The Way of Wisdom—Joy

What are the things in your life that bring you joy?  Sit with that question for just a moment.  What are the things that bring you joy?  Now, think of one thing in particular that brings you joy. 

When I think about things that bring me joy I think about my family, I think about proposing to Stacey and our wedding day. I think about the days my daughters were born and the different things we have done together over the years and then seeing them graduate from college and get married.  Just thinking about my wife brings me joy.  There are other things bring me joy, like standing in a crystal clear river with a fly rod in my hand and feeling the tug of a fish on my fly.

How do you describe such things with any other word than JOY?

Did you know that God designed you to experience joy? Not only has He created you for this, but He wants you to know and experience joy.

In case you missed out on being here this summer, our summer series is called The Way of Wisdom. We are exploring some of the themes throughout the book of Proverbs, written by King Solomon, who was granted unusual wisdom from God. Understanding the words of Solomon will bring you wisdom and understanding and ultimately lead you to joy.

Look at what Solomon says:

Prov 10:28 (CSB)—The hope of the righteous is joy, but the expectation of the wicked will perish.

Solomon says that when we pursue righteousness and Godliness, or, to put it in our context, when we seek to become more like Jesus, we find joy.

Would like more joy in your life?

In a world consistently filled with hopelessness, bitterness, anger, and disappointment, one of the things everyone longs for is more joy.  Life can be hard and our world looks for all of these different avenues to find joy, or some do their best to numb the pain of their lives because they have been unsuccessful at finding joy.

The Apostle Paul says this very thing in Gal 5.

Gal 5:19-21 (CSB)—Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar. I am warning you about these things—as I warned you before—that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Paul says that there is a result of pursuing these things.  The result, he says, is that you will not experience the kingdom of God.  However, if you pursue the presence of God, instead of these things, there are some things you will experience. What are those things?

Gal 5:22 (CSB)—But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. 

Paul says that a fruit of the Spirit is joy.

Many people who follow Jesus make a mistake when they read this passage. They read this list of the fruit of the Spirit and think it is a list of things to pursue.  They think since the Holy Spirit lives in me I should be more patient and kind and try to be better and more faithful.

That thinking will lead you to exhaustion and is a quick path to legalism.

But that is not what Paul is saying.  Here is what Paul is saying: 

Joy comes to us through the presence of God.

It doesn’t come through striving it comes through the presence of God.  Instead of striving to do all of these things, or to be all of these things, what we ought to strive for is to know His presence more.  Seek Him.  God says through the Prophet Jeremiah in Jer 29 that if we seek Him with all our heart, we will find Him.

We ought to strive for more of Him in our lives, and when we have more of His presence in our lives, we begin to experience more love, joy, peace, patience, etc …

King Solomon says the hope of the righteous is joy. Joy comes to the righteous through God’s presence in our lives. When we pursue God’s presence in our lives, we can’t help but find joy.  

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There is another way that joy comes to us.  

Have you ever known someone who simply chooses not to have joy in their lives? Did you know that you can choose to ignore joy? In my family, we call people who do this Eeyores—you know, Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh.

Here are a few notable quotes from Eeyore in Winnie the Pooh

​​”I was so upset, I forgot to be happy.”

“Don’t worry about me.  Go ahead and enjoy yourself.  I’ll stay here and be miserable.”

“Sure is a cheerful color.  Guess I’ll have to get used to it.

“Could be worse.  Not sure how, but it could be.”

—Eeoyre

These are all things Eeoyre said.  Maybe you know someone like this.  Maybe you know an Eeyore.  They are glass-half-full people who never see hope and the possibilities in people and situations.  They are people who never acknowledge that in Christ, there is always hope and a million different possibilities.  These folks have a tough time finding joy.  

The reality is, we are all Eeoyres sometimes, and that is why we need to know that …

Joy comes to us by our own choosing.

Often, we are faced with a decision. We can either choose despair or joy. We can choose to be discouraged or to choose joy. We can choose to see only the negative side of things or to choose joy. In our negative and depressive culture, it can be tough for the followers of Jesus to choose joy.  

Politics is divisive and always looks for a negative angle. On social media, people rant and complain, constantly nitpick, and look for things to be upset about. I have news for you: People who act that way choose to act that way. They have chosen a mindset that leads them to think negatively about everything. When immersed in that culture, it can be tough to choose joy, especially if you forget that you have a choice.

You are not powerless people.  You are not at the mercy of the wind and waves of our culture. You are powerful people, filled and empowered by the Holy Spirit.  The same power that raised Jesus from the dead is at work in you!  You can choose joy.

That doesn’t mean you have to be happy all the time and put on a fake smile. There are times for sadness, grief, and sorrow, but that doesn’t mean we sacrifice our joy when things are hard.

If our joy is rooted in God’s presence, goodness, and faithfulness, then nothing life throws at us can steal our joy. If our joy is rooted in knowing that God has a plan for us, which is for our good, then regardless of what comes our way, we can still choose joy!

Remember, you were created for joy.  God’s heart is that you have joy.  When we choose joy, we live out what we were designed for.

So, choose joy!

Joy comes to us through God’s presence and our own choosing, but there is another way.

Recently, I read a paper by Brené Brown on joy and gratitude.

“The relationship between joy and gratitude was one of the important things I found in my research. I wasn’t expecting it. In my 12 years of research on 11,000 pieces of data, I did not interview one person who had described themselves as joyful, who also did not actively practice gratitude. For me it was very counterintuitive because I went into the research thinking that the relationship between joy and gratitude was: if you are joyful, you should be grateful. But it wasn’t that way at all. Instead, practicing gratitude invites joy into our lives.

It’s not joy that makes us grateful, it’s gratitude that makes us joyful.

—Brené Brown

Joy comes to us through gratitude.

Prov 17:22 (CSB)—A joyful heart is good medicine, but a broken spirit dries up the bones.

Overcoming a broken spirit requires us to remember God’s goodness. Unfortunately, we have short memories. One day, God miraculously provides for us, but the next day, we encounter some hard thing, and we forget the miracle of the previous day.

There is a beautiful picture of this in Luke 7.  Jesus is invited to the house of a Pharisee for dinner, and a woman interrupts the dinner, probably a woman who had been a prostitute, and she bows at Jesus’ feet and begins to weep.  She covers his feet with perfume and begins to dry his feet with her hair.  The Pharisee is pretty freaked out by this because this woman is a sinner.  She is unclean.  So Jesus, in Jesus’ fashion, tells him a parable.

A creditor has two debtors; one owes 500 denari, and one owes 50 denari.  Neither could pay their debt, so the creditor forgave them both.  Who was more grateful Jesus asked.  The Pharisee replied the one who owed more?  You have judged correctly, Jesus said.

Lk 7:44-48 (CSB)—Turning to the woman, he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she, with her tears, has washed my feet and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but she hasn’t stopped kissing my feet since I came in. You didn’t anoint my head with olive oil, but she has anointed my feet with perfume. Therefore I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven; that’s why she loved much. But the one who is forgiven little, loves little.” Then he said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”

The woman’s tears were tears of joy, emanating from her gratitude toward Jesus.  This ought to be us every time we remember what God has done for us and when we remember the hope and the future we have.

Take time to be grateful, and you may find unexpected joy.

But discovering God’s presence and finding joy doesn’t always take the route we’d like it to. Sometimes …

Joy comes to us through our pain.

Prov 14:10 (CSB)—The heart knows its own bitterness, and no outsider shares in its joy.

In other words, we alone know our pain and our joy. We wrestle with them individually in our own hearts, and pain and sorrow can feel isolating.   

None of us likes pain.  The body’s natural response to pain is to recoil.  Our brain tells us that we are in danger when we are in pain.  In the same way, when we are experiencing difficulties, whether emotional or relational or are heartbroken over something or someone, we feel that pain so deeply. 

Maybe someone has wounded you, and you feel like you are bleeding out emotionally.  Our natural response to that pain is to recoil.  To hide.  To isolate.  To run away.  To be discouraged. 

But some of you need to hear this morning that the path to joy is often through pain and sorrow.

Pain and joy often seemed to be joined together.

Joy and pain, they are but two arteries of the one heart that pumps through all those who don’t numb themselves to really living.

—Ann Voskamp

Pain and sorrow are a part of the human experience.  It doesn’t matter who you are and how good you’ve been.  It doesn’t matter how much money you have or how many friends you have.  Pain and sorrow are a part of us.  But I also know that God has a way of turning mourning into dancing and sorrow into joy.

My own story is a great example.  As a young kid, I remember the pain of my parent’s divorce and the difficulties that event brought into the lives of myself and my siblings.  I remember weeping many days and wondering why God would allow all this heartache.

But in retrospect, I see how God worked through those painful events to bring me where He wanted me. If it weren’t for those events, I never would have met Jesus. If it weren’t for those painful events, I never would have met my amazing wife. If it weren’t for those painful events, you and I would not be having this conversation today.

God doesn’t cause our pain; a sinful world causes our pain, but He can use pain to shape us and bring us where He wants us.

In Jn 16, as Jesus is nearing the time when he will be crucified, he warns his disciples that they will experience pain and sorrow. He describes it in terms of a woman who has given birth.  The pains of labor are horrible, but once you are through the pain, you celebrate because you are holding a new child.

Jesus understood this process because He understands our pain.

Heb 12:1-2 (CSB)—Therefore, since we also have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us. Let us run with endurance the race that lies before us, keeping our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Jesus knew there was joy on the other side of pain, but the path was through pain.

Sometimes, joy comes to us through our pain.

You were designed to experience joy.  Solomon says that the hope of the righteous is joy.

That joy comes to us in several ways.

Joy comes to us through the presence of God.

Joy comes to us by our own choosing.

Joy comes to us through gratitude.

Joy comes to us through our pain.

But joy begins with a relationship with Jesus because He is the giver of joy. When I was a young kid, I started that relationship. What does it mean to have a relationship with Him?

There is something that separates you from God, and that thing is your sin.  But God solved the problem of your sin by sending His one and only Son, Jesus, to pay the price for your sin by allowing Himself to die on the cross.  That death paid for your sin, and three days later, Jesus rose from the dead in victory over your sin and death.  But God won’t force His love on you.  Instead, He offers it as a gift.  If you receive the gift of forgiveness, He offers you, the barrier that separates you from God, which is your sin, is removed, and God will take up residence in you and in your life, and He promises that one day you will be with Him forever in Heaven.

Rom 10:9 (CSB)—If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

I started a relationship with God by praying a simple prayer.  It is not a prayer that saves you; it is the attitude of your heart, and God knows your heart.  But I expressed my desire to follow Him by praying a simple prayer, and if you have never prayed to begin a relationship with Jesus, I encourage you to do that today. Here is what I prayed when I started my journey with Jesus:

God, I know I have sinned and don’t deserve your love, but thank you for sending you Son, Jesus, to pay the price for my sin. I receive your free offer of forgiveness and I want to follow you with all of my heart and all of my life. God, thank you for loving me and forgiving me. Amen.