True Joy

Too many worldly things encroach upon our lives and drive out the joy Our Father in Heaven meant for us to have. People are always trying to scare us to do their will or use their products and services. If you don’t buy our shutters, your house will be destroyed in the next hurricane. If your pressure is a mite too high or you are a few pounds over weight (by whose standards, anyway?), heart attacks and strokes will get you. Every place we look someone is trying to scare us into doing something.

If fear does not get us, then gossip and vengefulness permeate our lives. We learn to become angry and resentful because of real or imaginary assaults on our egos or the world we invent for ourselves. We gain enemies faster than an anarchist, even if our enemies are unaware that we put them on the enemies’ list.

In these evil days, we need to put joy back in our lives. The first place we must turn to is Our Father in Heaven because true joy can only come from Him and our following in His Way.
Joy Comes from Knowledge of Our Father in Heaven

A prophet found the Word of God and ate them, actually, ingested them mentally until they became a part of him. These words then became a joy and delight to his heart because God called by His name, a son of the Most High Creator, the Lord of Hosts.

David extolled Our Father in Heaven because he learned of Him and, thus, found more joy in his heart then all the wheat and wine in Israel. When believers learn of Our Father in Heaven, they glorify God and give thanks because of His holy Name and righteousness.

The righteous sing new songs praising God for the marvelous victories the power of His right hand has achieved. When Jesus instructed his disciples on Passover, he gave them the secret to eternal joy, knowing the kind of Being Our Father in Heaven is.

Without God, there is no joy, just counterfeit emotions resembling happiness and self-satisfaction.

Psalm 119 extols the joy of keeping Our Father in Heaven’s laws — how they rejoice the heart and enlighten the eyes, how they overwhelm the believer into shouts of joy, how they bring songs of joy upon the lips.

Unfortunately, some feel that the Laws of God are a burden and an impediment to having fun. These people will never know the joy of fulfilling the human potential by keeping the Commandments.

When we trust in Our Father’s Holy Name, our hearts are gladdened. When we choose to make Our Father our strength and shield because our hearts trust in Him, we sing praises to him with our whole being.

Jesus told us that when we are faithful in the little things, we will enter the joy of our master. When we walk by faith, joy becomes our constant companion.

This man became converted to the true church many years ago. Because of his unfounded faith, he invited the apostles to his house and set a banquet before them. Then he rejoiced with all his servants and family because he had been found worthy to believe in God.

Today, we cannot see Jesus or speak with the apostles, yet we are able from reading about him and the apostles to develop a great love for them. Those blessed in the Lord believe and rejoice beyond what words can express, for they realize what it took to bring them salvation and eternal life.

God gave Moses the Commandments to Israel and through them to the whole world. He told them, when they keep the Feast Days, they would rejoice in their banquet. You see in those days, believers put aside some of their tithes to attend and enjoy the Feast Days.

Others tithed, gave ten percent, to the needy and priests. They rejoiced that the needy found relief from their woes. The acts of helping are heard as far away as the angels in heaven, who rejoice as they inform Our Father in Heaven. The angels and all believers offer prayers of praise and thanksgiving to Our Father in Heaven for his steadfast love, which endures forever. They extol Our Father in Heaven because He has shown the way of love and sacrifice to help the needy and sustain the church.

Who does Our Father in Heaven favor? All people. How? He gives all people the air they breathe, the water they drink, the food they eat, the material for the houses they live in, the beauty they see and hear, and everything from family to friends. He gives in the hope people will turn to him and repent of their evil ways.

Even more so, Our Father in Heaven brings his special favor to those who believe and follow in His Ways. He turns their weeping aside by morning, He chases their mourning away, He teaches them wisdom in place of vanity, He gives a bountiful harvest in their fields, and He brings faith to replace their fears.

So all who live because Our Father in Heaven gives them the necessities of life, all who have been given faith, and all who practice the ways of life — rejoice in Our Father in Heaven because his love endures forever.

If you desire salvation so much that it inspires you to do all that is necessary to attain it, God will put joy into your hearts. Hannah recognized God’s salvation and protection, and he rejoiced in that knowledge. Job thought salvation something to rejoice greatly in and to inspire others with word of God’s goodness. David knew that all who sought refuge in God’s salvation were indeed blessed. He encouraged them to sing for joy and bless God’s great name.

Isaiah knew that God was his salvation, in whom he would trust. He said he would draw waters of joy from the wells of salvation. Shouting for joy and being led in the ways of peace, believers ought to break forth into singing. Let the trees clap in rhythm to the ode to joy.

The very soul of the believer exults in the salvation of Our Father in Heaven, and the knowledge of God’s grace regales the heart with fervent melodies of joy. Sing for joy because Our Father in Heaven has fashioned clothes of salvation and covered believers with the robes of righteousness as a groom wears a garland and a bride bedecks herself with jewels.

Mary rejoiced in God Our Savior because He made her to be the mother of His Son, strengthened her with His mighty arm, scattered the proud to the wilderness, pulled the mighty from their vain thrones, lifted the lowly up, fed the hungry, and brought salvation of all people. Yes, indeed, this man, Jesus, was the instrument through which Our Father in Heaven saved the world from its sins.

Through Jesus then we can come before Our Father in Heaven boldly and rejoice in the hope of sharing His glory.

When we pray in Jesus’s name because we abide in him and he in us, Our Father in Heaven draws close to us and brings us joy in his left hand and love in his right hand. Our Father in Heaven’s presence brings the fullness of joy.

He is as close as our next prayer, our next act of kindness, and our next stride in the Way of Truth. To keep us close, Our Father in Heaven gives us the gift of the Holy Spirit, which, in itself, brings joy. The disciples were filled with the joy of the Holy Spirit. Paul explains that the Kingdom of God is not food or drink but joy in the Holy Spirit. By the power of the Holy Spirit, people are filled with joy and peace, with power and hope. The second fruit of the Spirit is joy.

Then do not be drunk with wine, but be filled with Holy Spirit. Like the patriarchs and prophets of old, people today have reason to have greater joy because of the greater blessings, the nearness Our Father in Heaven through the Holy Spirit, which inspires that ecstasy. Think on these blessings and rejoice in Our Father in Heaven’s everlasting love and salvation.

If the angels in heaven rejoice when one sinner repents, should we not try to increase their joy by improving our talk and walk, according to Our Father in Heaven’s way. The pain and sorrow of opposing Our Father in Heaven turns also to joy in those who repent of evil ways. When Jesus ransoms God’s People and returns them to Zion, their hearts will overflow with great gladness.

So let those who sin repent and obtain gladness; let sorrow and sighing flee to be replaced with songs of praise and adoration of Our Father in Heaven.
Joy Comes from Tears and Trials

All right, it is easy to be glad when things are flowing smoothly, but cannot we cry and weep when things seem to go wrong? Maybe, maybe not.

The law of reversed effect says throw bread on the waters and receive bounty. The law of reversed effect says sow tears and reap shouts of joy. The law of reversed effect says blessed are the hungry for they will be fed. The law of reversed effect says blessed are those who are hated for Jesus’s sake for they will receive a great reward in heaven.

So if you have sorrow now, be of good cheer, Jesus will come into your hearts and turn tears of sorrow to tears of delight.

Even so, Paul says, rejoice in suffering because it produces endurance, which produces character, which produces hope, which produces an outpouring of the love Our Father in Heaven has filled our hearts with. So the rich are made poor and the poor rich. Poverty overflows in the riches of generosity that the rich often find so hard to emulate.

Finally, James says, to count it all joy when trials overtake you. Like Paul, he explains that trials are the testing of your faith, which produces steadfastness, which in its full effect makes you complete and perfect.

Praise the LORD. Praise the LORD from the heavens, praise him in the heights above. Praise him, all his angels, praise him, all his heavenly hosts. sPraise him, sun and moon, praise him, all you shining stars. Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the skies. Let them praise the name of the LORD, for he commanded and they were created. He set them in place for ever and ever; he gave a decree that will never pass away.

Praise the LORD from the earth, you great sea creatures and all ocean depths, lightning and hail, snow and clouds, stormy winds that do his bidding, you mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars, wild animals and all cattle, small creatures and flying birds, kings of the earth and all nations, you princes and all rulers on earth, young men and maidens, old men and children. Let them praise the name of the LORD, for his name alone is exalted; his splendor is above the earth and the heavens.

He has raised up for his people a horn, the praise of all his saints, of Israel, the people close to his heart. Praise the LORD.