Confront Thyself: Joy
This month, Seele Magazine’s Friday Posts were a part of a new series titled ‘Confront Thyself,’ with Proverbs 27:19 as our guide, with this idea, as if you’re looking at your heart and your soul in a mirror- what do you see? Chief Editor, Ally presented 4 issue areas that you may be struggling with that are ungodly and can’t come any further into 2020, unless you want a repeat of 2019.
Last week we looked at our ego, today’s final topic of joy is on the table. We don’t always feel happy and that’s ok. But, joy is a fruit of the Spirit, and it’s something that we should have 24/7 in our lives, that in spite of what we may be going through, we should always have joy.
All of us humans are going through life and life is really hard. We’re all trying to navigate it and figure it out. When we think we’ve gotten one part figured out, here comes a new problem or challenge. It can be hard to live around others and hard to live with yourself at times. And all of these challenges that come with life can eat away at happiness and joy. But let us not confuse the two:
Happiness is the state of being happy. A new car makes us happy, getting upgraded to business or first class makes us happy, winning the lottery makes us happy, blessing others makes us happy. But happiness is fleeting, only lasting for a short time. But joy is a source or cause of keen pleasure or delight. Joy in the context of having God in your life is a lifestyle. While we are not always happy we should always have joy. The mere fact that Jesus has purchased our sin debt in full and had paved a way for us to return to Heaven is the basis of Godly joy. And because we have Jesus, no matter what life may throw at us, we should have a joy.
This was hard for me to understand for so long and I’m still learning. I am a person that cannot pretend so a person betrays me or hurts me, I have at more times than not lost my joy. I love deeply and care deeply for people, so when someone has hurt me or I am around challenging people, I have found myself losing my joy- not just being unhappy but losing my joy. My countenance and energy are wreaking sadness and hurt. But over the last few years God has dealt with me on this issue. In 2017, one of the Hillsong London leaders, Julie Galanti said something that grabbed my attention. She said, “one thing that gives me strength and solace to move through some of life’s hardest situations with people is knowing that one day God will make every wrong done to me right.” Hearing that, knowing that I don’t have to lose my joy when I have been mishandled by people has encouraged me to keep my joy, despite the pain I may be feeling.
Why should I give someone the much power over me to be joyless, why should I give someone my joy when they have mishandled me? God wants us to have joy, yes, we may not always feel happy, but our joy is a lifestyle and He wants us to enjoy our life.
In order for 2020 to be more fulfilling, if you are a person who doesn’t live joyfully because you let people or situations steal that from you, you may want to assess. God knows every injustice done to us and we don’t have to wear it for all to see. When we have joy in spite of our pain, it bruises the devil and others will see that we are mature in how we handle hurt. We may even lead another to Jesus when we maintain our joy through life’s difficulties.
In this new year and this new decade, let us live from a place of joy- being kind, nice, giving, loving, and sociable with those around us. Even if we’re sad and going through it (and I’m not talking about hiding grief or heartache, we must feel these things and heal through them) we can still be joyful in our everyday lives. Trust God in the moments of sadness and continue to hope for good days. This is living a faith-filled life that with 24/7 joy we can have more fulfilling lives this new decade.
I hope you enjoyed this “Confront Thyself’ series. You can always find the series in the “Seele Series” section at seelemag.com.