Joy

“Be joyful always.” 2 Thessalonians 5:17.
It is one of my favorite verses. It seems so simple and yet I am still trying to figure out what it means. How am I supposed to be joyful always? Life is not always perfect. I can’t always have a smile on my face. So what kind of joy is it?

It is easy to be joyful when everything is going smoothly, but I believe that type of joy should actually be called happiness. Happiness is easy to have when things are running smoothly. Happiness is one of the outward expressions of joy. I think joy can actually be harder to have when everything is going smoothly. Joy is remembering what God has done for us and being content with it. In any situation: good or bad. In a good situation it is easy to be happy with what God has given us but we always seem to forget that He is the one who gave it to us. We forget what he gave up for us and lose the joy we have in Him. Of course this is not always the case.
In bad situations when we lose everything there is only one place we can turn to. To an extent it can be easier to take joy in Christ when we are put in a place where He is all we have. Joy is not a feeling it is a choice that we make. If you lost everything would you be able to say, “I am content with my savior.”? One day He will be all we have. Will we be disappointed when we get there?

1 Peter 1:8-9
“Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”

Love

I was talking to a friend the other day and she said to try inserting your name into 1 Corinthians 13:4-6 everywhere the word love is written. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” As Christians we say we try to follow all of God’s commands. God commands us to love one another as He has loved us. When you insert your name into that passage, how much of it is true? Am I patient, and I kind? Do I envy, do I boast? Am I proud or rude or self seeking? I feel like such a hypocrite just inserting my name. I claim to be a Christian and follow God with my whole heart but am I even working on the things in this passage? I would like to say yes but in my mind I get away with saying, “I’m better than that person in this area. I don’t need to work on that.” That is the wrong idea. It doesn’t matter how much better I am than someone else, because according to God’s standard we all fall short. When held up to His standard I fail. That is why I need His love so much. Try inserting God’s name into the passage. Every single thing is true. God is love. God and love are synonyms. I say I strive to be Christ-like which would in turn be love, but I’m not always striving to do these things. This passage is something that should be taken more seriously than, “I want to love people.” So many people say that, but do we even know what it means? What is the definition of love? 1 Corinthians 13:4-6. As Christians we should strive to live these qualities out practically. Recently I saw the movie “To Save a Life”. It really hit me hard. Among other things, it’s about a senior in high school who befriended a kid who sat alone at school. Later in the movie you find out that the kid he befriended was suicidal, but since the senior invited him to hang out at lunch he felt like he mattered and didn’t commit suicide. The senior didn’t know or think what he did that day would have any effect; but what he did had an effect on the kid’s whole life. He was trying to live out the principles of this passage. Love may not always show its effects immediately or ever but, somewhere, someone sees your actions. Even if no person does, God sees everything you do for Him and it pleases Him that you are trying to act more like Him. The qualities will not just appear over night but if we continually seek God and truly strive to be like Him, He will manifest these qualities in us.