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We all want happiness. And oh, my word, the lengths we can go in an attempt to find it. There truly is no reason for me to run down a list of things, as we all know what we have done in our lives in search of happiness. But fact is, no matter what we have thought would bring us happiness, sooner or later became the norm, ended, or even brought unhappiness. You know what I am talking about. You know the things you thought would be the end-all of bringing happiness into your life, just to find that things did not work out as planned. And then there is this thing called our brain. Yep, the complex brain in a human's head that can run amuck and bring us down for no apparent reason at times. Or it keeps recalling things that have long been over with. Or it worries about things that have not yet happened. Oh, yes, our brain causes us all kinds of trouble. If we could only find happiness so that we would not be so hurt, so down, so sad, so much of the time. We feel that we could get our act together if things would just go well for a while. But life just does not stop for us to get it together. One thing after another happens. Sometimes we just want to scream, "Get me off this ride!" But it would do no good. So, is there a simple answer to finding happiness? Yes, there is. And the short answer is delighting in the Word of God. "Delighting" in it. What do we do when we delight in something? We do it often. We enjoy doing it and want to do it. And we have time for it. Please follow me here: Psalm 1:1 - 3 "Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper." These verses begin with saying what not to do, in order to be blessed. A blessed person does not take counsel from the ungodly. This would include even our own flesh or the flesh of other Christians, as the flesh is ungodly. We are to only take counsel that is in the Spirit, by a person who is walking in the Spirit of God. Don't even let our own flesh tell us what to do, much less anyone else's flesh. The bible is clear that the only time we do not sin, is when we are walking in our born-again spirit, in the Spirit of God. It is easy to know to not take counsel from a known heathen. But we should also not take counsel from a Christian who is not walking right at the time. The next thing we see in these verses tells us that we are not to stand in the way of sinners. Basically, don't act the way that sinners act, like those who are going down into the pit. Yes, we still sin, but we are no longer "sinners," the noun. That does not describe us anymore. We Christians had a second birth, a spirit birth that supersedes our flesh birth. God sees us as righteous, because of His Son, Jesus Christ, who saved us and His Holy Spirit who lives inside of us. So, we should not behave as sinners, those who are not of God (at least at this time.) We are then told to not sit in the seat of the scornful. The scornful are people who reject God, hence reject His Son, who is God in the flesh. While we cannot lose our salvation and fully reject God, we can at times find ourself behaving as such a person, when we get angry at God and or challenge Him, because we are not getting our way or life is going rough for us. We are not to sit in that seat, if we want to be blessed. What do people who are happy in the Lord do, blessed people, who are not doing any of the above three things? Such people delight in God's law, which is His word. Like a tree that is planted by the rivers of water, we will bring forth seasonal fruit. And our leaf, which is our testimony of our salvation in Christ, will not wither. We will find that doing such, will cause us to prosper in all that we do, be successful in all we do. God's word is alive. His word actually gets into the believer and causes things to happen. We would not have to wonder about our choices in what we do, because we would be so tied in with God, that we would know what to do. We would not do what God would not want us to do. Hence, all we would do would prosper. We would be blessed and fruitful and prosperous. There does not come better than this. This is happiness. The answer has been in the bible all this time. And think about those three things that a blessed person does not do. Doing any of those three things is what hinders us from delighting in God's word. Delight in the Word of God, day, and night. Store it up in your heart, so that you can be thinking of His Word, day, and night. And yes, I am finding happiness in this. I can honestly say that I am truly happy in doing this. I only get unhappy when I starve myself of the good food I need, God's good word. Happiness has nothing to do with our circumstances outside of God's word. Happiness has everything to do with His word. When we delight in His word, we will find our bad circumstances easier to get through with peace and an amount of joy. And we will find our good circumstances all the better, with appreciation and humility. Debra... |
