Joy Advent week 3: Isaiah 12:2-6

Advent Week 3

Read Isaiah 12:2–6 “2 “Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and will not be afraid; for the Lord God is my strength and my song, and he has become my salvation.” 3 With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. 4 And you will say in that day: “Give thanks to the Lord, call upon his name, make known his deeds among the peoples, proclaim that his name is exalted. 5 “Sing praises to the Lord, for he has done gloriously; let this be made known in all the earth. 6 Shout, and sing for joy, O inhabitant of Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.””

Before we start let us talk about what is Joy

What is Joy

We use this word a lot

Synonym for some strong type of happiness

Think the opposite is sadness and sorrow

Philippians 4:4 “4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.”

James 1:2 “2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds,”

But scripture says Romans 12:15 “15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.”

Jesus weeps over Lazarus

You may have heard Happiness depends on circumstance, Joy does not”

Where do we get Joy

Joy has been here from the beginning

It comes from God: Matthew 3:17 “17 and behold, a voice from heaven said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”” Isaiah 42:1 “1 Behold my servant, whom I uphold, my chosen, in whom my soul delights; I have put my Spirit upon him; he will bring forth justice to the nations.”

Jesus was here from the beginning, this joy came from the beginning, and God wants us to have that same kind of joy, joy that comes from the Son

Joy comes from knowing Christ, and his goodness

Christian joy is a an emotion fulled by the holy spirit (Fruit of the spirit) that reminds us of 2 things:

Christs incarnation death and Resurrection

Christ’s second coming

Remember what it was like when you first believed:

That God loved you, knows your sin, sent his son, and died, so that you would have life eternal. That there was something after this world.

But that Joy tends to fade.

How do we keep that from happening.

Salvation is on going:

1 Corinthians 1:18 “18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

Romans 5:9 “9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.”

Look, it is obvious we are not how we are going to be. I could be a more thoughtful husband, gentler father, wiser pastor, a kinder friend etc

Here is where the circumstance changes for us as Christians. When we read texts like “Consider it joy when facing trials”

Or Psalm 30:5

Psalm 30:5 ESV

5 For his anger is but for a moment, and his favor is for a lifetime. Weeping may tarry for the night, but joy comes with the morning.

How? When your marriage is falling apart, when you have lost a child, when you don’t know how you are going to pay the bills, when our leaders fail, war, disease, famine, drought and the world seems so overbearing, how do we do it

Because if my circumstance says that I do not know Jesus, that there is no saviour, that there is no God, the world is a rough place to be.

But with Jesus, we do what Isaiah says

Isaiah: with joy drink water from the well of salvation. With salvation on our mind we know nomatter how bad things can be we have a saviour who was already done the work. That we have been saved are saved and will be saved.

But if our sanctification isn’t done when we become believers, how come we let our joy cease? We stop drinking from this well of salvation. We let our minds wander from Christ, and we start dwelling on things that are of eternal consequence. Its ok to be sad, upset at situations, but only if we are remembering that Jesus came, died, came back, and is coming back? He wept and he knew he was about to raise lazarus.

The point of our Joy

The point of our joy is to make his name known.

You know the people who are so filled with joy that it is just pouring out of them? I want to be like those people, we should all want to be like those people.

For most of us its like we put our christmas lights up but we forget to plug them in. They are serving no use for us and no use for them. We need to drink from the well of salvation, a deep and endless source of joy. If you are a believer in Christ and you: Can’t figure out how to get through the school/work day

You find yourself always irritated

You have a reputation for being grumpy or a complainer

You need to run to this well as fast as you can

Drinking from the well looks like

Reading scripture and praying constantly.

Im doing that, do it more or do it better

Stop spending time on people and things that pull you away from Christ.

Next time you are mad or upset, thinking about this advent, that Jesus came and died for you, and hes coming back. “He has the whole world in his hands” do you believe that? Hitting these trials with joy