Fruit of the Spirit - Joy

Joy

THE PURSUIT OF JOY

Men have pursued joy in every avenue imaginable. Some have successfully found it while others have not. Perhaps it would be easier to describe where joy cannot be found:

Not in Unbelief —

Voltaire was an infidel of the most pronounced type. He wrote: “I wish I had never been born.”

Not in Pleasure — Lord Byron lived a life of pleasure if anyone did. He wrote: “The worm, the canker, and grief are mine alone.”

Not in Money — Jay Gould, the American millionaire, had plenty of that. When dying, he said: “I suppose I am the most miserable man on earth.”

Not in Position and Fame — Lord Beaconsfield enjoyed more than his share of both. He wrote: “Youth is a mistake; manhood a struggle; old age a regret.”

Not in Military Glory — Alexander the Great conquered the known world in his day. Having done so, he wept in his tent, before he said, “There are no more worlds to conquer.”

Where then is real joy found? — the answer is simple, in Christ alone.

— The Bible Friend, Turning Point, May, 1993 — (10,000 Sermon Illustrations)

Joy on the Road

Honda made a "Musical Road" for a commercial in Lancaster, CA, that played the William Tell Overture when you drove on it. At first, it wasn't too exciting. But as you picked up speed, you could actually hear a song played by the tires hitting the grooves in the road at just the right time, and it put a big smile on your face. But alas, some people complained, and they paved over the grooves.

Sometimes, our lives seem mundane with brief moments of happiness, but a deep inward joy from the Holy Spirit that does not fade comes from knowing the Lord.

Let’s turn to Galatians 5:22-23. We all probably know these verses well.

The New International Version Chapter 5

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

As you might have guessed, we’re going to only focus in on one of these this morning, joy.

But first, what does joy mean?

Webster’s tells us that joy is “the emotion evoked by well-being, success, or good fortune or by the prospect of possessing what one desires.” Another definition is “a source or cause of delight.” In the NIV, there is 247 occurrences of joy or some form of it, such as joyful or joyfully. As I thought about the number of times this term is used and these definitions from Webster, they just do not adequately describe the true meaning of joy for a follower of Jesus.

All too often I think we confuse the word joy for the word happiness. They are not synonyms. They do not mean the same thing. They can certainly go together, but not in every circumstance. Happiness may come and go, but as believers our joy should be always in all circumstances. Did you know that it is possible to be joyful while sad, in a time of trial, in sickness, in devastating loss, or even when mourning? Some of you are probably thinking that it isn’t possible to be joyful in some of these circumstances, but according to Scripture, our joy should not be coming from anything, anyone, or any circumstance in this world.

The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary tells us joy is “The experience of deliverance and the anticipation of salvation provide the most significant occasions for rejoicing among the people of God in the OT. The coming of the Messiah, who delivers his people and brings salvation becomes the basis for rejoicing in the NT. The response of joy, gladness, or happiness is not only a deep inward feeling, but is expressed in celebration when God’s people gather together.[1]”

Author Leo Buscaglia tells this story about his mother and their "misery dinner." It was the night after his father came home and said it looked as if he would have to go into bankruptcy because his partner had absconded with their firm's funds. His mother went out and sold some jewelry to buy food for a sumptuous feast. Other members of the family scolded her for it. But she told them that "the time for joy is now, when we need it most, not next week." Her courageous act rallied the family.

Christopher News Notes, August, 1993.

The Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible tells us that joy is a “positive human condition that can be either feeling or action. The Bible uses joy in both senses.[2]”

As a third-century man was anticipating death, he penned these last words to a friend: "It's a bad world, an incredibly bad world. But I have discovered in the midst of it a quiet and holy people who have learned a great secret. They have found a joy which is a thousand times better than any pleasure of our sinful life. They are despised and persecuted, but they care not. They are masters of their souls. They have overcome the world. These people are the Christians--and I am one of them."

Today In The Word, June, 1988, p. 18.

C.S. Lewis tells us, “Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition, when infinite joy is offered to us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in the slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

This morning, I believe there are several things that the Lord has for us as we consider this fruit of the spirit.

God’s people find their joy in Him

A Russian countess accepted the Lord Jesus as her Savior and was open about her testimony. The Tsar was displeased and threw her into prison. After 24 hours with the lowest level of Russian society, in the most miserable conditions imaginable, he ordered her brought into his presence. He smiled sardonically and said, “Well, are you ready now to renounce your silly faith and come back to the pleasures of the court?” To his surprise, the countess smiled serenely and said, “I have known more real joy and more real happiness in one day in prison with Jesus than I have known in a lifetime in the courts of the Tsar.”

http://ministry127.com/resources/illustration/the-joy-of-the-lord-is-better-than-the-pleasures-of-sin

Norman Cousins was hospitalized with a rare, crippling form of arthritis. When he was diagnosed as incurable, Cousins checked out of the hospital. Aware of the harmful effects that negative emotions can have on the body, Cousins reasoned the reverse was true. So, he borrowed a movie projector and prescribed his own treatment, consisting of Marx Brothers films and old “Candid Camera” reruns. It didn’t take long for him to discover that 10 minutes of laughter provided two hours of pain free sleep. Amazingly, his debilitating disease was eventually reversed. After the account of his victory appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine, Cousins received more than 3,000 letters from appreciative physicians throughout the world.

http://ministry127.com/resources/illustration/your-attitude-makes-a-difference

God provides us with laughter.

Psalm 43:4 NIV

Then I will go to the altar of God, to God, my joy and my delight. I will praise you with the lyre, O God, my God.

Philippians 4:4 NIV

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

Philippians 4:4 NIV

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!

Habakkuk 3:17 NIV

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls,

These Scriptures remind us that we are to find our joy in God in all circumstances, in all situations. We aren’t promised that when we become a believer and surrender our entire beings to God that it will be easy. In fact, we are promised the opposite. But we are told that we are to rejoice in all things and be joyful in all circumstances – because no matter what happens to us in this life, no matter how we are treated, whether we have earthly possessions or not, we have a relationship with the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think there is any greater reason to be joyful!

R. A. Torrey said, “There is more joy in Jesus in 24 hours than there is in the world in 365 days. I have tried them both.”

Our attitude makes all the difference in the world. It is easy to get down because of the circumstances of life. We may have job troubles, financial troubles, family troubles, the list goes on and on. But folks, no one can take the joy that God gives away from you.

How to keep your joy in the Lord? Spend time with him in prayer, in the Scripture.

God himself gives joy to His people

We see several examples from Scripture that remind us that true joy comes from God himself.

Ecclesiastes 2:26 NIV

To the person who pleases him, God gives wisdom, knowledge and happiness, but to the sinner he gives the task of gathering and storing up wealth to hand it over to the one who pleases God. This too is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.

Job 8:21 NIV

He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of joy.

Nehemiah 8:10 NIV

Nehemiah said, “Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is holy to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”

I always thought of the joy referred to here as the joy which God gives, and so it is. I now realize this does not say quite enough. It is also the joy which God possesses and experiences. God gives us joy because He is joyful. He is the source of joy, just as He is the source of love, of truth, of mercy, and so on. Joy is both a description of God and a description of what He gives.

According to the prophet Isaiah, the promised Messiah is the One in whom the Father delights (42:1). He is described as the One who will “delight in the fear of the Lord” (11:3). And, He is the One who will be characterized by joy, a joy which surpasses that of all of His brethren:

Finally, joy is the byproduct of obedience.

In Matthew 25, Jesus told a parable which has much to teach us about both joy and obedience. We see a man entrust his estate to three different people, each according to their ability.

This parable has much to teach us about Christian service, aka obedience. We must conclude that of these three people, only the first two were true believers. The third was cast into outer darkness, a place where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (verse 30). The first two were good and faithful, and the third was unfaithful and wicked. I find it interesting and instructive to consider this story from the perspective of joy.

The first two slaves were faithful, and their reward was to “enter into the joy” of their master. Do these words not indicate that their master was joyful and that they were blessed by entering into his joy with him? The master was (or would be) joyful, and the faithful would enter into this joy as well. The “master” in this story most surely represents our Lord and the faithful “servants,” His followers. The blessings of the master and his slaves are summed up by the word “joy.”

This third person fascinates me. In the past, I have always focused on what this wicked, lazy person did not do. This time, I am especially interested in why he failed to do as he should have done. Was he lazy because he did not work to gain a profit for his master? Of course. But was he not evil in thinking wrongly of his master? He thought of his master as one who expected a profit where he made no provisions.

Matthew 25:24 NIV

“Then the man who had received one bag of gold came. ‘Master,’ he said, ‘I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed.

This person’s assessment of his master was wrong. It is true that Jesus judges this man on the basis of his view of his master, but it is nevertheless a wrong perception. God is not a cruel master, who expects us to gain a profit where He has given us no provision. He deals with us in grace. He gives us the means to do that which He expects and requires. We can fulfill our responsibilities to Him only by His grace. This is why we can only boast in Him and not in what we have done. This person was wicked because he did not see his master as gracious and (may I be so bold as to say) joyful. The reward of the faithful was to enter into their master’s joy. The master was joyful. The faithful were to enter into this joy. And the wicked man had no grasp of God’s joy at all. How many of us have this same distorted view of God as a grouchy, demanding slave master rather than a joyful master into whose joy we too may enter? And the service He requires of us even now is to be done joyfully rather than sullenly.

As we wrap up this morning, we must remember that God is a God of joy. He rejoices in His creation, and He especially rejoices in the salvation of lost sinners. If we are God’s children, then we are in tune with the heart and character of God and should thus be characterized by joy as well. This joy comes from God and is mediated through the Holy Spirit to every Christian. “The joy of the Lord” should characterize our service and our worship. It is a joy that will be even greater in heaven, a joy we will enter into in heaven. For the Christian, joy is not an option, for we are commanded to experience and to express joy as Christians.

In addition, we see that joy is the motivation for Christian witness and service. All too often we try to motivate Christians to witness by making them feel guilty. This text indicates that the “joy of Thy salvation” acts as the motivator of our service, not guilt or fear. “The joy of the Lord is our strength” (Nehemiah 8:10). The Spirit of God and the Word of God are two primary means by which the joy of the Lord is conveyed to men (see Psalm 119:111; Jeremiah 15:16; verses on the Holy Spirit and joy above).

We do a great disservice to God and others when we portray God in a way that matches the false perception of the wicked slave of Matthew 25. The wicked man feared his master, but rather than prompting him to serve his master, his fear produced just the opposite response. God takes great pleasure and finds great joy in His creations, including the new creation of believers in Jesus Christ. He also delights in the growth and godliness of His people.

Joy serves as a tremendous source of guidance concerning the “will of God.” Many think and speak of the “will of God” as some great mystery, difficult to discern and even harder to defend. But the Bible does not speak of God’s will this way. In Romans 7, Paul did not say the will of God was hard to know; he said that it was impossible to do. He knew what was right, he just did not do it. He knew what was wrong, yet he persisted in doing it. It is not the knowing of God’s will, but the doing of it, which is hard.

Note carefully that the world’s form of “joy” is not the same joy which the Christian possesses. The two “joys” are very different. In fact, the Christian can be distinguished from the unbeliever by those things which are the source of our joy. Evil men delight in their abominations (Isaiah 66:3) and choose that in which God does not delight (Isaiah 65:12; 66:4). They do not delight in the Word of God (Jeremiah 6:10). They are pleased with a thief, and with adulterers (Psalm 50:18), and in wickedness (2 Thessalonians 2:12).

The child of God has a very different source of pleasure or delight. His joy is in the Lord (Psalm 37:4; 43:4), from His Word (Psalm 1:2; 112:1; 119:16, 24, 70, 77, 92, 143, 174). He has joy in doing God’s will (Psalm 40:8) and in praising God (Psalm 147:1). He chooses that which is pleasing to God (Isaiah 56:4). He rejoices in justice (Proverbs 21:15). His delight is not in personal, selfish, sensual pleasures, but he finds pleasure in God.

So many non-Christians seem to think that becoming a Christian spells the end of pleasure and the commencement of a dull and joyless life. The term “puritan” or “puritanical” is far from a compliment to anyone today, because the Puritans are thought of as a pleasureless people of the past. Such characterization of the Puritans is simply not true. Nothing could be further from the truth. There is no joy like that of knowing God and serving Him, no joy like that of knowing that our sins are forgiven and we are right with God through the shed blood of Jesus Christ. There is no joy that endures pain and suffering and persecution like the joy of the Christian, whose hope and joy are in the Lord, and not in our circumstances.

https://bible.org/seriespage/13-joy-god

It’s difficult to find you in the everydayness of life. Yet, in the words of C.S. Lewis, “joy is the serious business of heaven.”

How “seriously” do we take joy?

We expect ourselves as believers to adhere to certain doctrines, to avoid sins, to pray and read our Bibles regularly, but do we expect that we will gradually become more joyful? That we will be able to exhibit delight in the midst of the mundane?

According to the Scriptures, joy is not an option. it is required of us. In other swords, living a life characterized by joylessness is a sin.

[1] Arnold, C. E. (1992). Joy. In D. N. Freedman (Ed.), The Anchor Yale Bible Dictionary (Vol. 3, p. 1022). New York: Doubleday.

[2] Elwell, W. A., & Beitzel, B. J. (1988). Joy. In Baker encyclopedia of the Bible (Vol. 2, p. 1224). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House.