Keep Your Joy

“Joy is gone from our hearts; our dancing has turned to mourning.”
‭‭Lamentations‬ ‭5:15‬ ‭NIV‬‬

I was reading a devotional about losing your joy. I’m not talking about losing your happiness. Happiness comes and goes depending on your circumstances. I am talking about losing something that we need to keep...our joy.

The devotional said that joy is the easiest thing to lose. We can lose our joy in a traffic jam or bad news or an argument with someone or a unexpected bill or stress at work. The enemy wants us to lose our joy. Because when we lose our joy, the world looks at us and decides that the Christian life does not work. The world does not decide against our testimony when bad things happen to us. The world writes us off when we have no joy in the midst of our circumstances.

What should we do about this? Because deep down, we want to be different. We want our lives to be a testimony to a lost world. Ask God to give it back.

“Restore to me the joy of Your salvation And sustain me with a willing spirit.”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭51:12‬ ‭NASB‬‬

I don’t know about you but I struggle to keep my joy. When I handle this in the right way, I outright ask God to restore my joy. You know what happens, he gives it back...every single time. Notice that I did not ask him to change my circumstances. Just my joy in the midst of those circumstances.

When Mark and I aren’t getting along and I am despondent over this, I ask God to restore the joy in our marriage. He does his every single time because God is able to do this and wants to do this.

When I ask God to restore my joy when my job stresses me out, he does this. Realize that this is a daily, minute by minute thing. The request for joy is not one that lasts and we never have to ask again. God wants us talking to him all day long.

When the death of 3 precious people in our lives occurred last year, our joy was jolted. But when I think of them now, I am so excited that they are with Jesus, dancing around with no suffering. I think my dad is having the best time with that twinkle in in eye.

Don’t believe that some people are just meant to be joyful while you are not. This is a lie from the enemy. Facebook is not a barometer of how joyful someone is. Be careful when you scroll the Facebook news. You will wrongly think that everyone is joyful and you are not.

Ask him over and over again to restore your joy. Strive to become a joyful Christian. This is not a suggestion. God says,
“Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!”
‭‭Philippians‬ ‭4:4‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Trouble Brings Joy

“My brothers and sisters, you will have many kinds of trouble. But this gives you a reason to be very happy.”

‭‭James‬ ‭1:2‬ ‭ERV‬‬

Why does trouble make you happy?

“You know that when your faith is tested, you learn to be patient in suffering. If you let that patience work in you, the end result will be good. You will be mature and complete. You will be all that God wants you to be.”

‭‭James‬ ‭1:3-4‬ ‭ERV‬‬

The enemy shows a counterfeit to joy and happiness. He shows relationships that are going perfect, promotions in jobs, wealth, beautiful houses, free time to watch TV, lots of food, perfect health, ... you name it. The enemy says that these things provide joy and happiness. Then he flips things around and interprets suffering in the wrong way.

Satan lies and says that suffering means that God is not able to provide all that you need. He says that broken marriages, rebellious children, financial hardship, health problems are symptoms that God is not big enough and kind enough and does not love you enough to take care of your troubles.

He started those lies with Eve and she fell for it. He tried the same lies with Jesus and Jesus quoted the word and the devil fled!

“If I had not found joy in your teachings, my suffering would have destroyed me.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭119:92‬ ‭ERV‬‬

What a powerful truth! We need an arsenal of scripture to quote and claim when troubles come and they will. If I want to be all that God wants me to be, I need suffering in my life. As paradoxical as that may be, the way to grow in the Lord is to allow suffering in our life and dig in deep with it. If I say that I want to be like Christ, point my eyes in the right direction.

We must never stop looking to Jesus. He is the leader of our faith, and he is the one who makes our faith complete. He suffered death on a cross. But he accepted the shame of the cross as if it were nothing because of the joy he could see waiting for him. And now he is sitting at the right side of God’s throne.”

‭‭Hebrews‬ ‭12:2‬ ‭ERV‬‬

Every time we pray, picture Jesus at the right hand of God’s throne and thank him for paying the price it took him to get there. He counted it joy! Let us count our suffering as joy to get us where we want to be.

Generosity Brings Joy

“These believers have been tested by great troubles, and they are very poor. But their great joy caused them to be very generous in their giving. I can tell you that they gave as much as they were able and even more than they could afford. No one told them to do this. It was their idea.”
‭‭2 Corinthians‬ ‭8:2-3‬ ‭ERV‬‬

Does it surprise you that that the joyful givers were the community that had so much trouble and were very poor? Wow! Let that speak to your heart.

Go look through your abundance of stuff and decide you can give a lot of it away to some who is more needy than you. Get ready to feel the amazing feeling of joy that comes with generosity!