Merritt Opening Song: #470 There is Sunshine in my Soul
Scripture: Proverbs 17:22, A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.
Three sons left home and prospered. First said, “I built a big house for mother.” Second said, “I sent her a Mercedes with a chauffeur.” Third said, “Mom enjoyed reading the Bible but she can’t see well anymore. I sent a remarkable parrot that recites entire Bible. Elders in church took 12 years to teach him. He’s one of a kind. Mom just has to say chapter and verse, and parrot recites it.” Soon Mom sent out letters. “Milton, house you built is so huge. I live in only one room, but have to clean whole house. Gerald,” she wrote, “I am too old to travel, so I rarely use the Mercedes, and driver is rude! Dearest Donald,” she wrote her third son, “You have good sense to know what mother likes. The chicken was delicious!”
Delicious. Does thinking about your religion make you happy or sad? Some are unhappy because we see the world going to hell in a shopping cart. Epidemics, recession, gridlock, global warming, and culture that worships sex and money. Lots to be gloomy about. “Rejoice in the Lord always.” Why should we rejoice? Paul says Jesus is near! Gloomy Christians get nervous that Jesus is near because they see the Lord coming like FBI agents, breaking down the door to make an arrest. They see Doomsday. But Paul means his friend Jesus is coming in justice, love and peace. How we look at God is important. “If you are good, you get dessert; if you’re bad, you’re locked in the basement. If you’re nice, Santa will bring you presents, if you’re naughty, you get nothing, zilch.”
A certain amount of reward and consequence is necessary in raising children, but some parents only care that the house is quiet. God is not that kind of parent. Children do all sorts of things that are not good; yet their parents love them. God does not tell us, “I love you if you keep my commandments.” He gave His life for us while we were yet His enemies. Gloomy Christians object because they think it will permit people to ignore the law. If it were not for risk of going to jail, some adults WOULD steal. Some people ABUSE those who love them. But God, our good parent, loves us and hopes we respond to His love. Paul is talking about a happy arrival of a loved one, not arrival of a bill collector. When you read a book or watch a movie, heroes go through all sorts of terrible things, but you know good guys will win. Christians believe justice and love will triumph. The good guys. Christians are romantics at heart.
Research is proving what Solomon said, laughter is good for us. It causes endothelium, tissue that lines blood vessels to expand, which increases blood flow. Laughter improves arteries by reducing mental stress. Include 30 minutes of exercise and 15 minutes of hearty laughter every day. Experts found people with heart disease were less likely to recognize humor or use it in uncomfortable situations. They laughed less, even in positive situations.
No one wants a FREE truck if you have to push it. No one wants down in the dumps people lacking cheerfulness. Their own religion is burden to them. They suppose joy is sign of triviality and neglect of life’s seriousness. They think of religion as severe, stern, solemn, sad. Life is not without cares, but we must not lose sight of a glad heart or let the world choke our song. Christ inside us is joy.
SONG: JOY COMES IN THE MORNING
God’s joy rejoices in happiness of others. It is open hearted, gentle, with a heart of tender sympathy, and a hand ready to help. Someone said stars would rot in their orbits if they had no motion. Water that rests, stagnates. He was a wise physician who prescribed for an unhappy patient, “Do something for someone else.” Best thing for an unhappy Christian is to send him out to comfort or help. Religion in head but not in heart soon grows unhealthy. Joyful life must be active. 2Corinthians 2:14, Wherever we go, God uses us to make clear what it means to know Christ. It's like a fragrance that fills the air.
Some Christians seem to think because they do so much for God in public, they are free to be ugly and un-Christlike in private. Practical joy shows itself in daily life. A gloomy Christian, miserable Christian, exacting, demanding Christian, cruel, hard, self-absorbed Christian with sharp bitter words may be a very earnest worker and have honor in Church, but if we’re not loving Christians, how good is that? “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete,” John 15:11.
Anyone who’s been a Christian any length of time knows life isn’t a bed of roses, things don’t always go the way we like, But, and it’s actually a big But, all these things which try to trip us up pale in significance when compared with Jesus. That God takes ordinary people like you and me, with our faults, and not only forgives and heals, but welcomes us into His family and we get to journey with Him; that’s real joy!
A gloomy Christian is contradiction, and nothing has done Christianity more harm than connection with wearing sad sacks and long faces. I used to wear long baggy dresses to my knees that my husband called potato sacks. C.S. Lewis said, “Joy is business of Heaven.” Drs. Berk and Tan, Loma Linda University studied effects of laughter on immune system. After humor, there’s increase in antibody which fights upper respiratory tract infections, increase in gamma interferon which tells immune system to “turn on”, higher Complement 3 to help antibodies pierce dysfunctional or infected cells. Increase was not only present while subjects watched a funny video, there was lingering effect of increased levels the next day. Dopamine levels were also decreased. Dopamine is part of the “fight or flight response” which raises blood pressure.
“Christianity wants nothing so much in the world as sunny people, and the old are hungrier for love than for bread, and the Oil of Joy is very cheap, and if you can help the poor on with a Garment of Praise, it will be better for them than blankets,” said Henry Drummond. “Our joy in Him may be a fluctuating thing: His joy in us knows no change,” said Hudson Taylor.
“Begin to rejoice in the Lord, and your bones will flourish like a herb, and your cheeks will glow with freshness. Worry, fear, distrust, care -- all are poisonous! Joy is balm and healing. It is His joy that remains in us that makes our joy full,” said A.B. Simpson. “Like supernatural effervescence, praise will sometimes bubble up from joy of simply knowing Christ. Praise like that is delight. But praise can also be a decisive action. Praise like that is quiet resolve. Strength of spirit,” said Joni Erikson Tada, the paraplegic. When our lives are filled with peace, faith and joy, people will want to know what it is.
SONG: STEP INTO THE SUNSHINE
“If you have no joy, there’s a leak in your Christianity somewhere,” said Billy Sunday. “Purest joy in the world is joy in Christ. Everyone knows how to smile. It’s one of the greatest gifts God’s given us. A smile makes people feel good, and people look so beautiful when they smile. When the joy in your life is obvious, it rubs off on others. But when you keep God’s joy locked inside and don’t allow it to show on your face, you’re depriving those around you,” says Joyce Meyer.
“You may be lonely, poor, cold, neglected by children, forgotten by friends, yet you may have glad Christmas joy in your heart as Paul had, shut up in prison,” said John Rice. “A joyless life is not a Christian life, for joy is constant recipe for Christian living,” said William Barclay. Joy has nothing to do with material things, or with a man’s outward circumstance, for a man living in luxury can be wretched; a man in poverty can overflow with joy.
“Angels of heaven rejoice over Sinners that repent: will not you and I do the same? I do not think the church rejoices enough. We all grumble enough and groan enough: but very few of us rejoice enough,” said Charles Spurgeon. Holiness is associated with a sour disposition, yet only those who walk with Jesus experience true joy. God is glorified when our experience of Him ignites a forest fire of joy that consumes all that competes. What is true happiness? Joy is experiencing God’s love. If a Christian trusts God, then he is prepared to accept anything from Him, suffering or bliss, for he knows God is infinitely good. God loves us so much He moves heaven and earth to save us. He won’t betray us, not even for the best reasons, and He will certainly save us, if we so desire. Earth and boundless universe belong to God. No event, from smallest to greatest can occur without His knowledge, and He loves us infinitely.
Why would we prefer gloom of sin to light of His love? Word of God is sure testimony to the soul than all raptures a person can feel! I’d sooner walk in the dark with Jesus, than trust light of the brightest day that ever dawned and be without Him. Joy is not root of Grace in the soul; it is fruit and must not be put out of proper position. Precious as fruit is, do not put fruit where the root should be. “The fruit of the Spirit is joy” and grows when we’re rooted in Jesus. Joy comes not from what we have, but from what we are, children of God. Not from where we are, but from Whose we are, not from what we’ve done, but what Jesus has done. Precious joy blossoms and ripens even in winter. Jesus has defeated death!
Like Habakkuk we learn to rejoice in God, though there is violence in this world. We’re certain of pardon, not condemned. In Christ we’re secure He has given us eternal life! We’re happy, not for causes at which we can only guess. “How beautiful upon the mountains are feet of him that brings glad tidings. Let Jesus be exalted and we ask no more! Joy is not just invitation, but a command, ”Be glad in the Lord and rejoice. Rejoice in the Lord always.” Gloomy Christians who go about as if midnight had taken up its abode and everlasting frost had settled on our hearts are leaking. I know, God is teaching me this and Isabelle can’t do it in my own power.
Rejoicing will nerve you and strengthen you for life’s duties. “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” A man who goes about Christ’s work in an unwilling, miserable spirit will do it feebly. As soldiers marching into battle with half their courage if they tramped along in silence, beat the drums! Let the trumpet sound! Wake the reveille. Listen how sailors, when they pull the rope, will shout, sing and work all the better with cheery notes! Let our heart make music to God. Why should children of the King go mourning all their days?
SONG: SOUND THE TRUMPET
We have been hanging our harps on the willows--let us take them down. Joy is certainly best preparation for heaven. We are going where, if we learn to groan ever so deeply, our education will be lost, for melancholy words are unknown up there! First thing in Heaven will be, “Hallelujah!” And if we have been joyful on earth we shall say, “Ah, I am at home here!” I’m sure Christian usefulness is not helped by dreariness of spirit. “Come you children, hearken and I will teach you miseries of religion!” He wonders that dear children are not attracted to ways of godliness! Are they likely to be? When I was little, a SS teacher said angels follow you around and write down all the bad things you do. Bible tells me angels rejoice over one little sheep. God delights in joy and created us to be happy! I didn’t believe I deserved to be happy, but I do now.
Some of you spend Thanksgiving with your families. Possibly you have a large family, a grandchild or two. What joy to see happiness of our children and how they enjoy what you provide. They please you because they’re so pleased! It gives us joy to behold joy in those we love. Suppose children come marching in Christmas day in a gloomy state, cold and joyless. Suppose they don’t enjoy anything but grumbled? You would wish the day never came again!
A cleaning lady was a joyous Christian. “Ah! Nancy,” said a gloomy Christian who disliked her constant cheerfulness. “Ah! Nancy, it is all well enough to be happy now; but thoughts of your future should sober you. Only suppose you have a spell of sickness and be unable to work, or suppose your present employers move away, and no one else gives you work to do, or suppose” “Stop!” cried Nancy, “I never supposes. De Lord is my shepherd, and I knows I shall not want. And honey,” she added to her gloomy friend, “it’s all dem supposes is makin’ you miserable. You’d better give dem up, and trust de Lord.”
Our trials may be our chariots. We long for some victory over sin, and we ask God to grant it to us. But His answer comes in form of a trial which He means is the chariot to bear us to triumph. We either let it roll over us, crush us, or mount and ride onward. Joseph’s chariots which bore him to victory were trials of being sold into slavery, cast unjustly into prison. Our chariots may be nothing but irritating people or circumstances. If we’re impatient and long to be patient, our chariot will probably be a trying person. God does not order the wrong thing, but He uses it for our blessing, just has He used cruelty of Joseph’s wicked brothers and false accusations of Pharaoh’s wife.
This way of seeing our Father in everything makes life thanksgiving. “God’s will on earth is always joy.” If the will of God is our will, and if He always has His way, then it is our way too. “Thanks be to God, which always causes us to triumph in Christ!” Grimness is not Christian virtue. If God really is center, joy is His gift. If we have no joy, we missed the Good News, and our bodies and attitudes suffer. Glum, sour faces give impression that instead of coming from Father’s banquet, we came from the Sheriff. Matthew 6:16, Whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as hypocrites do. They put on sad sacks to make it obvious they’re fasting. They banish all pleasantry and cheer. Does this please the Lord who bought their salvation with His OWN life?
SONG: KEEP ON THE SUNNY SIDE