"JOY STEALERS"
Gal 4:8-18
* For 2009 I’ve ask us to make this the “Year of Joy” with joy being understood as the acrostic, “Jesus-Others-Yourself”. In calling us to this Christ-like attitude we heard scriptures verses like this; “The Joy of the Lord is my strength”, “Restore to me the Joy of my Salvation, “ “Fulfill my joy”, “Share Your Joy,” and even the “Fruit of the Spirit is Joy.” Truthfully, I cannot imagine a believer not wanting to be joyful.
* Yet it happens. Bona fide, Born-again Believers start their journey with the joy of the Lord oozing from them only for something to go “wrong” and they become joyless. You know what I’m talking about. Instead of overflowing with joy, they begin to exude characteristics which are unbecoming of a believer. It’s sad to say but the apostle Paul identified some of these characteristics. In Ephesians 4 he tells us that “Bitterness, anger, wrath, insult, slander, and rotten talk should not be a part of a believer’s life.” So what happens? How does it happen? It’s my belief that we there exists “joy-stealers”, whose primary task is simply to “extract the joy” from life.
* Joy should be our signature as Christians; it should be our badge of honor. Our joy should be the one thing which separates us from this world. Why should we be joyful? Because “Freedom Brings Joy!” Consider the joy of one being release from jail or the hospital. And yet not one of these is as free as the person who has been freed from sin’s shackles and chains.
* When I think about someone or something stealing our joy—I am drawn to Paul’s letter to Galatia. In Acts 13 & 14 we read of Paul and Barnabas in Antioch and southern Galatia. In spite of great opposition many believed in Jesus & churches were started as they walked in the fear of God. NOW, Paul writes them a letter because he has been given a report that they returned to the bondage of Judaism and had lost their joy. In Galatians 4, we can hear Paul’s heart about these folks. (READ) Verse 15 is our key as Paul literally asks “What has happened to your joy?” By law, thieves go to jail. Let’s expose the 3 Joy stealers & put them under lock & key.
1) PAST - (V 8-11) To read verse 8 is to understand that each of us have a past and that past has to potential to steal our joy.
a) Heartache of Sin-The recollection of being a slave to sin can cause you to lose your joy. Before we were saved we served god’s that did not really exist. And the enemy will use this.
Joy Stealers Pg 2
* Satan will deceive you into believing that God could never love or use someone with “that” in their past. When we begin to think that “I have sinned and there is no way God can use me” the enemy wins the battle, we lose our joy, and our life becomes ineffective.
* Jerome was well-known in the community for his past evil deeds, through witness of his brother Jerome was saved. His conversion was a shock to those who knew him. As he grew in the Lord, he received many invitations to speak. Once, as he was sitting on a pew waiting to speak, an usher handed him a paper with list of deeds from his past. He wanted to leave. However, when he went to the pulpit he said, " just a moment ago this paper to me with this list of horrendous sin which I have committed. These things are true. The implication is to question my right to stand up & speak for God. Here is my right. Eph 1:7 "In Him we have redemption through His Blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His Grace." In other words, God’s grace is sufficient.
* Being aware of our past is one thing, being bound by it is not necessary because of God’s Grace, power, and Love.
b) Hurts After Salvation –v9 – One of the great internal hurts a new believer can experience is the lose of joy by going back to that same old place, doing the same old things, and acting the same old way that I did before I met Christ. Turning back ranks up there as one of the most common problems of a new believer. For the Galatians, this was a “theological” issue as they mixed law & grace. They believed in God’s grace but were misled to believe that they needed to keep the law to be saved.
* Have you ever been Hurt and wanted to “QUIT”? Some in this room indeed have been hurt and thought about “giving in, giving up, and getting out.” Hurts take our joy and make us want to throw up our hands and call it “ball-game.”
* Here is your problem: God called YOU! Remember this, God didn’t call you to be like you are, that would be too line to the line of your past. He didn’t call you simply to go to heaven that is just a benefit. He called you to become Jesus and when you become like Jesus, for when you do, the hurts are minimized and the joy remains. Paul said it this way, “I am not all I need to be, not all I’m going to be, but I am taking hold and pressing on. I’ll forget the hurt of the past & reach toward HIS future. And the past will have no hold on you.
Joy Stealers Pg 3
2) PEERS- v17 We are show two basic groups.
a) The Unhappy-Ever noticed that you do your best to be joyful or happy and this bunch, who is unhappy, will try to make you like them. Truth; If you hang around unhappy people, they will ultimately steal your joy.
* Perspective – Paul’s came to churches in S. Gal and totally gave of Himself. He preached & shared through an ILLNESS (unsure of what it was, perhaps epilepsy, eyes, or malaria). The saw through HIS hurt & welcomed Him with joy. As a result, he brought them a freedom they had never known. Free from the bonds of the law.
* Then came the Judaizers pretending to love God, yet they had ulterior motives. They were (and are) a controlling bunch which exudes unhappiness. The bondage they felt stole their joy and, like us, they wanted others to be like them.
* The sad truth today is this; the world (even the church) is filled with unhappy folks. If they are believers their heartache from days past or their hurts since they met Christ has wrecked their joy. Since they are miserable they attempt to make others feel the same way.
b) The Uniformed - I’ll submit to you that this is one of the most dangerous groups in the church. That person of group of people who THINK they know what the Bible teaches and really has never given serious study to God’s word. They are generally well thought of (like those Judaizers in Southern Galatia) and attempt to speak with some authority.
* The uniformed will steal our joy by name subtly changing doctrine. Consider this; probably no clear thinking believer would consider that a person could have a personal walk with Christ and live in open sin. Why? Because the Bible teaches us that to walk with Christ is to abandon our known sin. Yet, ever so subtly the uninformed have changed the way many people think. This is why in 2009, there are churches who condone sin like homosexuality, fornication, gossip, and the like. True spiritual happiness is gone.
* Calvin Miller tells story about man who wanted to teach the sparrows how to sing. Tire of the chattering. So He bought a canary and hung it cage in the garden. Canary sang enthuse-astically for a while against the chatter of the sparrows. But somehow became discouraged and his determination failed. Soon the sparrows have taught the discouraged canary how to chatter. Canary had lost his song.
* It does matter who we run with. “Hard to soar with eagles…”
Joy Stealers Pg 4
3) PASSONS (17-18)
a) Have you ever heard this phrase? “Your passions will be your undoing.” If you’ll look at verse 17, you’ll discover a group of people who were passionate about the wrong thing. Let’s read. Who are the “theys” in this verse? They are the people who are excited about themselves and their brand of belief. They desire to be controlling, they manipulate, and even pervert the word of god.
b) One of problems today is that we are people of passion and are easily misled to have passion for other things than our God. Candidly as a pastor, I see minister that feel so beaten up that their joy has gone and the result is “no passion in ministry.” Can you imagine Paul, Peter, or Stephen with no passion? Truthfully, there would be NO religious freedom without the passion of the pilgrims and the founding fathers of our nation.
c) It would seem our country we has a generation of dispassionate believers because there is no joy in the Journey. The word of the day is “laid back,” or kind of a “Que Sera, Sera” attitude. The passion is seemingly gone. Why would that be?
d) Could it be that the joy is gone because we have become passionate about other things than Christ? Or have we allowed other people to steal this joy which God gives? Or have we not turned loose of those sins of our past?
CONCL: Are you joyful? Do you find joy in life? Or have you developed into a full-fledged “mulligrubber?” If so, who or what has stolen your joy? What is it that has you sidetracked from God?
* Remember this; King David was called a “man after God’s heart” AFTER his sin with Bathsheba. In his prayer of repentance, found in Psalms 51, he ask God to “be gracious, blot out my rebellion, wash me, cleanse me, create in me, renew in me, and restore to me the joy of my salvation.”
* Tonight I end with an acrostic which is a suggestion help you “IF” something or someone has stolen your joy. I will use the word “AIR” because just like we need air to breath, we need joy.
* A – dmit you’ve lost your joy.
* I –dentify the who or what which is responsible.
* R- epent and request that God restores your joy. Keep Psalms 51 close.
