For the second installment of “Always” Christians, we will be looking at 1 Thessalonians 5:16:
"Rejoice always."
If you missed the introduction click here
God calls Christians be people of joy. In fact, the word for "joy" or "rejoice" is found over 120 times in the New Testament (in it’s various forms).
As Leon Morris said, “Few things about the New Testament are more remarkable than this continual stress on joy.” There must be a reason why it is used so much—that little word must have great meaning and importance for the Christian life.
Christianity is in fact a joyful religion.
Jesus didn’t come to make us miserable; the gospel is good news, not bad.
The angel told the shepherds in Luke 2:10, “I bring you good news of a great joy which shall be for all the people.” In John 17:13, Jesus said, “...these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy made full in themselves.”
Christians have more to be joyful about than anyone else on the earth.
As William Barclay said, “True Christianity is an exhilarating and not a depressing thing.”
Paul said to rejoice “always”—in comfort as well as tribulation? How can one rejoice in sickness, and pain, and disappointments, and bereavement, and so forth?
Well, this doesn’t mean we are simply callous to difficulties and sorrows. “You’ve lost your job, your family, your home, and your health.” “Yeah, well, no skin off my back.” No, it’s not that—on more than one occasion we read about Jesus weeping.
It’s the fact that we have a deep inward joy, based on things that are eternal; they do not change and they cannot be taken away from us by the world.
Let’s look at this further:
1. You will notice that we are commanded to rejoice. We find passages like this and Phil. 4:4, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.” The second aspect of the “fruit of the Spirit” in Gal. 5 is “joy.”
Joy is commanded and thus, it’s not just an emotion that comes from earthly circumstances that change from hour to hour. It is an attitude (a mind set) more than a feeling.
2. “Joy” for those in the world, is usually only thought of as related to their immediate circumstances. It’s a beautiful day; my business is doing well; I just won the lottery. You can’t command the world to have joy because their joy is based on things that are subject to vicissitude (unstable and prone to change).
3. As it has been said, “Chasing happiness [from a worldly perspective] is like chasing rainbows—it’s always just beyond reach.”
4. A Christian’s joy is not connected to popularity, prosperity, power, possessions, or pleasure—or any other “P”s connected to the world.
5. If I am not a joyful person, it’s probably because I have tied my joy to earthly circumstances and Christ is not leading my life. Like I said, our joy is a deep inward joy, based on things that are eternal; they do not change and they cannot be taken away from us by the world.
..We will continue looking at how we can "Rejoice always" tomorrow..... |
