Joy or Happiness?

    How many times have you had a "bad day," when everything seemed to be against you? You get up to find your favorite shirt dirty. So you put on a less-beloved top and head to the kitchen. You end up burning your bacon because you're so busy cleaning up the milk you spilled all over the table. Then, as you go to put on your shoes, you stub your toe on that wall that came out of nowhere. Finally, you discover that your shoes are wearing out, and the soles are coming loose. That's the last straw! Grumbling, you take your frustration out on whatever is handy, excusing your actions with "I'm having a bad day."

   Who else has experienced this? I know I'm not the only one who has had those weird days where, the second you crawl out from under your bed covers, you know today is already ruined. 

   When those days come, I'm not happy. The day is ruined; therefore, I have the right to be unhappy. Maybe even grumpy the entire day. It's just not fair to expect a person who's having a bad day to just pretend everything's okay and go about their merry lives without a word of complaint, right?

   Wrong. It is so easy to pity oneself into making up excuses for our attitude. Trust me, I know. But . . . it's so tiring to be unhappy. I mean, when you're feeling okay and bad things come, it makes you frustrated. But when you're already grumpy and bad things come, it makes you angry. At least, that can happen to me. But after grumbling all day, you feel kind of tired. If it's so tiresome to grumble our ways through our trials, why do we do it?

   The truth is that I'm not absolutely sure . . . but it just might have something to do with the fact that we want our own way. We don't want to have to go through trials and frustrations. Who would want to? That's nonsensical! If someone told us to be happy about the trials we have to go through, we'd probably either retaliate or laugh, wouldn't we? Be happy about trials and persecutions and even the little tiny things that frustrate us so much? Absurd!

   The real question is: what does God say about it and how do we respond to it?

Well, James 1:2-4 has God's answer:

Consider it all joy, my brothers and sisters, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

   Hold on! Have joy when we encounter trials? Are you serious? Why in the world should we joy when we go through trials? That doesn't make any sense!

   Hm. It actually does, if you take a second to think about it and read the passage again. Why should we consider it all joy when we go through challenges? Because the testing of our faith produces endurance. If you are a Christian–a true, born-again believer in Christ–God is using various trials to test and therefore strengthen your faith in Him! The trials (even the tiny ones, like spilling tomato juice on your favorite white shirt) produce endurance! 

   I personally don't have much endurance in certain activities, like running and swimming. Sometimes I wish I did. How wonderful for your endurance to be strengthened in a favorite activity! Well, for a Christian, what's more important than his walk with Christ? Who wouldn't want more endurance and a stronger faith in Christ? Even at the cost of "various trials?"

   One more thing to notice: the verse did not mention happiness one iota! It never mentioned being happy or pretending everything's okay. Did you catch what it said? "Consider it all joy!" He didn't say, "Work up a joyful feeling," either. Know why?

   Joy is not based on circumstances like happiness. Being joyful is a choice.

   We're happy if things are going great, if we get what we desired, or if something happened just like we wanted it to. But joy, true joy, is not based off of whether things are going well for us. Joy is a choice!

   We must choose to be joyful. And true joy comes from Christ. So even when we start having a "bad day," we can stop and remember what Christ has done for us. And we can stop and remember that God told us to choose joy! Huh! That's not just a saying that you see on a t-shirt, after all!

   Don't just take it from me. I'm not writing this post to preach at you or guilt-trip you into anything. I'm merely writing about a topic God placed on my heart over the past few weeks. Don't assume I'm an authority on the subject; I've got to work on this topic a lot myself. Go read the Bible! God's Word is the way He speaks to us. Go and listen to what He has to say.