What is the meaning of joy? What does it mean to you?
Is it happiness, elation, excitement? Is it something that happens when everything is going perfectly? You receive good news, and that triggers your joy?
Or does it run deeper, in a way that’s indescribable. Almost raw and bittersweet. Almost overwhelming. It’s every extreme, all rolled into one. You shouldn’t feel happy in the situation you’re in, and you don’t. Nothing is right in your world. But still, joy pursues you. It’s this innermost tug, that in the midst of your situation, you can still have hope. Maybe joy isn’t based on circumstance. Maybe it’s based on something else. Something far greater.
We like to bring up how “fear not” is mentioned hundreds of times in the Bible; one statement for every day of the year.
Did you realize that various versions of the word “joy” (“rejoice” or “joyful”) is mentioned in the Bible about 430 times? Happiness, the emotion based on circumstance, is only in the Bible roughly ten times (openthebible.org).
If telling us to “fear not” is so important to God that He’d give us that phrase for each day, how much more joy.
If you’re like me and love starting in Genesis and reading through your Bible starting January 1, highlight every version of the word “joy.” Study those verses. See how they meld. See the situations they were in and the grief and the overwhelming places. See all that King David went through, every way in how he messed up and fell short – but He understood how important joy is to God. See Jesus praying for us, praying that we would have His joy.
Joy is Jesus’. He spoke so that we could have His joy. Joy runs deeper, because for those in Christ, it’s a spiritual birthright.
We’re good at hearing so many sermons under the sun, we’re good at saying how cool Jesus is. We’re good at condemnation. Yet maybe the key that we’re missing, the message that needs to be displayed to the world, is that Jesus is love. He is peace, and hope, and salvation. And Jesus is joy.
It doesn’t make sense, but His way seldom looks like the world’s. He transcends it. He’s God. And joy is so important to God.
“If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in His love. These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” – John 15:10-11
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