Fruits of the Spirit: Joy

Benjamin Franklin was concluding a very strong speech one time about the Constitution. And someone heckled out to him that those words don't mean anything. Where's all the happiness? You say it guarantees us. And Franklin very calmly answered back, My friend, the Constitution only guarantees the American people the right to pursue happiness.

You have to catch it yourself. I think one thing all of us in this room could agree on. It doesn't matter what our background is. It doesn't matter our age. It doesn't matter our economic status. We can all agree we would like to be happy. We want happiness. Happiness makes life worth living. That happiness, that positiveness of life. And yet it's something that most people struggle with from time to time. Everybody struggles with from time to time. Everybody struggles with unhappiness. Everybody struggles with despair. Everybody struggles with discouragement or depression at just different levels. But not everybody's happy all the time. And everybody would say, what would you like and like? What's the more happiness?

It would be good. Now we've been going through the fruits of the Spirit. And when we look at what we've gone through so far, we look at all these fruits take effort. There's a certain stress in producing these fruits. There's certain uncomfortableness in producing these fruits. We went through self-control, which involves struggling against your corrupt human nature. Self-control by its very definition involves a struggle. It involves stress as we bring our lives into subjection to God and His laws and His instructions.

Meatness, which is the Spirit in which we accept God's dealings with us without resisting Him. Well, that goes against our very nature. So meatness in itself, because of our own self-righteousness and our own pride, is a struggle. So a lot of these fruits involve struggle.

They involve times when you don't feel very happy. Faithfulness, remaining faithful to God, even when times are tough, when bad things happen, when you experience the loss of a loved one or the loss of a job or the loss of resources or the loss of your own health. Goodness, which as we went through and showed, that word literally means being able to be strong enough to make a stand for good, which you may be persecuted for. Well, that's no fun. That's not really happy. Kindness, the ability to be kind and considerate to others, whether they always deserve it or not.

Kindness is a character trait. You're just kind, even to people who maybe don't deserve kindness. Long suffering. And that was the one I said I liked the least of all the things. Well, suffering, you're not happy when you suffer, right? But we have to learn to suffer not short, but long. And then last week I went through peace. How hard it is to have peace. In my life, I have to look at my life, that's probably the one of these spirits I prayed for the most.

I think I have some peace. Then I can work on the other ones. I don't know how to work at all without peace. So we look for peace. But that means we have to be a peacemaker. And being a peacemaker means that people do bad things to you because you try to make peace. We get to the next of the fruits of the spirit is joy, which means happiness and gladness of heart. Oh, wait a minute. How in the world can God expect me to be learning all those things? Because remember, no fruit happens overnight. It takes a lot of time for fruit to grow.

Right now, the trees are just beginning to get light back in. There's no fruit coming out yet, but there's the leaves, maybe a bit of butter here and there. It'll be a long time before we have fruit. Apples, pears, cherries, right? But it's going through the process now to produce the fruit. It's a long process to produce fruit. And we're expected to be happy in all this.

God desires you to have joy. Just as much as He desires you and I to have all these other fruits. We're supposed to have a certain amount of happiness in this life because in the change, when we're resurrected, when we're changed, and this is part of what was brought out in the sermon at the end, we can look forward to something even better than this because we will experience joy as a character train. It'll be who we are.

We will be happy. But right now, we're not always happy. Just like right now, we don't always have self-control. We're not always very weak. We're not always very good as we struggle to learn these things. You and I are to struggle to have God created us. Joy. Gladness of heart. Now, how do we do that? How do we do that? Well, let's start by understanding what we've had to do with every one of these fruits of the Spirit. It's understand that when we're talking about joy in the sense of a product of God's Holy Spirit, that means it has to be spiritual.

This isn't something you and I can just go do by reading a self-help book. It might help, but it's not going to produce this. Some people are just more happy by nature. They just have a personality. They're more happy. That's not what this is talking about either. It's talking about a joy that's produced in us through God.

And you and I have to learn it. Now, so we think, oh good. I can be really, really happy if God gives me a better job, if God gives me a better house, if God gives me—you know, we start listing—if God gives me a husband, you know, that will be more attentive if God gives me going to life. If God gives me these things, I will finally have joy. So this is a great sermon because now we're going to find out how to get all these blessings. Well, let's go to Ecclesiastes 2, because here we have a man who had it all. He had all the blessings.

Now, it is true—and we'll talk about this—that these physical things give us a certain amount of happiness. God doesn't tell us to go live like monks, right? True Christianity isn't to go create a monastery and live on a hard bed and eat bread and drink water and not talk the rest of your life. Do nothing but pray and study the Bible and live in total isolation. This is the whole idea of the monastery, and you're more righteous.

That is not Christianity. That is against Christianity, because joy is one of the things we're supposed to learn, and physical things were designed to give us some happiness. But if that's all our life is based on, there's a problem with it.

There's a problem when happiness is entirely based on physical things.

Verse 1, Solomon says—now, this is towards the end of his life—when he says, okay, I had to learn some very hard lessons. Let me tell you this one. So he says, I said in my heart, come down. I will test you with mirth. Okay, I'm going to be absolutely happy. I'm going to try a life of absolute happiness, mirth. Okay? So I'm going to test life and figure out how to have absolute happiness. This was the Greek philosophy. The Epicureans were this way. Test everything in life. If it makes you happy, it's good. If it doesn't make you happy, it's bad. And that's how you determine whether something's good or bad.

And there's a problem with that, as we'll see.

Therefore, enjoy pleasure. But surely this was nothing.

I said of laughter, madness and of mirth. What does it accomplish? Now, that's pretty distressed. When you finally get to the place, you don't even enjoy laughter anymore.

I have to admit something I did yesterday that my wife thought I was nuts. Okay? I got an email from someone that had a song on YouTube, you know, a link. And it was a weird yank of it. No, I don't know. How many know who you weird out yank of it? Okay, some of you. Some of you have a sense of humor. Okay. And I watched it, and I sort of chuckled. And of course, you know, when you watch on YouTube, all the other ones show up. So I watched two or three weird yell. I was laughing until I was crying. Okay? I showed it to my wife, and she just stared.

Why are you laughing so hard? It's hilarious. I'm laughing, and I'm laughing, you know. And she was yelling, madness! What good is it? You know, what does it accomplish? No, it wasn't.

But, you know, don't we enjoy laughing? She sort of... One time she cracked a smile. I know she wanted to laugh. She just wasn't going to. Okay, this is the game that's being played, and I know the game. Okay, that's not funny. But she really wants to laugh, but she won't.

He says, I searched my... I searched my heart how to gratify my flesh with wine while guiding my heart with wisdom, how to lay hold of folly, that I might see what was good for the sons of men to do under heaven all the days they're alive. He says, I even figured out to do bad things, so that I could figure out if it really was bad. So God says, don't drink too much. He won't drink too much. You know, it's like people who experiment with drugs to open up their consciousness, which, you know, some of you are old enough to remember when that was the excuse for using LSD. Right. Now the use of drugs is just because people want... You know, it's honest. I just want to escape and feel good. Okay. But it used to be that it was like a good thing. It opened your mind.

He says, I made my works great. I built myself houses. So you got the best houses you can have. He was the richest man on the face of the earth at the time. I planted myself vineyards. I made myself gardens and orchards, and I planted all kinds of fruit trees in them. I made myself water pools for which water... to water the growing trees of the grow. He made gardens. He could stroll through beautiful parks that he made. He made palaces. So he says, if a house could do this, I made the best. If the beautiful gardens could do it, I made the best. If laughter could do it, you know, comedians came in and entertained him all the time. He had everything, the best entertainment. Sometimes we do this with TV. We say, well, TV will make me happy. Well, TV can add something to your life, and it can detract from your life. It's the problem with physical things. They can add and detract. He says, I acquired male and female servants and had servants born in my house. Yes, I had greater possessions of herds and flocks than all who were in Jerusalem before me. He says, I became the richest man. If we could just all become, you know, rich, that would bring me happiness. He says, I did that. He says, I also gathered for myself silver and gold and special treasures of kings and of the provinces. I acquired male and female singers, the delights of the son of man, and musical instruments of all kind. He says, you think music makes you happy? Which it does, music. All these things, by the way, bring happiness in your life. But he centered his life on these things. These were the things that were going to make every day happy for me. I know, I mean, if I sometimes, I can see here, listen to a song, you know, pick me up, right? Music's good! But he's so, he had concerts whenever he wanted. He says, the best singers, the best musicians, he says, I could just say, hey, I want a concert tonight.

There are people back in call. But you and I have radios and, right? MP3 players.

We can listen to music at back and call. And he goes on and he says, in verse 10, Whatever my eyes desired, I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart rejoiced in all my labor. But he says, I found some fun in this. I found good in this. I found happiness. I worked hard. No, even work brings a certain amount of happiness in life. And this was my reward for all my labor. Then I looked at all the works that my hands had done, and on the labor which I had toiled, and indeed all was uselessness, vanity, and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun. He said, if that's all there is to light, there's a point like you're just trying to put wind in the bottle. Now, these things are bad in themselves. But if it's all, his point is that this is all there is, you might as well take out a bottle and try to catch the wind. I'm going to open it up and have the wind blow out of it. You can't catch the wind.

He's chasing the wind. So he didn't say these are bad things. He just said, you can't make this all just the center of your life. And in chapter 2, verse 26, we come to his conclusion. If you read the rest of chapter 1 and all of chapter 2, you just get depressed. He was at the slow point in his life because he said, I grabbed it all. And I had moments of happiness and excitement and joy. But in the end, I feel empty. In the end, something's missing. In verse 26, he says, For God gives wisdom and knowledge and joy to a man who is good in his sight, but to the center he gives the work of gathering and collecting, that he may give it to him who is good before God. And this is also vanity and grasping for the wind.

He realized that there was a joy that only could come from God. The physical things bring us a certain amount of happiness, but there has to be something more than that. There has to be something more than that. This is what God is talking about, this fruit of the Spirit, a joy and happiness that can come into us, that carries us through the times when things aren't so good. When we lose our health for a while, when we have some kind of problem with our job, when we have a problem with our marriage, when we're struggling with happiness, then what do we do when the physical things just won't take care of it all? Right? The physical things just won't fix it when we get another physical thing. So what do we do in this country? Prescription drugs. I'm not saying all prescription drugs are bad. I mean, we all take some sometimes, but I'm saying we have to be very careful about prescription drugs as a means to happiness. You said, I mean, it can help us. And I'm not saying you shouldn't be on some prescription drugs. I'm saying that there's a problem when a pill will make me happy. A pill will give me happiness because at the core there is something that can only come from God. I mean, people do it with alcohol, right? People do it with all kinds of illegal drugs. Why do people over drink and why do people use illegal drugs? Because it will bring me happiness. It makes the pain go away for a while. So the guy that goes out after a hard week at work, and every Friday night he's not an alcoholic, he's not addicted, but every Friday night he goes out with these buddies and spends five hours drinking at the bar. You know, up in Wisconsin, it was, well, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the same way. Every street corner has a bar.

Because when they come home from a hard week's work at the steel mill or the coal mines or whatever, guess what those guys do? They spend Friday night at the bar, and they get their big hoagie sandwiches, and they drink 10 beers! A few years ago, I wanted to watch a Steeler game, because in San Antonio, Texas, there's not a lot of Steeler games, right? So there was a restaurant that had big screen TVs, and it was called a Steelers bar. So I said, come on, I know you want to watch the game. Let's just take a couple hours and say, oh, wow, my wife wants me to go to see the game. This is great. I mean, what a better life. A wife takes you to the game, right? And we're sitting there, and of course, everybody in the whole place has Steelers jerseys on them, and they were winning most of the game. And as they were winning, you know, everybody was sitting there, sipping their beer, and it was a very nice crowd. Everything was great. And then they started losing the game. And so five minutes before the game was over, as it was obviously we're going to lose, I said, watch what happens. She said, what do you mean? I said, it's time for Boilermakers. They're losing. She said, what does that mean? Just watch. And we watched as a hundred people ordered, you know, Boilermakers, a shot in a beer. And the shot goes in the beer, and then you drink it.

It's not good, is it? Okay. But it's a part of the culture. So you lose, you drink a Boilermaker, right? And then you don't want to drive home with that crowd. You know, you want to leave early before that crowd leaves.

Why do we take? Why do we overindulge in those kinds of things? Sometimes why do we overindulge in food? I mean, we all have comfort foods. And if we're not careful, I have to admit I finally, I have finally, I have this one under control. I used to sit down, and at night, to have a bowl of ice cream. And I'd drink, I'd eat a half of a half, a quart of ice cream.

Can you say, what happened to that ice cream?

No self-control there. I don't do that anymore. It took a couple years to get through that one. There's a comfort food, right? It's a comfort food. Like some people, mashed potatoes or whatever your comfort food is, fried chicken. Mine was ice cream. You realize, wait a minute, I'm eating this for an emotional reason, not for a real reason. I can eat three ounces of ice cream and have a real reason. I eat a quart of ice cream, and it's not good for you. It's not really bringing happiness. It feels like it for a while, especially if it's like hot fudge sundae, you know, and it feels like it for a while. This is happiness! Oh, a three-ounce hot fudge sundae might be happiness. A quart! And I'm not kidding. One time, I was, my brother-in-law and my son-in-law, and I had a contest at an ice cream shop who could eat a Boston sundae. You know what a Boston sundae is? Boston sundae is a 32-ounce milkshake with a hot fudge sundae on top of it. I couldn't. Anyways, I don't do that anymore, okay? Because it doesn't bring happiness when you're done, right? It does for a while, especially when you think you're going to beat your brother-in-law. But it doesn't bring happiness in the end.

We figured these things out as we grow up, or at least we're supposed to. Actually, most people don't. Solomon finally figured it out. There was a joy that could only come from God.

And that's what the fruit of the Spirit is.

Now, here's a trap. There's two things you have to resist in this. One is, since I don't have a lot of joy in my life, I guess God's not with me, and why even try?

Well, no. Remember, the fruits of the Spirit are a progressive learning process. One day, all of us wake up and say, I need more goodness in my life. Or wake up, I need to be more kind. I'm really too harsh.

That's God working through us and developing these fruits in us. And all of us, at some point, wake up one morning and say, I need more joy in my life. The physical things are good, but in the end, if that's all I have, it's hollow. It's empty.

So we can't say, since I don't have it right now, why even try? Because that's the point we grow into this. And secondly, we have to know that there's a difference between joy and fun. God likes fun, by the way. Fun is a reaction we have that's created in us. We like having fun. But, you know, if you went to an amusement park every day for eight hours, it wouldn't be fun after a while. So after a while, you'd be unhappy going to the amusement park. You'd hate it.

So fun is a temporary experience. What we're talking about here is joy. So let's look at a few biblical principles to increase joy in our life. First, and I'll read this twice because I actually want to read the sentence so you can really think about this. Joy, as the fruit of the Spirit, keeps us from being emotionally controlled by circumstances and other people because we trust in God's greater purpose. Joy, as the fruit of the Spirit, keeps us from being emotionally controlled by circumstances and other people because we trust in God's greater purpose. Now, we can't deny that people or circumstances do, does contribute to whether we're happy or not. I mean, if somebody you really respect, or say, your husband or wife, one day they're having a bad day and they yell at you and you feel unhappy, then you can't say, well, that doesn't mean I have God's Spirit. No. Circumstances of people affect us, which actually creates chemical reactions in our body. You sort of can't help but feel unhappy at certain times.

So we have this unhappiness, especially when we get into other related emotions like grief, or a sense of loss, or despair, discouragement, because you just feel like you can't go on. Now, those are all forms of unhappiness, but each one has its own cause and its own way of dealing with it. But all those things happen to us. So joy is the ability to transcend that. It does not mean you don't experience it. It means you have the ability to transcend it, because you believe and trust that God's final outcome is good. We transcend it because we believe that God's final outcome is good. You know, if you go to the places in Acts that I just find amazing, where the apostles were dragged before leaders of different communities, and in this case we'll look at a minute, the Sanhedrin, they beat them up. They put them in prison, and they have a very peculiar response. Let's go to Acts 5. Acts 5. And verse 40. What had happened here was a meeting of the Sanhedrin with Gamaliel talking to them, and they agreed, okay, we can't kill these people, these followers of Jesus. So here's what they decided to do. Verse 46. And they agreed with him, and when they had called for the apostles and beaten them, I don't know, getting beat up is not my idea of being happy, and commanded that they should not speak in the name of Jesus, they let them go. So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name.

Hey, look Paul, you got a couple, or look John, you have a couple of Pauls along here, but you have a couple of back teeth that fell out in your beating.

Oh, yeah, look at that! And then there's this grid that says, this is for Christ.

Now that is not a normal human reaction, right? And instead of running away after their command and don't go preaching his name anymore, verse 42 says, and daily in the temple and in every house, they did not cease teaching and preaching Jesus as the Christ.

This joy transcends the circumstances we go through because we see the ultimate good. That doesn't mean they liked getting beaten, okay? It doesn't mean that probably, you know, you go through getting beaten and put into prison. There's a point where the adrenaline wears off, and within a couple of days, they probably went through a period of depression. That's just, that's a normal human reaction.

So they probably went some very, through a few days of unhappiness later in the week.

Anytime you have a trauma happen to you, you can go into shock, right? And then the shock wears off. And now they had to pray and ask God to do what? Give them joy and peace and courage and all these other things that God had to give them. The point is the joy, the ability to have God working in them and giving them joy is what carried them through the unhappy times. We can't think that joy means that you never have an unhappy time. It means that it's what carries you through, because you believe in God's purpose. And there's a couple things that I know I've asked myself at times when I don't have a lot of joy. And you know, I've always kind of break everything down into its simplest form. And usually it comes down to, many times, a question I have to ask myself an answer. I usually don't like the answer, because I know my answer is wrong.

Do you know, I mean, when you know the correct answer, but you have to admit my answer is wrong, when I don't have a lot of joy, I have to ask myself, do I love God enough that I find happiness and joy and obedience to Him and not in my own desires?

Do I love God enough to find happiness in Him and not in my own desires? And I have to admit, when I ask myself that question, the answer is, no, I want my desires! And then I realize the moment I say that, I'm saying, I don't really love God the way I should. I'm putting myself over Him.

Another question I ask myself is, do I trust God enough to wait for His answers? Because I believe He wants joy in my life. Much of the time, we actually don't believe God wants joy in our life. We don't believe He wants us to be happy. He doesn't believe it. And I've counseled many people over the years who have said, God doesn't want me to be happy. Yes, He does. It's one of the fruits of His Spirit. He wants that in your life. But sometimes we don't trust Him enough to believe that. We hold, actually, hold on to our own unhappiness. I'll talk about that in a minute. Second point. Joy is a willingness to find contentment even when things aren't going the way you expected. Joy is a willingness to find contentment even when things aren't going the way you expected. And there's a book I don't always recommend. There's parts that I don't agree with, but there's some parts that are really good. It's called, Happiness is a Serious Problem, which I love the title. It's by Dennis Prager, the Jewish philosopher, writer. He has a radio program.

Very interesting man, a very religious man. Not a Christian, Orthodox Jew. But he wrote a book called, Happiness is a Serious Problem.

The premise of the book is that happiness is a moral command. Well, I see that a little different. I see it as something that God does require of us through His Spirit. So it is, there's a moral element to happiness. We are to try and strive to have the kind of joy that comes from God. That's always a real mind bender when you're really down, you're really unhappy, and usually wallowing in it. And you have the thought, this isn't very moral. I am not having in my life what God wants to have in my life. So therefore, I am disobeying God. Now, that's not to put, now I have to be careful saying that, because some people now will have guilt on top, and they'll just make them more unhappy. I'm not saying to feel guilty because, oh, I'm having an unhappy time. All of us have unhappy times. Okay? All of us do. The point is, is the turning to God so that God can build joy in us, so God can lead us through the time, instead of staying trapped in it. We can't stay trapped in those times. And so it's the ability to find contentment. Contentment means this isn't the way I wanted it, but today I'm okay because of God. It's not the way I wanted it, right?

You live long enough. There's lots of things in your life that's not the way you wanted, right?

It's not the way I wanted it, but it's okay. That's interesting. Ephesians 4, the way Paul puts this, because if anyone should have been unhappy, it was Paul. When you think of all the things he went through in his life. Verse 11, and this is an often quoted couple of verses here, verse 11 of Philippians 4, Not that I speak in regard to need, for I have learned in whatever state I am to be content. He didn't like the difficulties he went through, but through his prayer and interaction with God, he was able to say, okay, today's okay.

There is good today, even in the bad things that are happening. Because look what he says, I know how to be abased. I know how to be brought down to nothing. I know that. I've experienced it. Paul says, I know what it is to be discouraged. I know what it is to be depressed. I know what it is to want to give up. I know what that feels like, because he says, I've been there.

He says, I know what it is to be abased. I know how to abound. I know what it is to feel like you're riding on top of the world. He says, I've been there, too. He says, I know what it's like to feel like my work is so good. I wouldn't start at a new church. And he says, I know what it's like to go back three years later, and half of everybody left the truth. Because he went through that. And he says, why do this? Be discouraged, depressed. Why even do this? Why even try?

He says, I know that in all areas of life. He says, and everywhere in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry and to abound and to suffer me. He says, I know what it's like. And you read through his life, he knows what he knew what it was like to be shipwrecked and floating around in the Mediterranean for three days. That's a lot of prayer time there. You can't say he was happy. He says, I know what that's like. He says, I know what it's like to be beat up.

And he says, I know what it's like to be hungry. And he says, I know it's, you know, he lived in Ephesus for three years, where he had plenty of food and he was honored and he probably lived in a nice house. It was great. He says, I know that was a good time. Verse 15, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

One of the points that Dennis Preger brings out, and I think he has a very good point, is that one of the greatest deterrents to happiness is we have unrealistic expectations. So we set ourselves up to fail. We actually set ourselves up to fail. I mean, you see, young people do that marriage sometimes. They can have a very good marriage, but they have such unrealistic expectations that they actually hurt their own relationship, trying to make each other meet expectations that weren't even real to begin with. You know, she will never get sick and she will always look perfect.

He will always be attentive to me and he will always understand.

Those are unrealistic expectations.

But we go into relationships, we go into jobs, we go into life with all these unrealistic expectations. We're unhappy because they weren't realistic to begin with. With realistic expectations, you're happy. So a lot of the times we have such unrealistic expectations. What you find here with, it seems like Paul at this point has no expectations. Well, I don't know what tomorrow brings, but Christ will get me through it. He's not afraid, oh no, no, tomorrow brings. God, why don't you just kill me? It's like, I don't know what tomorrow brings, but Christ will get me through it. No expectations at all, except the understanding that Christ will get me through it.

Happiness is a realization that we can't have these high expectations that aren't based in reality.

Because you know, a lot of times we have these high expectations which we compare our lives with other people. Well, look, they have a nicer car than me. I am now unhappy. That's called envy.

You want to be unhappy? Become envious. That is about the surest way to unhappiness is you can come up with. Comparing what other people have to you. Because I guarantee you, there's people looking at you and saying, oh, I wish I was like them. Like everybody's doing it with each other, right? Third point. Joy comes from outwardly caring for others instead of always being motivated by personal desires. Joy comes from outwardly caring for others instead of always being motivated by personal desires. Here's the strange thing about happiness. The more you say, I'm going to try and spend my life and center my life on being happy, the more hard it becomes to find happiness. The more we center everything in life on my happiness, well, one thing you do, you destroy your relationships with everybody else, so now you're really unhappy. So much of life's happiness comes from relationships. If you say, well, everybody has to make me happy. You ever be around somebody that they think everybody's job is to make them happy? Pretty soon they have no friends, and so they're unhappy, and whose fault is it? Everybody else. So they're trapped in a way of thinking they can't get out of it. I'm unhappy because everybody else won't make me happy, and they have problems because they won't make me happy. So I'm really unhappy. We have to reach out to others. Yeah, that's what the whole point Jesus was saying when He talks about making our priority the kingdom of God. Seek you first the kingdom of God, right? And all these things will be given to you. For your Father knows what you need. He didn't say we should ignore our physical or emotional needs. He didn't say that. He didn't say it was wrong to want a nice close. He didn't say that. He said God knows what you want. God also knows what you need, and those are two different things. And He will give you what you need, but seek first God. This is the great secret in the Sermon on the Mount to Joy. Seek God first, then deal with the physical, opposite. This is what we do. We deal with the physical first, and then we seek God. Seek God first in your life. Make that number one. Make His kingdom number one. That's your goal. That's your priority. Then seek the other things. And ask the great secret to Joy. It's the priority of God first, His kingdom first.

John 15. This is a very interesting passage here. I won't read all of it.

What time did I start? I lost track here.

Does anybody know what time I started? I think it was about 1115.

John 15 verse 9. Now this is something that Jesus is saying to His disciples on that Passover evening. This is part of the Passover message. That's why we read parts of John 14, 15, 16, and 17 in every Passover service. This is part of the message that He wanted His disciples and we, as His disciples, to know. As the Father loved me, I also have loved you, abide in my love.

If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in His love. This doesn't mean the Father's commandments and Jesus' commandments are different. You've seen me abide what my Father says, so you do what I say. You have an example of how my Father works, how my Father's ways work in me. These things I have spoken to you, notice, that my joy may remain in you. The disciples experienced a joy when they were around Jesus Christ that they hadn't happened before. Now notice, they still had problems, didn't they? But when they were around here, they experienced an excitement for life, a joy for life, a purpose for life that transcended their problems, that got them through their down times. Oh, they even fought with each other. I mean, they just, you just look at them, they're just typical human beings, like the rest of us. But he says, you know, the joy you've had with me, I want this to stay in you, even though I'm going to go.

So this joy that came from putting God and Christ first, they were experiencing. They didn't even know where it was coming from. They just know they liked to be around him. They just know when they were with him, life was different.

That my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. Understand, this is exactly what Christ wants for you now.

That the joy that he has with the Father be in you, and you have it to its fullness. That's what he desires. We can't use the excuse, well, you know, I know, but I'm such a bad person, or the things that have happened to me are too bad, or I can't change, because you know what we do when we say that? We say we're greater than God's Spirit. We're saying we're greater than Christ, and greater than the Father. That God's Spirit can't do with us what God wants to do. And we can resist it. God doesn't take away our free will.

But as long as we don't resist, God will produce in us whatever he wants. Now, he could force us. I mean, it's not that God can't overcome our will. He just won't.

He just won't, which is amazing, because that shows self-control, meekness, goodness, long-suffering, peace. You look at all the fruits of the Spirit. You have to have all those fruits. They have billions of people spitting at your face, and you don't take away their free will when you could do it. You start to see this is who he is.

And Jesus said, I want you to have my joy. Go down to verse 16. He says, You did not choose me, but I chose you. Okay? Everyone who is called of God is chosen by the Father and by Christ. You are here because you're chosen. We cannot say, I cannot do this. Well, yeah, we can't because none of us can do it on our own. But with God, we can do this. With God, these fruits can be produced in us. These disciples didn't believe this anymore than you and I do.

Read through the book of Acts. It took them a while to figure it out.

But God's Spirit in us can't do this. We submit to it.

It's a struggle. I do counseling with people sometimes all over the country.

And I did some counseling this week. I was the person we were talking about these very things.

We can't do this. We can't. He can't. We have to submit to it, though, which means we have to give up part of ourself for this to happen. We have to give up the fact that we resist the joy.

We actually have to give up the part of us that resists the joy. Just like there's part of us that resists self-control. There's part of us that resists goodness. There's part of us that resists peace. If I have peace over this, that person doesn't suffer. So I need them to suffer.

Right? So I will not have peace until they suffer. You can have peace. Just forgive them. I'll take care of them later. No, no, no, no, no. I've got them with us to suffering.

What if they repent? I think that's enough. You don't have to suffer because you're repentant. I'm going to have you. I'd like you to have some peace now. I don't want them to have peace.

We resist it. We resist joy. He says, You do not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and what? Bear fruit. You have been appointed by God when He gave you His Spirit to bear fruit.

We don't have a choice on the fruits of the Spirit. We are to let God do this in us.

So we participate in this process. And that your fruit should remain. And that whatever you ask of the Father of my name, He may give it to you. These things I command you that you love one another.

This is not easy. This means one thing we can do when we're unhappy is do the exact opposite of what we think.

When we're suffering from unhappiness, go serve someone else.

Go serve someone else that is worse off than you. It changes who we are.

And that goes against human nature. I'm unhappy. I need somebody to make me happy. I'm unhappy, so I have to go make somebody else happy? Yes. It's a spiritual law that makes sense to us. But our unhappiness, go make somebody else happy. And our grief, go help somebody else. And our discouragement, go hold somebody else's hand.

It's part of what happens to us. It takes us out of it. And this spiritual law takes place in us. A fourth thing. Joy is destroyed when we always look at the negative.

The truth is we condition ourselves to be unhappy.

Corrupt human nature conditions itself to be unhappy. If you feel that everyone is out to hurt your feelings, guess what? Everybody is going to hurt your feelings. Right? Because you're going to find a reason for everybody to hurt your feelings. If you believe that everyone around you is bad, you're going to find all their faults and none of their good points. You'll find all their faults. It's not that hard. But you'll see none of the good points. If you feel that God is unfair to you, you will never see the blessings He gives you.

So you programmed yourself to be unhappy. You can never see the goodness that God does. You can never see the love or good thing as in another person. And you always will be hurt.

You always think that everybody is doing to this on purpose and you'll be a victim.

You'll always see yourself as a victim.

We can actually program ourselves to be unhappy. To be unhappy.

Now I want to go through four things that we can do for viewpoints in the last 10 minutes here that can lead us to unhappiness. Four false viewpoints that help produce unhappiness in us.

The first is actually a false viewpoint of God. It goes something like this.

God is a wrathful being who is just waiting for me to mess up and punish me. Let's see.

Isaiah 61. How many times have we read this?

I gave a sermon here about three months ago where I read this because this is what Jesus quotes in his first sermon to say that this is his job. This is why God sent him. Isaiah 61 verse 1.

We have this wrong viewpoint of God that he wants us to fail.

Now God has created us with a purpose and the purpose is that the fruits of his spirit, the character that he is, is reproduced in us through his power and our submission to it. It takes two points to do this. His power, our submission to it. But he wants us to be this way. He wants us to have peace. He wants you to have joy.

Verse 1. The Spirit of the Lord of God is upon me.

And this is a prophecy of Jesus Christ. This is why Jesus came. Because the Lord has anointed me to preach, what? Bad tidings to the rich.

Good tidings to the poor.

Good news to people who don't have what other people have, who are suffering.

He has sent me to beat up the brokenhearted. That's what he said. To heal the brokenhearted. To proclaim liberty to the captives.

And to opening of the prison to those who are abound.

To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God.

To what? To make those who mourn more even more? No. To comfort those who mourn. To console those who mourn in Zion. And remember, Zion in the Old Testament, of course we know what that means. It's a very place. It also is a term used for the very throne of God. And it can be an application to the church today. Because we go before the Zion above. You and I don't go to the Zion in Jerusalem. We go to the Zion above.

To mourn, to comfort those, or I mean to console those who mourn. To give them beauty for ashes. The oil of anointing for mourning. The garments of praise for the Spirit of heaviness. So that we can praise God even when we are distressed. That they may be called what?

Interesting, we're back to fruit. Trees of righteousness. The planting of the Lord. That He may be glorified. He may be glorified because He that does it in us. And it's His power, His mind, His love that does this in us as we submit to Him.

God does punish.

God does punish. But that's not His purpose, His desire.

So God is a wrathful being who is just waiting for me to mess up and punishment is a false view of God.

Now God wants to help you have joy and peace.

Long suffering, mercy, gentleness, faith. That's what He wants us to have. A second false viewpoint.

I know what I want in my life, and God doesn't care for my happiness. In fact, He's going to keep me from what makes me really happy.

When you and I accept this false viewpoint, we will not enjoy obeying God because we believe obedience to God keeps us from what really makes me happy.

We won't obey Him eventually, or we'll find ways. We'll do it, but we'll hate doing it. I mean, I've met people who they do this way of life, but they hate it because really other things would make me happier. Other things would make me happier.

And so then we have a totally false viewpoint on what it means to obey God. And a false viewpoint of God's way of life. God's way of life actually makes us happy.

But we sort of don't believe that. You know, it's interesting, ancient Israel was actually commanded to obey God with joy. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 28. I mean, if they were commanded to obey God with joy, then how much more must we obey God with joy since we have His Spirit in us?

To obey God grudgingly, to do it because you feel like you have to?

Okay, God, here, I'll do this. It makes me unhappy because you really don't care about my happiness. You don't really care about me having joy.

What does God say about that kind of attitude? Deuteronomy 28, verse 47. Because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and gladness of heart for the abundance of everything, He's telling those people, you did not serve God with joy because what He was doing with you. They always found that, well, I do it, but it's because I have to. Therefore, you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you in hunger and thirst and nakedness and in mean of everything and He will put a yoke of iron upon your neck and until He has destroyed you. That's a pretty severe punishment because they did not serve God with joy.

They didn't even say they didn't serve Him. So we can go through the motions of serving God.

We can show Him His services. We go to the feast of tabernacles and not appreciate.

We can go to the North Carolina feast site and not get one of the rooms in the Holiday Inn and get one of the rooms in the Motel 6. They're not, I mean, they're all in the same place. That's not what they're called. You know, you say what I mean. And we can have a terrible feast and hate it. Not because we're there to serve God, but because we didn't get the room we wanted. We're there to serve God with joy and gladness.

And I don't know about you, I've stayed in some incredible places at the feast. And I've stayed in some less than incredible places at the feast.

Right? I remember one time we rented what we thought was a cabin, well, it was a cabin, but a cabin for our family. And they had one bedroom when we got there.

And it really was a cabin. I mean, it wasn't fancy.

So we all slept in the one room until my story woke everybody up. So I was sleeping out on this old rickety couch, you know, there was, had those springs in it, you know, you woke up every day, you could hardly walk, you know.

It was a great feast. I enjoyed it. We all still laugh about it, you know. But if there was points where we could all get pretty upset with this, right? Everybody stuffed in the one little room.

Somehow what they advertised and what it was wasn't the same thing.

It still was a great feast. We have to serve God with joy.

So sometimes we have this false viewpoint of what it means to serve God and His way of life. A third false viewpoint is a false viewpoint about yourself. I am a wretched person and I do not deserve happiness. I'm not sure that that means that has any relevance. We're all wretched people and none of us deserve happiness. So that's the point. The point is in Hebrews 12. Let's go back to Hebrews 12, which was read in the sermonette. Hebrews 12.

Verse 1 says, Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. Looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, and here's the next statement. This is incredible.

Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame and it sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

You think He was happy when they spit on Him and beat Him and nailed Him and stuck Him up there on that stake? You think He was happy? And yet there was joy. Why? He saw God's purpose.

And the joy was for us. You know, He didn't enjoy doing this for Himself. I mean, God didn't suffer by sacrificing His Son because He enjoyed it for Himself. You know, what benefit did God get? You ever think about that? What benefit did Jesus Christ get? He had joy for this. He wanted to do this. What benefit did the Father have? There was no personal benefit except one. Us. Us. We're the benefit to God. The joy sent before Him was us that He would get us.

So when we say, I don't deserve happiness, I'm a wretched person, that is nothing to go with it. God says, hey, I want to give you some happiness, you wretched person.

Okay. God just denied our wretchedness. What God says, I want to give you, poor, wretched people, some joy. And He experienced joy in knowing that. He experienced joy in doing that for us. So how dare we say, I don't deserve happiness because I'm a wretched person. That's not even part of the discussion. That's accepted.

But God is saying, no, no, no, I don't want to give you this.

I don't want you to be wretched anymore. I don't want you to be what you are anymore. I don't want you to be who you are anymore.

And He experienced joy in doing it for us. Wow. That's got to change the way we think. As the Passover comes up, I want you to think about this.

Because that's got to change the way we think.

One last point, and I've already mentioned this, but a false view of happiness sometimes keeps us from being happy because we believe it's possible to be happy all the time. It is not chemically possible to be happy all the time. Have a bad night's sleep and get up the next day. You know, your wife says, what are you some grubby for? I sleep well. Okay. Well, why aren't you happy? I'll shut up. I don't say that. But you know, I mean, can you, you never, you ever see somebody that has a soft well, they're having a really bad morning. And they, you know, they want that first cup of coffee. They come into work. They had a bad drive. They didn't have any breakfast. So chemically, they're all messed up, right? They didn't eat breakfast. They had a bad night's work. They went all this traveling. They show up at work. They say, give me a cup of coffee. And you say, good morning! Be happy! And then you wonder why they punch you in the nose.

It is not possible as a human being to chemically be happy all the time. In fact, people who are happy all the time, we basically don't like them, right?

They're just too happy.

So we have to understand, as human beings, you're not going to be on top of the world all the time. It is not possible. So if you try to be on top of the world all the time, you just make yourself more unhappy.

This time, you sit and say, I need some time, right? I need my cup of coffee. I need some time to vegetate.

So we all have those times.

There's just a time I have to have time to let myself physically catch up, physically rest. The Sabbath is actually an issue of joy. Without the Sabbath, we work ourselves to death.

The Sabbath is a gift of joy, if we keep it properly.

It's a gift of joy. Remember, the joy of God doesn't erase all that happens.

It gives us the power to move through that and experience purpose and meaning and some joy even the worst of times.

And the end product of all this is we get to feel happy when we're changed.

Now, does God feel joy all the time? Yes, but it's not the only thing He feels.

He feels anger.

It says He feels grief.

It hurts Him when we sin.

But it never destroys His joy. Aren't you glad? Aren't you glad that our sins don't destroy God's joy?

Because if He ever has a bad day, we're doomed. Right? If He ever has a bad day, we're doomed.

It doesn't happen.

Because even though He experiences these other things, it doesn't destroy His joy, and that's what we have to learn. That even as we experience these difficult times and these trials and these senses of loss and things we go through, it doesn't destroy the joy.

Even though the experiences may be bad.

But I believe joy is a serious issue.

Happiness is a serious problem as a Christian.

It's just as serious as self-control and meekness and faithfulness and goodness and kindness and long-suffering and peace, which are all the fruits we've gone through so far.

Like the other fruits of the Spirit, this must be cultivated, so don't get discouraged and add guilt on top of the times that you struggle with happiness. Because adding guilt on top just makes you more unhappy. That's not what God wants.

God wants us to learn the way of happiness, the way of peace, the way of goodness. See, we struggle with it.

So don't get discouraged over it. Just go to God and say, you have to do this in me. You have to help produce this in me. And then you have to realize we have to give it something up. You and I have to give up the parts of us that resist God's joy.

Every one of us resists at times happiness because of our corrupt human nature, our corrupt thought processes, and emotional processes. This will grow in us, it matures in us, and it develops over time. And what it produces is fruit, the fruit in your life that God wants, which is the fruit of joy.