Joy and Happiness

In today’s world there is an enormous emphasis on happiness. The message of the day is: ‘do whatever you want to do, as long as it makes you happy’. According to the world’s philosophy, we should all be striving for this gold standard in life. If wealth makes you happy, then work to get rich. If health makes you happy, then live a healthy lifestyle. If relationships with family and friends make you happy, then spend your time cultivating these relationships. Finally, if religion or spirituality makes you happy, then do religious things.

This kind of mind-set paves the way for envy and covetousness. If we think that wealth/health etc. are what we need to make us happy, then we envy others who have these things, thinking: “wow, they must be happy”. The rich and famous, or the healthy and popular must be happy, so we envy them and covet what they have. Yet, we see time and again that the people who seem to ‘have it all’ and therefore must be happy are often depressed and distraught. They did everything right to find happiness, but it seems to have evaded them.

Some people have understood that health, wealth, and even relationships don’t bring them lasting happiness, so they turn to religion. In some cases, that religion is Christianity. They want Jesus to provide them with that supremely evasive feeling of happiness. “I have tried everything else to be happy, but failed,” they think, “so maybe this ‘Jesus-thing’ can do it for me”. So they attend church, and in some churches they will find an emphasis on happiness. They sing happy songs, the preacher says motivational things, the people in the church are all smiles – surely, this must be the source of happiness? Yet, the novelty wears off, and even in a church the happiness-seekers may not find what they are looking for. Perhaps they are happy on Sundays, or when they attend Christian worship sessions or camps, but in day-to-day life happiness remains as evasive as ever.

The problem with seeking happiness in church or elsewhere is that the very concept that happiness needs to be sought above all else is from the world. Society dictates that we need to be happy, so we go out looking for it, as though that is what we actually need. The issue is not that we haven’t found the right recipe for happiness, but that we should not even be looking for it.

In the Bible, God does not promise us happiness, although it is described as a side effect that people may experience when serving Him (Deut. 33:29; Job 5:17; Ps. 144:14, 146:5). Interestingly, happiness is not even mentioned as a benefit of serving the Lord in the New Testament. As shown in the Old Testament references above, happiness is a good thing, but it is not important in God’s reckoning. God created us, which means that He knows what the human heart really needs, and happiness does not appear high on His list. This does not mean that God does not want us to be happy, but rather that He has something much better for us.

Now enters joy. Joy is so far superior to happiness that it is difficult to even compare the two. The best I can do is to say that happiness is like candlelight to someone who lives in complete darkness. To that person, the candlelight is an amazing thing. Joy is like the same person who has lived in darkness finally stepping out into blazing sunlight. Once you have found the sun, the candle seems quite pathetic, and becomes rather unnecessary.

The world offers us happiness, but like a candle it can be blown out at any moment, and it provides a fickle light at best. God offers us sunlight, whereby He is the eternal Sun that never sets and who will always provide us with light, as long as we stay in the sunshine. As you can see, there is a condition attached to joy that is not attached to happiness – we need to come to the Lord to find joy, whereas we can try to find happiness on our own. This is why the world emphasises happiness, whereas only God can offer joy.

If we earn our happiness, then we have some reason to be proud of ourselves and boast of our achievement. In contrast, when we come into God’s presence, we are stripped bare and shown to be wretched sinners who have nothing to boast about, yet it is then that we find joy. You will show me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; At Your right hand are pleasures forevermore. (Ps. 16:11). The last word of this verse shows one more difference between joy and happiness: joy is forever, whereas happiness is momentary. We have a choice: to have lasting joy in this life followed by everlasting joy in eternity, or to have a few fleeting moments of happiness in this life followed by torment in eternity.

If you want to choose serving the Lord and finding His joy, then you need to know more about it before making a decision. Firstly, you will not necessarily find happiness with joy. Being happy or sad relies on your current circumstances and your emotions – as humans we will all experience varying degrees of these feelings in life. Yet joy does not rely on your feelings, and it is often manifested in its fullness under the very worst circumstances, when you feel sad. I will give three examples from the early Christians to demonstrate this point.

Soon after the early believers received the Holy Spirit, those who sentenced Jesus to death started persecuting them. There was a very real danger that these early Christians would also be killed. After being thrown in prison, their persecutors debated whether or not to kill them, but in the end they let them go. The reaction of the Christians to this near-death experience is telling: So they departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer shame for His name (Acts 5:41). They rejoiced – i.e. they were filled with joy!

Paul’s epistle to the Philippians is especially filled with joy – he mentions the words ‘joy’ and ‘rejoice’ 12 times in this short letter, more than in any of his other letters. He wrote this epistle while he was imprisoned in Rome, where his life was finally ended. It is clear from Chapter 1:19-26 that Paul knew that his life was hanging in the balance as he wrote this letter. Furthermore, Paul mentions that he is sorrowful (Phil 2:27-28), as he was very concerned about other believers. Yet without knowing whether he would live or die, and bearing a constant burden in his heart for the church, Paul was still able to declare Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice! (Phil. 4:4).

My final example is from James’ letter to the early Christians. This was at a time when the church was being persecuted to such an extent that Christians were fleeing for their lives to other cities. It is against this background that James writes these amazing words: My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. (James 1:2-3). The trials he is talking about here were not the kind of small issues that upset us today; these Christians were being beaten, stoned, chased out of their homes, and rejected by family and friends for their faith (to name a few). Yet he tells them to ‘count it all joy’! We can have joy even in these dire situations. Indeed, joy is likened to oil in the Bible (Isaiah 61:3), as it is produced in a Christian life in the same way that oil is produced from olives. The olives have to be pressed hard to produce oil. It is during the darkest, hardest times of our lives when we fully rely on God and seek His face, that He sustains us with His joy.

Although joy is most evident when we rely on the Lord to bring us through hardships, this does not mean that the Christian life has to be one long hardship. Monks and nuns in the Catholic Church are taught that they need to be miserable in order to show their piety. They must inflict themselves continually to try and earn God’s grace. This is not what the Bible teaches. We may experience both happiness and sorrow in our lives, and happiness is often a side effect of serving the Lord. Sorrow is also a part of serving the Lord, as we must deny ourselves those earthly pleasures that are contrary to His will. However, as Jesus Christ said to His disciples before He went to the cross: Therefore you now have sorrow; but I will see you again and your heart will rejoice, and your joy no one will take from you. (John 16:20).

Finally, although joy is far superior to happiness, it is also not meant to be the thing that we seek in our lives. Joy is found only in the presence of God, and He is the One we must seek. When we set our minds and hearts to seek the Lord and to obey Him, then joy flows into our hearts as naturally as water flows from a spring. For Christians, we may have as much joy in our lives as we are willing to have, for the Lord gives to all His children liberally. However, if we have sin in our lives, then we are not in the presence of the Lord, and cannot experience His joy. If we prepare our hearts to seek His face and obey Him, then He is faithful to fill our hearts with inexpressible joy.