Is Christianity about being 'happy'?

[MatthewG]

Hebrews12:14
rom.8:28-39
psalm1
psalm37
mt.5
lay out a path for a person ... A God ordained path spoken of in Isa.35.a highway of Holiness. Only those born from above are called to be saints on this highway.
Look at the Ot.prophecies...not for how it fits into your end times view, but look at the result of those Kingdom members.

Alright Iconoclast, thank you for taking time to bring forth those scriptures and sharing.

 

[Iconoclast]

Alright Iconoclast, thank you for taking time to bring forth those scriptures and sharing.

Enjoy the verses...meditate on the scriptures as God has given them as great gifts

 

[marks]

Pain no feels good my friend . HOPE IN GOD , HOPE IN CHRIST . The LORD is with us no matter what we suffer .
REJOICE IN THE GLORIOUS LORD MY FRIEND . And i say it again , REJOICE IN THE LORD .

As I have learned, suffering causes the child of God to draw nearer their Father. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. And in His presence is the fulness of joy.

Much love!

 

[Wynona]

What about other people who you do not agree with on the biblical text; you can always harp on them By the flesh. Say no no no you are wrong and as believers act like babes in Christ. Or you can be mature in the spirit of Christ to actually have a mature respectful discussion even if not seeing eye to eye on scripture; drop it and have love for each other.

There is much fighting done today; even now because of differences of opinion and that will never end of course because the world will being on forever even after you and me have died whoever is reading this.

You are the only person in your life that can be an example of Christ but also in the truthful realization that you are going to fail other people; but God will not.

You can honestly have a realization that nothing good comes from us human beings; and that is why the need for a saviour is needed; so that the all powerful God of the universe will work in our minds and hearts by the Son of God with in us or the spirit of Christ that is given that you; can by the spirit let the flow of love come from above that is pure into your own life and into others lives.

It is all up to you; and God is with you, even if people do not understand you, you feel alone in this world, or whatever the case may be.

Take care and seek God friend.

I really appreciate this post. In the midst of our arguing here, I hope we can still demonstrate the love of Christ.

I may disagree strongly with someone's opinion but at the end of the day, I still want to respect that person. Because God wants us to love one another and do good to even our enemies.

 

[amadeus]

@MatthewG
Thank you for this uplifting thread. We get so many which are scarcely readable.

Give God the glory!

 

[Ronald Nolette]

Oh, I most certainly do remember! I have plenty wrong, and including some strong mood disorders. I live in the contradiction. But that's not accurate, I live in the Spirit, and the Spirit has no disorders.

It's through working with these physiological disorders that I've been able to learn how to apply "put on" and "put off" discipleship.

Much love!

Well I have two years of Christian psych training, but this is above my pay grade.

 

[Ronald Nolette]

By trusting Jesus, I've known joy and peace and love and gratitude while enduring severe pain for days and weeks, fortunately not for sometime! The pain isn't always an easy thing to endure, but by trust in Jesus, it can be endured, and joyfully.

We can have both joy and distress at the same time. But I find my desire is to bring that distress into the joy, and trusting Jesus does that.

Much love!

I love how Paul worded it:

2 Corinthians 4:8-10
King James Version

8 We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;

9 Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;

10 Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

 

[Ronald Nolette]

You will never know happiness, then, if this is what you think. I can see why you said what you said about happiness. It caught my attention because most Christians have your pessimistic view about it, too.

I have known great happiness in my life as well as great joy! I havew also known deep sorrow and depression (the emotions opposite happiness) but those negative emlotions did not diminish my joy unless I let them. The can take happiness away, but not joy!

I am not pessimistic about happiness- that is a false assumption on you rpart. I merely said that if given a choice, I prefer joy over happiness.

 

[Ronald Nolette]

@Ronald Nolette ↑↑↑

And I never said happiness was a bad thing! but I can be content with my life and be un happy or happy! I want to be happy, but I want more to have the Lords Joy!

 

[marks]

I love how Paul worded it:

2 Corinthians 4:8-10
King James Version

8 We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair;

9 Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed;

10 Always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our body.

Something interesting to me about this passage. Paul is naming our circumstances, and our non-response. Troubled / not distressed. Persecuted / not forsaken. Cast down / not destroyed.

But then there is "perplexed", and the rest of it's couplet, not in despair. The "state of mind" is in the same group as what others are doing to us.

Mind of the flesh?

Much love!

 

[marks]

Well I have two years of Christian psych training, but this is above my pay grade.

We can talk about it if you want.

Much love!

 

[Ronald Nolette]

Something interesting to me about this passage. Paul is naming our circumstances, and our non-response. Troubled / not distressed. Persecuted / not forsaken. Cast down / not destroyed.

But then there is "perplexed", and the rest of it's couplet, not in despair. The "state of mind" is in the same group as what others are doing to us.

Mind of the flesh?

Much love!

Most assuredly it is the flesh, when we are in the Spirit we can only know Joy! Our emotions (soul-psuche) may not be in sync with our spirit (spirit- pneuma) which is why we can be joyful though not happy. we have as a culture equated joy with happiness but the Bible makes a distinction. Happiness emanates from our soul while joy emanates from our spirit!

 

[marks]

Well I have two years of Christian psych training, but this is above my pay grade.

I always try to find more succinct ways to tell this . . .

I've learned about and seen in myself the connection between my chemical depression and my thoughts, emotions, and behavior. I've learned about how foods and metabolism can have profound effects on mood.

A simple example is yeast in the digestive track. Overpopulation of yeast reduces probiotic populations, resulting in poor digestion and it's effects. Yeast excrete chemicals which in sufficient quantity cause anxiety, depression, sleep disorders, and the list goes on. The gut has so many neurons it's considered like a second brain. Chemisty affects it profoundly.

And this has effect on how we think and feel and act.

I had to learn about this as part of learning to deal with my anxiety disorder. There was a period of time, well, I noticed that every day, around 5 pm or so, my anxiety would start to increase, then the next morning I was normal. To shorten an even longer story, I finally figured out this was the diurnal cycle of the yeast bacteria, becoming active in the PM. And when I treated the yeast, the anxiety become the random thing it had been instead of daily at 5 pm.

Anxiety is just another word for fear. It's the "feeling of fear", without something to incite fear. But before I learned to associate that feeling entirely with the body, I'd become afraid, literally, in whatever I'd think about. I'd fear over something with my job, then deal with that. Next moment the fear is something with my car, or a tooth, or a tax, or a relative, or whatever.

At the end of the day, I learned how corruptions to my body, the body of flesh, resulted in inaccurate thinking, inappropriate emotions, leading to inappropriate behavior. And as I deal with complusions and obsessions imprinted, literally hard wired into my brain from a traumatic childhood, I see the same thing. Corruptions of the flesh, ie maldevelopment of the brain, results in wrong thinking, and the rest.

So the inner drive to do something wrong, I realize that's my body, my mess of a body, with it's corruptions, pushing to sin. Just like I've learned to ignore my depression when I find it intruding into my mind, I've learned to ignore the "feeling of fear", knowing it doesn't describe me. I'm trusting Jesus. My body is feeling afraid. But I'm trusting Jesus.

My body insists it MUST have _______ RIGHT NOW, and that I have every right! It want's what it wants, that's my corrupt flesh! It's not me. I want what God wants.

Am I making sense? I always feel so disjointed trying to talk about this.

Much love!

 

[Ferris Bueller]

I havew also known deep sorrow and depression (the emotions opposite happiness) but those negative emlotions did not diminish my joy unless I let them. The can take happiness away, but not joy!

I can see how a person can be happy and not have joy because happiness is not an emotion (but can cause an emotional response). What I can't accept is your assertion that a person can have joy and not be happy. Surely joy is a source of happiness! You can't be joyful and not be happy at the same time, lol.

This rubs me the wrong way because far too many Christians I've talked to over the years are afraid to be happy, like that's a sin or something. And because they are unacquainted with, and even afraid of, the overflow of the Spirit in their lives. And so they say they are joyful instead, inside, as if that's the acceptable and spiritual way to be instead of happy. I just think saying, "God wants you to be holy, not happy" is a complete lie. It's used to rationalize the fact that one is not experiencing the Holy Spirit. It's a lie that robs Christians of the abundant life Christ said he died to give his people.

Christianity would be so different if Christians were actually happy and experiencing the 'zoe' life Jesus came to the world to give us!

 

[farouk]

Amen, farouk! It makes life worthwhile and purposeful. We have a destiny!
Job 23:10-11
10 But He knows the way that I take;
When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.
11 My foot has held fast to His steps;
I have kept His way and not turned aside.

-jb

@jessiblue Great verses there! Job is so searching but also so heartening!

 

[Ronald Nolette]

I can see how a person can be happy and not have joy because happiness is not an emotion (but can cause an emotional response). What I can't accept is your assertion that a person can have joy and not be happy. Surely joy is a source of happiness! You can't be joyful and not be happy at the same time, lol.

This rubs me the wrong way because far too many Christians I've talked to over the years are afraid to be happy, like that's a sin or something. And because they are unacquainted with, and even afraid of, the overflow of the Spirit in their lives. And so they say they are joyful instead, inside, as if that's the acceptable and spiritual way to be instead of happy. I just think saying, "God wants you to be holy, not happy" is a complete lie. It's used to rationalize the fact that one is not experiencing the Holy Spirit. It's a lie that robs Christians of the abundant life Christ said he died to give his people.

Christianity would be so different if Christians were actually happy and experiencing the 'zoe' life Jesus came to the world to give us!

You have it the opposite. Happiness is an emotion and joy is a result of walking rightly with god. Jesus never promised happiness, but He did promise Joy!

Well I can be joyful and sorrowful.. I can be joyful though suffering terribly iunn pain (that is nothappy) If you can't see it, you will in time and more study in the word.