2 Timothy 4:1-8
Don’t Worry be Happy!
If it were only that easy. The Constitution tells us that the inalienable rights we have received from God include life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Happiness is a difficult thing to nail down. What is it that makes you happy?
A degree, A special job or position, married, divorced, remarried. If I could just make a certain amount of money, loose weight, move to another city, buy a certain house, get a special car.
We all have these hopes and goals in life, but sometimes these things become more than goals and hopes they become the total focus of our lives. And it becomes even more of a problem when we make them the goal of our pursuit of God.
I came back to the Lord during the heyday of the so-called name-it-claim it gospel. One of the things we learned was that God wanted us to prosper. Prosperity was one of the blessings of serving God. It sounded so good.
On the positive side, it opened up a whole new positive slant to the message of the gospel. The Bible wasn’t just about sin, heaven and hell, it was about abundant life, prosperity and expecting good things.
On the negative side it tended to baptize greed, selfish ambition and covetousness.
Along with those notions came the idea that happiness was what God really wanted for us. God wanted us to be happy. Today you can see shelves of books dedicated to being happy, and many of them claim that is God’s main priority for you. But that becomes a very slippery slope. If God wants me to be happy, then I need to find out what makes me happy and do that. God will actually help those things come to pass. If I am not happy, then it must be God’s fault. Before long my happiness becomes god and God becomes my servant, because his job is to make me happy.
Let me be clear God does want good things for us. As a matter of fact, the Bible says:
[Mt 7:11 ESV ] If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
[Jas 1:17 ESV ] Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.
God also reminds us that our worship of happiness can seriously distort our view of God and Life. Let’s look at this passage of scripture.
[2 Ti 4:1-5 ESV ] I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.
In our Western culture we have accumulated teachers who will tell us what we want to hear rather than what we need to hear. Our happiness is not God’s number one concern, at least in the way we mean happiness.
There are at least two instances when God doesn’t want you happy:
1. When it causes you to sin
[1 Pe 1:14-16 ESV ] As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”
- Happiness is never the bottom line with God. The bottom line is always becoming like he is.
- We were created in the image of God, God knows us and knows what will make us happy. Our real happiness comes when we live the way he created us to live.
- The problem is that we live in a messed up world where we are taught to be self-centered to the core.
- Our self-centeredness teaches us that the very best state of affairs is when I am happy, in that scenario I become the focus of everything. If it pleases me its is ok, then that’s all that matters.
- That is called narcissism, falling in love with yourself.
- Jesus taught us just the opposite.
- What happens when your happiness conflicts with the happiness of someone else’s?
When your pursuit of happiness conflicts with God’s desires, choose God’s ways.2. God doesn’t want you happy when it is based on circumstances
[Ec 7:14 TNIV ] When times are good, be happy; but when times are bad, consider: God has made the one as well as the other. Therefore, you cannot discover anything about your future.
Hey, stuff happens. We have good days and bad days. When things are going great we are all excited and happy, but when things are falling apart we sink in despair.
People spend their entire lives, every waking moment looking for what will make them happy. In our pursuit of happiness, in the most blessed country on planet earth, many people are discontent and miserable.
God doesn’t want you happy when it is based on happenings. There’s a deeper gift that God gives us, and that’s a gift of joy and contentment that we can find in the life of the apostle Paul.
Let’s look at a verse that we are familiar with:
But before we read it, I want to remind you of the context in which this verse was written.
The apostle Paul was writing this from within a prison. He was locked up to another Roman soldier, and don’t forget this, he was waiting a decision that would decide whether he would be executed or whether he would live. So in other words, life wasn’t great for him at that moment.
[Php 4:11b-13 ESV ] … I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
He says: “I’ve been on both sides of it.” “I have learned the,” secret of being content.
He said, “I can do all things through Christ gives me strength.” Now, listen to what Paul is saying. “I’ve had it all, and I’ve lost it all. I’ve been healthy; I’ve been hurting. I’ve been blessed, and I’ve been cursed, but I have a secret that most people miss. I have a joy and a divine contentedness that is not based on my circumstances. It is based on something internal that no one can see, and that is that I can do everything. I can make it through this. I can make it while being locked up in prison. I can make it if they kill me.” How? “I can do it all through Christ who strengthens me. There is something internal that sustains me.
God wants you more than happy. He wants you to have a joy on the inside no matter what is going on outside.
God wants you to be blessed
Far from a happy life God wants you to lived a blessed life. Blessing is the distinctive joy which comes through participation in the divine kingdom [Little Kittle p. 548].
We tend to equate blessing with good things, but blessings could come through things that are not good. Take a look at Matthew 5
- The poor in spirit
- Those who mourn
- The meek.
- Those who hunger and thirst for righteousness.
- The pure in heart.
- Peacemakers
- The Persecuted
Why are they blessed because in spite of the external circumstances, they are participants in the Kingdom, and have a joy that it is beyond measure.
Instead of getting the higher paying job, you may be blessed by losing your job. Why?
- So you can learn to trust in Him like you never have before.
- So that you can finally pay attention to your kids that you have been neglecting when you were supposed to be doing something for them You were building a career, not a family
- So that your marriage that has been struggling because you have neglected it can flourish, because now, you’ve got to pay attention to it.
God could bless you with healthy kids, or you could be blessed with a child with incredibly special needs … and you may experience the love of God through that child in ways that you never, ever thought of before.
And, God could bless you with conflict-free living for quite some time, or God could bless you with conflict, and trouble, and persecution, and those who hate you because you love Him. And you are still blessed.
As much as I would like to tell you, “Come to God and everything will to be o-kay,” if I did that, I would be lying to you, because sometimes, that is just not true.
But, what I will tell you is this.
[Ps 37:4 ESV ] Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.
The Hebrew word for delight here means to be made soft or pliable. It means to delight or enjoy. Here’s what we do not do. We do not go to God for Him to serve our desires to make us happy. We go to Him as His servant, and as we enjoy Him, as we delight in Him, He gives us His desires. And as His desires become our desires, then He loves to give us and fulfill the desires of our heart.
How do we get there?
[Mt 6:33 ESV ] But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
Seek first the kingdom of God; not happiness, not the things that we want, but seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and then all these things will be added unto you.
And so, I’ve got good news for you. The good news is, God doesn’t always want you happy. He’s always got something much, much better for you than that. He wants you to be blessed.
Some of you are seeking happiness in ways you know are not right. You know what you are doing is wrong, but you continue in it, because it makes you feel good, or avoid difficult consequences. Your happiness has become a God.
Some of you are right now are miserable, because you have yet to find your joy in the kingdom. Instead of becoming soft and pliable in the hand of God, you are kicking and screaming like a two year old in Wal-mart! Understand that circumstances come and go, become soft and pliable, open yourself to what you can learn in your present circumstances and let God give you the desires of your heart.
We all go through tough times, we all want the tough times to end. We need to have the attitude, “I will be better for having gone through this.”