He wants them to wipe off their grim looks, put smiles on their faces, and let laughter flow from their lips.
As we learned in the previous sermon:
• The world can give us happiness because happiness comes from WITHOUT.
• Only God can give us JOY because joy comes from WITHIN.
When the lost world attends the house of God, they should be able to see something that the world cannot provide.
Illus: William Treadwell said, “If we can convince people that we are onto something that's full of joy, they'll stampede one another to follow us.” (William Treadwell, Leadership, Vol. 1, no. 3.)
WHY DON’T CHRISTIANS REFLECT THE JOY OF THE LORD? Some Christians are convinced that God never intended for the church to be full of joy.
No church will ever be effective in reaching the lost until they have the JOY OF THEIR SALVATION.
Illus: C.H. Spurgeon said to a young group of preachers, “There are more flies caught with honey than with vinegar, and there will be more souls led to heaven by a man who wears heaven in his face than by one who bears death in his looks."
Illus: A Princeton Seminary professor made a study of great preachers across the past centuries that have made a difference. He asked the question, "What do these outstanding pulpiteers all have in common besides their faith?"
After several years of searching he found the answer. IT WAS THEIR CHEERFULNESS.
Listen, the joy I am talking about is not generated by …
• Coming together and giving each other the high-five
• Cutting cartwheels down the aisles
IT IS SIMPLY AN INNER JOY that comes from within and is reflected in the faces of God’s People, whether they are in church or out of church.
Illus: A Hindu trader in India once asked a missionary, "What do you put on your face to make it shine?"
With surprise, the man of God answered, "I don't put anything on it!”
His questioner began to lose patience and said emphatically, "Yes, you do! All of you who believe in Jesus seem to have it. I've seen it in the towns of Agra and Surat, and even in the city of Bombay."
Suddenly the Christian understood, and his face glowed even more as he said; "Now I know what you mean, and I will tell you the secret. It's not something we put on from the outside but something that comes from within. It's the reflection of the light of God in our hearts.”
This morning we looked at some JOY BUSTERS that Satan has used to rob us of that joy, but also let’s look at-
II. SOME JOY BUILDERS
Illus: A Christian was praying aloud at the altar and he was praying, “God when I got saved I had such wonderful joy, restore unto me the joy of the Lord.”
Another man heard him praying this prayer and he prayed, “God don’t answer that prayer, because he will just let it leak out again!”
Many Christians seem to have a hole in their bucket of joy -- it keeps leaking out! God wants to build lasting joy into our lives so that we don’t have any leaks in our salvation.
God’s Word gives us ways to experience this JOY FROM WITHIN. How? We need to-
A. RECOGNIZE GOD AS JOYFUL
Many have unscriptural views of God. That is, they think of God as sitting on His throne with a frown on his face and ready to destroy anyone that crosses Him.
Illus: That reminds me of a man who says that one particular event cured him of being obnoxious in a restaurant. He had ordered a steak well done. When they brought it to him and he cut into it, it was rare. It was still bleeding.
So he waved at the waitress and said, “Come here, come here.” She came and he said, “This steak is too rare.” So she took it to be cooked some more.
When she brought it back, he cut into it again, but they had overcooked it. Again he waved for the waitress, “Come here. Look, it’s almost burned to a crisp.” So she took the steak, and brought him another one!
He started cutting it, and then waving once again for the waitress, he complained, “It’s too tough. I can’t eat it. Take it back.” So she took it back and brought him yet another one.
With the waitress standing there, he cut into that steak and it was just right. She walked away.
Then he cut into his baked potato, and it had a black spot in it. Turning to the waitress, he said, “Look at this potato. It’s a bad potato.”
Then she picked the potato up (Spanking it as she said) “Bad potato! Bad potato!” and placed it back on his plate and said “If you have any more trouble with that potato, just let me know,” and she walked off. He said that was the last time he ever complained in a restaurant.
Some folks are hard to please and they always have a frown on their face. Many think God is like that. They think He always has a frown on His face and He never smiles.
Listen I have never seen God and neither have you. So how do we know what God is like? We can only get a true description of God as we turn to the Word of God, and His Word tells us about Him.
Look at Zephaniah 3:17, we read, “The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with JOY; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing.”
This scripture tells us that God delights in us and breaks out into song when He thinks about us! That’s hard to believe, isn’t it?
Psalm 104:31 says, “The glory of the LORD shall endure for ever: the LORD shall REJOICE in his works.”
Isaiah 65:18-19, “But be ye glad and rejoice for ever in that which I create: for, behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy. And I will rejoice in Jerusalem, and JOY IN MY PEOPLE…”
God is a God of Joy!
Illus: Garrison Keillor said, “Some people think its difficult to be a Christian and to laugh, but I think its the other way around. God writes a lot of comedy, it's just that he has so many bad actors.” (Garrison Keillor, presentation at Goshen College, quoted in Reflections, Christianity Today.)
Listen, do not tell me God sits around and frowns all the time. God has a sense of humor.
• When God gave these children all this energy and we old timers don’t have much energy to take care of them, do not tell me God does not have a sense of humor.
• When God made the giraffe with that long neck, do not tell me He does not have a sense of humor.
• When God painted all those funny looking stripes on a Zebra, do not tell me God does not have a sense of humor.
• When God made a bullfrog, do not tell me God does not have a sense of humor.
If we have little or no joy in our lives, it could very well be because we don’t know the God of the Bible well enough, because joy is one of His character qualities.
As we view God this way, we will discover that He takes great pleasure in us.
• He is the Good Gardener who toils over us with constant care.
• He waits patiently for His fruit to ripen, and with great joy He longs to gather in the harvest.
• His Holy Spirit, who lives within us, can transmit His joy directly to us.
One of the Joy builders in life is to RECOGNIZE THAT GOD IS A GOD OF JOY. Also, another joy builder is:
A. REAFFIRM YOUR COMMITMENT TO OTHERS
Illus: You may have heard the acrostic for JOY:
• J - Jesus First
• O - Others Second
• Y- You Last
When a person lives a life like that, they are going to begin to bear the fruit of the spirit. There will be JOY in their life.
• The first joy builder is vertical, and has to do with how we view God.
• The second joy builder is horizontal, and has to do with how we view each other.
Many folks could have more joy in their lives if they could learn to treat others the way the Bible teaches we should treat others.
Ephesians 4:32 teaches; “And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.”
Notice, this verse of scripture says we are to treat each other with kindness. Kindness is always something that stands out.
Illus: In the “Christian Reader,” a woman said, “Our daughter, who worked in Chicago before she was married, told us how one day she got off the commuter train to go to her job when a scruffy-looking panhandler stopped her, asking for a quarter. Never one to cast judgment or ignore a need, she faced a dilemma. Looking straight in the man's eyes, she said, ‘I'm sorry but I don't have a quarter. I don't have any money to take the bus to work today.’”
“She was quite touched, when the man, without saying a word, reached into his pocket and gave her a quarter.” (Doris Hier, Christian Reader, Vol. 33, no. 5.)
There are so many ways we can be kind.
Illus: In 1994, Thurman Thomas, head bowed, with his hands covering his face, sat on the Buffalo bench following his team's fourth straight Super Bowl loss. His three fumbles had helped seal the awful fate of his Buffalo Bills. Suddenly, standing before him was the Dallas Cowboys' star running back, Emmitt Smith. Just named MVP for Super Bowl XXVIII, Smith was carrying his small daughter. Smith looked down at her and said, "I want you to meet the greatest running back in the NFL, Mr. Thurman Thomas." (Allen Mann, Remington, Virginia. Leadership, Vol. 15, no. 4.)
Illus: It was his first day on the job. He was a new clerk in the green goods department of a super market. A lady came up to him and said she wanted to buy half of a head of lettuce. He tried to dissuade her from that goal, but she persisted.
• Finally he said, "I'll have to go back and talk to the manager."
• He went to the rear of the store to talk to the manager, not noticing that the woman was walking right behind him. When he got into the back of the store, he said to the manager, "There's some stupid old bag out there that wants to buy half a head of lettuce. What should I tell her?"
• Seeing the horrified look on the face of the manager, he turned about and, seeing the woman, added, "And this nice lady wants to buy the other half of the head of lettuce. Will it be all right?"
• Considerably relieved, the manager said, "That would be fine."
• Later in the day, he congratulated the boy on his quick thinking. He then asked, "Where are you from, son?"
• The boy said, "I'm from Toronto, Canada, the home of beautiful hockey players and ugly women."
• The manager looked at him and said, "My wife is from Toronto."
• The boy said, "Oh, what team did she play for?"
(Bruce Thielemann, "Because," Preaching Today, Tape No. 105. )
If we are going to have JOY in our life, we are going to have to learn how say nice things to others.
Notice the Bible said, “And be ye…tenderhearted.”
The opposite of being tenderhearted is to be HARD HEARTED.
Illus: Have you ever had tough calluses on your hands? Those calluses become so hard that you could take a pin and stick it into the skin of those calluses and you would not feel a thing.
There are people like this. They have such a HARD HEART they can’t feel a thing for others.
• They will do things to people and cause them much misery.
• They will say things about people that will destroy their character.
They simply do not care how much they hurt others.
But listen, a person like this can’t experience JOY in their own life until they learn to care about others.
Also we are told, “…be ye…forgiving one another.”
People are going to do you wrong, and if you do not learn how to forgive, you will soon live in a world of few people that you speak to or have anything to do with.
If we’re serious about drinking deeply out of the rivers of joy, we must learn how to be KIND, TENDERHEARTED AND FORGIVING to others.
We can’t do it alone. Romans 12:15 challenges us to, “Rejoice with those who rejoice…”
Happiness only comes when good times come, but joy can come even in the bad times.
Illus: This reminds me of what Matthew Henry, a Bible scholar from the 1700’s, wrote in his diary after some thieves robbed him and took his wallet: “Let me be thankful:
• First, because I was never robbed before.
• Second, because, although they took my wallet, they did not take my life.
• Third, because, although they took my all, it was not much.
• Fourth, because, it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed.”
God wants to give us JOY during all times of our life.
Conclusion:
• Guard yourself against those joy busters that crash into your life like a tidal wave.
• Identify one joy builder that you need to work on and attack it viciously.
Illus: "Granny" Parker was in her mid 70’s. She had trouble with her rooster! She was a godly woman who could "pray heaven down."
Like anyone, Granny has had her share of sorrows and pain. She had a rooster that she described by saying, “He was as mean as Satan himself.”
She said, “That bird had decided that I didn’t belong in the yard with all "his" hens.
Whenever she ventured too close to the hen house, he’d come flying at her with spurs thrashing and slashing. He got her a few times.
Sometimes she went to church with her legs bleeding from this rooster attacking her. When folks asked her what happened, she would say, "Blame rooster done it again!"
But granny was getting tired of that rooster. One day she ventured out the back door toward the hen house, calling, "Here chick-chick. Here, chick."
The hens knew what that meant, and they all came on the dead run for chow. That old rooster came too. He was bent on protecting his territory, but he made a slight miscalculation.
You see, over seventy years of handling problems, weather, crop failures, depression and stubborn barnyard animals, made Granny a formidable foe with a hoe. She watched out of the corner of her eye as that rooster came squawking and flapping his wings she was ready for him. At the last second, Granny "Make-My-Day" Parker sidestepped the leaping rooster and swung the hoe, and next Sunday he was Sunday dinner.
We all have our roosters. We all have those irritating circumstances of life that rob us of the joy of the Lord. We have seen that there are . . .
#2a
I. SOME JOY BUSTERS
#2b
II. SOME JOY BUILDERS
