Moving Beyond Happiness
I rather enjoy pleasure. I seek it out. I enjoy laughing out loud at a good comedy. I take great delight in every bite of my friend Wayne’s delectable coconut cream pie—and having it all to myself.
Who among us doesn’t like pleasure? We pursue it. We plan our vacations to go places we consider pleasurable. Pleasure just feels good.
But those pleasurable experiences don’t last. The book we loved so much comes to the final page. We’ve thoroughly licked the pie pan clean. (Wayne, if you’re reading this …) Vacations come to an end.
But joy … ah, joy is something altogether different. Joy is not something you can necessarily tie to a specific experience or thing. Joy is a sense of well-being that permeates us.
We can’t talk about joy without also talking about love and peace, and we can’t talk about all three of those without talking about Jesus. I walk with love, peace, and joy because I walk with Jesus. To realize I am loved by Him no matter fills me with joy. To know I am at peace because I have been fully forgiven and embraced by God fills me with joy. Because nothing can take away that love and peace, nothing can take away my joy.
Unless I let it.
When I take my eyes off Jesus, I’ve taken my eyes off the source of my joy. My eyesight can become clouded with my circumstances, my sin-filled past, my worries about the future—and the joy dissipates.
We can experience joy in the midst of our circumstances, even painful ones. I’ve known people whose joy was not diminished by the pain of cancer or the threat of death. The “secret” for these individuals is the very thing I want to know: the inner transformation of the Christ-filled life. This sounds odd to the world, but when we walk with Jesus, “the joy of the Lord is your strength” (Neh. 8:10).
Consider what Jesus told His disciples on the night of His arrest. Jesus knew the cross was before Him and He was only hours away from His execution. You’d expect a somber tone, but Jesus talked to them of joy. He invited them to cling to Him as a branch clings to a vine. When we cling to Him, getting our sustenance and strength from Him, Jesus said His joy would be in us and our “joy would be complete” (John 15:11).
I still choose pleasure over pain. Yet the arrival of pain, hardship, and difficulties may negate any sense of pleasure—but it doesn’t negate joy. We see this in the testimony of the Thessalonian church. They faced severe persecution, but despite that they “welcomed the message with joy from the Holy Spirit” (1 Thess. 1:6).
When Paul was in a nasty, dank Roman jail cell, what did he write to the Philippians? “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!” (Phil. 4:4). Paul modeled the joyous life in the hardest circumstances. Later in Philippians 4, he wrote of the contentment he had regardless of his circumstances. How could he endure? How could he be joyous and content?
“I am able to do all things through him who strengthens me” (Phil. 4:13).
Pleasurable movies end. Pie pans become empty. Good friends move. Circumstances change. But joy remains because Christ remains.
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