Urban Legend: God Wants You To Be Happy Series

Urban Legend

God Wants me to be Happy

God wants me to be Holy more than He wants me to be Happy

How to live a holy and blessed life for the long term

Worship the Lord

Know the word

Obey the word

Avoid the Disobedient

Make the best of the bad

Slide

Last week we started a new series called Urban Legends.

We saw some pictures of big foot and a video of a cell phone popping popcorn. Well, I have discovered that this is not only with American phones but phones across the world as well.

Check this out.

Video

Slide after Video

I promise, as a service to our congregation, we at Hickory Creek will continue to investigate this to make sure our people safe from the cooking effects of cell phones on our brains.

Imagine if it takes a microwave on full power a whole minute before popcorn will start to pop, what is happening to your brain if it only takes a couple of rings on a cell phone to emit enough energy to pop some popcorn. But have no fears, we will keep you informed if this is as true as it appears to be or if it is an urban legend.

Last week recap

Now last week we saw that urban legends don’t just happen in the secular world, but there are Spiritual Urban Legends.

We talked about the Spiritual urban legend that says

God won’t give you more than you can handle.

That is an urban legend because while we won’t face temptation beyond what we can handle, God does give us more than we can handle to help us learn to

Carry each others burdens

Rely on God’s strength and to

Prioritize our best choices.

Transition

Well, this morning, we are going to look at another urban legend that says

God wants You to be happy.

Slide

What, the statement that God wants me to be happy is an Urban Legend?

How can that be? Does God want me unhappy?

No.

God’s desire is Not for you to be unhappy.

Well if that is the case, how is the statement that “God wants you to be happy” an Urban Legend?

Well, first we need to understand, that when this statement is said, it does usually not stand alone. Most of the time it is preceded by another statement that goes something like this.

I am just not happy being married to my wife anymore, so I am going to get a divorce because God wants me to be happy.

I am so happy being in a relationship with my boyfriend, but if we don’t go further than I want, he won’t like me anymore and will break up with me, so I am going to give in to his advances because God wants me to be happy.

The statement that God wants you happy is usually said with the meaning that God wants me happy above all else.

Now parents can relate to this.

We want our kids to be happy. But often things that will make them happy in the moment are not things that are good for them.

“I want candy for dinner…don’t you want me to be happy?”

“I don’t want to go to school…school does not make me happy…don’t you want me to be happy?”

And the reality is, whether we are adults or kids, I believe the thing that we think will make us happy, often will actually make us happy…for a time.

Skipping school will make us happy that day, but not for the long haul.

Getting a divorce may bring happiness…for the short term.

If you give in to a boyfriend’s advances, you might experience pleasure…for a moment.

But, I will argue that anything that makes us happy that goes against what God would have us do, will certainly not make us happy forever. In fact, not only will it not make us happy forever, it will eventually bring disappointment and hardship.

Now Jesus did say in

John 10:10 - I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

So the question is what is the full life that Christ wants us to have if it is not being happy?

I would argue that the full life is a blessed life.

How is a blessed life different from a happy life?

Slide

Well,

A Happy life is dependent Circumstances

When our circumstances are good, we are happy.

When our circumstances are bad, we are not happy.

The blessed life is not about circumstances.

A Blessed life is Dependent on relationship.

Relationship with the Lord.

Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him – Psalm 34:8

Blessed is the man who trusts in you (Lord Almighty) – Psalm 84:12