The Stairway To Happiness

God does not wait until chapter two before He tells us how we can receive a blessing. He starts off in chapter one, verse one.

The word translated, “Blessed,” is from the Hebrew word, “aishair” which simply means: “HAPPINESS.” Many people have different ideas on how to find happiness in this life.

Illus: Dr. Norman Vincent Peale has written a book called, “The Power of Positive Thinking.” In his books and teachings, he taught that to find happiness, all we need to do is think POSITIVE THOUGHTS.

This is a popular concept with many lost people, because to them, happiness does not depend on God but on their own POSITIVE THINKING! But remember, God’s Word says, in Prov. 14:12, “There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.”

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE FALSE WAYS THAT SEEM RIGHT UNTO A MAN TRYING TO FIND HAPPINESS?

(1) SOME FEEL IT IS WHAT YOU HAVE

If they can just buy one of these and one of those, they are satisfied they will be happy. We live in a world today where people are addicted to shopping.

Listen, we live in an age where people LOVE THINGS and they will do anything to get them!

Illus: I heard about a woman that had a unique way of shopping. She entered the butcher shop one day and confronted the butcher with the news that she was pregnant and she asked what he was going to do about it?

Very reluctantly, the butcher finally said he would provide her with free meat until the child was 16. She agreed.

The baby was born, and it was a boy. Later when the boy was old enough, she would send him down to the butcher shop and very reluctantly the butcher would supply her with free meat each week.

The years went by, and he marked off each year on the calendar, waiting for the day he would no longer have to provide free meat to the woman and the boy.

Finally the boy was 16, and he came in for his weekly supply of free meat. While he was there, he said, “I will be sixteen tomorrow.” The butcher smiled and said, “Yes, I know! Go home and tell your mom this is the last week of free meat and watch the expression on her face."

When the boy arrived home he told his mother. The woman nodded and said, "Son, go back to the butcher and tell him that for the last sixteen years, I have had: free bread, free gas for my car, free milk for my family, and free groceries and watch the expression on his face!"

There are people who believe that to find happiness in this life, they must HAVE AN ABUNDANCE OF THINGS IN THEIR LIFE! And they will do anything to get them! ANYTHING!

Listen, the American people are living proof that things do not bring happiness. We have more people today that have more than any society on this earth, but look at the misery among the youth and adults in this nation.

(2) SOME FEEL IT IS WHAT YOU DO NOT HAVE

This thinking was prevalent during the 60’s. Many young people were very confused about life. They became known as the anti-establishment generation. They were against everything that their parents had provided for them.

HOW DID THEY REACH THIS CONCLUSION ABOUT LIFE?

They had been raised in the era of PEACE and PROSPERITY of the 50’s. Many of their parents had been through the “great depression.” Those parents had gone through a time when they did not have even the essentials of life, and they were determined that their children would not have to struggle and do without, the way they had to. So, they bought things that they never had when they were growing up during the depression for their children.

These parents gave them beautiful homes to live in, nice clothes, and an abundance of food, and took them to “nice” churches.

Young people with nothing to do become restless. They rebelled against “The Establishment.” They would live in tents and sleep in old Volkswagens because they were convinced that you did not need things in your life to be happy.

Thank God, some of them have come to know the Lord, and found out that happiness does not depend on WHAT WE HAVE or DO NOT HAVE!

(3) SOME FEEL HAPPINESS CAN ONLY BE ACQUIRED WHEN RELIGION HAS BEEN ABOLISHED

Illus: Carl Marx said, “The first requirement for people’s happiness is the abolition of religion.”

There are people today that are trying to take God out of everything, because they are convinced we will never have happiness until RELIGION HAS BEEN BANNED FROM THIS COUNTRY.