Reason for Joy

Have you ever noticed how glum and somber Christians can become? Sometimes we’re grim, and occasionally even grumpy. This tragedy is three-fold. First, we’ve got plenty of reason to be joyful. Second, God commands us to be joyful. Third, unjoyful Christians don’t attract non-Christians to Christ.

With this in mind, today I’m talking about how Christians can cultivate a lifestyle of real, deeply-grounded joy. The Apostle Paul was a great example of this type of life. Never was there a Christian with more trouble and responsibility. Yet, he exhibited a profound joy in everything. His letter to the Philippian Christians includes more references to joy than any other document in antiquity, and yet he wrote it from jail.

If ever there was a man with reason to be grumpy, it was Paul: five times he was whipped; three times he was beaten; he was shipwrecked; he was stoned and left for dead; he was imprisoned several times. And yet, he had joy. Where did he get it?

More to the point, where can you and I get joy?

The kind of joy Paul had is founded upon the undeserved miracle of salvation. Think with me about how God saves people.

Though God is the absolute King of the universe, and though He created us exclusively for His glory, we have attempted a coup. We have sought to supplant Him from His rightful Lordship, not only over our own lives, but over all the affairs of human existence. Though He draws us by His grace, we have rebuffed His love and stiff-armed His embrace. To these personal insults we have added our willful rejection of His good law, and have tried instead to make humanity the measure of all things. Paul summarized our willful rebellion against God with these words: “although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him” (Romans 1:21). Thus, having renounced both His love and His law, we turned so fully from God that we lost our ability even to seek Him.

And so . . . He sought us! It’s amazing, but it’s true. Though we deserved to die under aggravated condemnation, He sent His Son to die in our stead, to take upon Himself all the Father’s righteous wrath. By virtue of this unmitigated grace, and through His gracious gift of faith, God saves us from the just penalty of our sin and brings us into a state of peace and favor with Himself. Amazingly, by His own act of sacrifice, He sought His enemies, and having found them, made them His own children. Astounding!

And – here’s the reason for unrestrained joy! – we bring nothing to this transaction. No merit. No credit. No effort. Nothing. He saves us by His own initiative, simply because He wants to. We don’t earn it. We don’t deserve it. It is entirely a gift, motivated by the astonishing fact that He longs for us with an unchanging, unchangeable love.

That’s all the reason we need for joy. Indeed, it’s reason enough!