Finding Joy in the difficulty

What is the difference between Joy and Happiness?

What does everyone want in life?

They want money, achievements, notoriety, fame, a super model spouse, be the best. What all does Tom Brady have?

He has all of this and more yet he is still searching. He has a net worth of 180 Million. Has won 7 Super Bowls. Everybody knows who he is! He is married to an actual Super Model. He is the G.O.A.T.

So why does he keep searching for more?

He is searching for Joy. This is something that is constant regardless of how a person feels. Everlasting Joy can only come from one source.

Everybody wants to be happy but the problem with just finding happiness is that happiness changes drastically depending on what is happening throughout the day.

The people that played the game tonight may have been happy before they came but as soon as the flour hit their face that happiness most likely disappeared...

Tonight we are going to begin a series in Philippians. So to begin a book where do you start?

Chapter 1 correct!

Lets read verses 3-11

Philippians 1:3–11 NLT

3 Every time I think of you, I give thanks to my God. 4 Whenever I pray, I make my requests for all of you with joy, 5 for you have been my partners in spreading the Good News about Christ from the time you first heard it until now. 6 And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. 7 So it is right that I should feel as I do about all of you, for you have a special place in my heart. You share with me the special favor of God, both in my imprisonment and in defending and confirming the truth of the Good News. 8 God knows how much I love you and long for you with the tender compassion of Christ Jesus. 9 I pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing in knowledge and understanding. 10 For I want you to understand what really matters, so that you may live pure and blameless lives until the day of Christ’s return. 11 May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation—the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.

Philippians is a letter that Paul wrote while he was in prison for the gospel. The letter was written to a church in Philippi who financially supported Paul in his missionary journeys. This is similar to what we do with the church in Belize. This church is near and dear to Paul’s heart and he has found immense Joy from serving alongside them.

When we are going through the book of Philippians we are going to continually look at finding joy throughout life’s difficulties.

Paul begins with the Joy he found through prayer.

1. Finding Joy through prayer

Philippians 1:3–6 NLT

3 Every time I think of you, I give thanks to my God. 4 Whenever I pray, I make my requests for all of you with joy, 5 for you have been my partners in spreading the Good News about Christ from the time you first heard it until now. 6 And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.

Paul opens this letter to the church explaining that he was praying for this group of believers. He was thankful and grateful for them because they partnered with him through out his journeys. Paul understood that prayer was ultimately communication to a Holy God in who we do not deserve to be able to talk too. Paul also prayed for others more than he prayed for things.

A. Pray for others others

Paul prayed and thanked God for this church of believers because they brought him joy. Paul was so joyful that he prayed for them.

Every time he thought of them he would pray thanking God that He allowed them into his life!

God puts people in our lives in order to bring us joy but so many times we don’t find the joy because we get so focused on ourselves.

B. Joy through sharing the Gospel

This group of believers who were sharing Christ and doing ministry brought joy to Paul because it showed that the Gospel was at work in their lives and people were active in ministry.

Paul was joyful that he was not alone in sharing the gospel. Paul counted others who shared the Gospel as blessing and found joy in them.

How many times are we filled with Joy when we see people actually doing the work of Christ? At school if you see Aiden sharing the Gospel with friend are you filled with Joy seeing God at work through Aiden?

When we see God working through others or just being around people who are pursuing the same thing brings us Joy.

c. Finding joy knowing its only him!

What brings us the most Joy as being a Christian is knowing that God is going to complete what He had started. Salvation is a work that only comes through God. There is nothing we can do for salvation. Once we are saved God continues the work in our lives of salvation. Finally God will complete his work of salvation in our lives when we meet him face to face.

The fact that God is the reason we have salvation should bring us to a humbling point in life because it is not something we could do to earn it.

This brings the source of Joy for us since we did nothing to earn it then there is nothing we can do to lose it.

2. Finding Joy through Love

Philippians 1:7–8 NLT

7 So it is right that I should feel as I do about all of you, for you have a special place in my heart. You share with me the special favor of God, both in my imprisonment and in defending and confirming the truth of the Good News. 8 God knows how much I love you and long for you with the tender compassion of Christ Jesus.

A. Love for God’s People

Us as Christians should be filled with joy when we are around those who are saved! Whenever we come to church we should be around people that bring us joy.

The church should also be a place where people are the most joyful but why is it so often not the case? So many times we come to church and there is hardly any joy at all. People come here to be entertained rather than people coming for the Gospel and community.

We find joy when we love other believers.

This should not be something that is foreign but something that is happening due our common interest in the Gospel.

B. Love for the Gospel

The reason we find joy through others is through our love for the Gospel. We need to reflect on the reason we can find joy. We need to reflect on how we did nothing at all to be saved so for that we fall deeper in love with the good news of Christ.

Realistically we should not be able to find joy when life is falling apart and everything seems to be going against you. But the reality is that when we realize we don’t deserve Christ but yet he gave himself for us regardless we find joy in that completely.

We couldnt earn the love of God but God showed his love for us!

C. Love for God

We find joy in the love God had for us. We have joy through the compassion that God displayed for us. We are not worthy of the creator of the universe to sacrifice himself for us but yet he did through His son. We can make it through the difficulties of life when we lean on the love that God showed us.

3. Joy through God

Philippians 1:9–11 NLT

9 I pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing in knowledge and understanding. 10 For I want you to understand what really matters, so that you may live pure and blameless lives until the day of Christ’s return. 11 May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation—the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.

Ultimately the joy that we have comes through God alone. We look at Paul and in his circumstances that he is living in while writing this letter.

He is in a jail chained to a prison guard but is still praying and worshiping God. His Joy is not found in his circumstances but found completely in God.

A. Joy through our love for God growing

He commend the Philippians in there growing love for God. This only happens when we start going to God and learning more about who he is through his word and prayer.

We love God more when we intentionally seek after him. This happens because we realize how great and massive God truly is. When we study and read about God we develop an awe about him that overtakes us.

God is incomprehensible but that makes us love him more. We worship a God we cannot fully understand.

B. Joy through sanctification

When we are saved God continually grows us through a process called sanctification. This is the process of God changing us to become more like Christ. From the moment we are saved we are being changed and molded to become more like Christ. This is the process that is difficult and is an ongoing process until we cease to live. The joy is found through the work of God not being completed in us. God changes us and grow us to reflect Christ in our lives.

There is joy in being a christian because we are continually becoming more like christ.

Sanctification is the process of us returning to the way we were originally created to the point in which God ultimately changes us when we see him face to face.

C. Joy through God changing us!

There is joy in God changing us and revealing himself to us. We find joy when we look back at our lives and see where God has molded and changed us to become more like him. This is a difficult process because life is messy and life sucks! But God uses the moments in our life that seem terrible and they really might be terrible but if we allow for Him to change us through those moments he will. And that is how we find joy through the difficulties of life!

Tonight there may be some of you who have never experienced that Joy of God and I would love to talk to you right after this. Others there may be struggling with life now and need to pray or talk please come talk to me or one of the small group leaders!