Him? Is the work at hand the desire of my heart?

This is an example of spiritual cause-and-effect…how do I delight myself in the Lord? The psalmist answers in verses 5-6. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.

Commit my way to Him? Scripture tells us how in John 15:9-11: “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.”

Obedience out of love leads to joy and righteousness. With those in hand, the justice of our cause becomes the brightest light in the sky, like the noonday sun – if our cause is to follow Him…and we encourage others to join us!

In consideration of how I commit my way to Him and His cause, here are some thoughts:

In preparing a lesson, working a youth event or cleaning up after a meal, am I loving my Savior or checking off one more item on the to-do list?
Is my attitude and demeanor attractive to the lost?
Am I laboring for my salvation (grace by works)?
Have I presented the joy He brings in our redemption or have I placed joy under the bushel so that none may see by it?

My delight should be that the desire of my heart is to have my joy complete in Him!

Delight in God’s Commandments